Theological Problem of our Time

Tonight at Disciples History and Thought class, Dr. Clark W. Gilpin asked us to think of the "theological problem of our time." Although there could be many good arguments about a number of "problems" (maybe, even, the problem of using the word "problem" so much), I thought that our world seems to be in a peculiar position: dealing with difference.

As our world has grown in connectivity due to our globalizing social tendencies, our encounters with people of difference has simultaneously increased. We come across people of different faiths, traditions, cultures, political views, sexual orientations, interests ,etc. The intersection of these differences is not leading to healthy appreciation of each other, but seems, at least to me, to lead too often to resistence. And this resistence can lead to conflict and violence, especially when difference is either ignored or demonized. We haven't done the best job getting to know each other, coming to appreciate diverse perspectives, or learning from each other.

As a Disciple of Christ, I have a rich heritage filled with concerns for unity. This has been a rallying cry for many congregations and ecumenical efforts. I think we can live into our spirit of "unity" by theologically addressing a central problem of our time: difference. Most importantly, I find it particularly pressing to consider unity-in-difference, similarity but not sameness. We need to find theological grounding to live, breath, and act amidst a plurality of people--to reside peacefully beside our sisters and brothers; and not just those who call themselves "christians" or "Americans" or "liberal."

I believe there is ample theological space for considering unity-in-difference, but, alas, I shall not work that out here and now. All I will say is that I affirm the importance of: openness toward difference, looking for similarity, and celebrating our togetherness--a togetherness we need if we plan to live a better tomorrow.

Christ in Conversation

We live in a shrinking world. Diverse ideas and thoughts are colliding in public space; in work, school, and politics. William Schweiker notes that “Currently, diverse peoples and cultures, diverse 'worlds,' are merging into an interdependent global reality.”1 In this context, there are many reasons to be hopeful for our futures and shared space. Yet the reality of our increasingly interactive present can also draw our attention to the difficult task of navigating this shared space, a space where differences can erupt into conflict, and where conflict can devolve into violence. Situated within the complex web of intersecting traditions, cultures, and peoples is the minister, a localized Christian leader with a special relationship to a community of faith.

Yet the minister, wherever she may be, is faced with the daunting task of responding to the myriad concerns of a shrinking world. How might a minister respond? What resources does she have to articulate her concerns and speak to her community? How can she find ways to communicate responsibly beyond her community to a world that is compressing? These questions demand reflection and consideration. While addressing each one is beyond the scope of this inquiry, I will take up a general question in ministry: How might I, as a minister, think about speaking out? I intend to suggest that speaking as a minister, generally, to whatever audience, is not about communicating theological ideas, but about communicating theologically. For the way in which we communicate says as much about our theology as what we are communicating.2

Thus, I will examine one particular resource a minister might consider in communicating theologically. I want to suggest that the classical theological symbol of Christ is a particularly insightful way for considering how we might respond as ministers to a shrinking world. In speaking about ethical thought, William Schweiker writes that “there is a profound symbolic and conceptual poverty in much current thought.”3 While I agree that much thinking could be bettered with symbolic discourse, I firmly believe that faith communities have an abundance of symbolic resources. My fear is that we might neglect the fullness of these resources if they only supply content to our speech—and this would be, in a way, a kind of poverty. Our symbols and theological resources can also shape the very way in which we speak.

In considering how the theological symbol of Christ might affect how we speak, I will explore the notion of symbol expounded by Paul Tillich, the Christological trajectory of Douglas John Hall, and briefly touch on the model of conversation described by David Tracy. These thinkers will aid in constructing a way of thinking about communication informed by the Christian tradition, yet fully capable of engaging the larger community of traditions, cultures, and religions which are closing in on each other in the ever shrinking world.

For Christians, as the name suggests, the idea of “the Christ” is an important concept. The sacred texts of this tradition—specifically the New Testament—focus on the figure of Jesus as Christ, and create a wealth of images and thoughts for understanding our human situations in the world. These understandings come in direct contact with the concrete person of Jesus as Christ developed textually and theologically throughout the Christian tradition. But today, in our language of faith, what does it mean to talk about Christ? What does it mean to talk about anything “religious”? What are we doing differently when we speak in our language of faith about anything? What does it mean to talk about Jesus as Christ? I believe Paul Tillich has a valuable insight into the power and distinctiveness regarding the language of faith.

In his Dynamics of Faith, Paul Tillich writes “Faith is the state of being ultimately concerned.”4 For him, to be human is to concern oneself, in some way, ultimately. As a formal definition, then, faith is all encompassing of everyone who is human. But, for Tillich, the content of faith is contingent upon the symbolic expressions of concrete faith traditions which change over time and vary from place to place. Regardless of this contingency, he goes on to say that “symbolic language alone is able to express the ultimate.”5 Why, we might ask, is this the case?

Tillich explicates the notion of symbols by describing six characteristics. First, he notes that symbols, like “signs”—which is a term often used synonymously for symbols, but which needs to be distinguished—point beyond themselves to something else. However, unlike signs, symbols participate in the reality to which they are pointing. Because of this, symbols have the power to open up levels of reality which are otherwise closed off to us. In addition, symbols open up “hidden depths of our own being”6 which are correlated to dimensions of reality. His final two characteristics are that symbols must come to life in the collective unconscious, and, as a result, that they can grow and die.

Symbols are necessary because concrete, finite reality cannot express that which is infinite: “the true ultimate transcends the realm of finite reality infinitely.”7 Although symbols themselves must not be elevated to the level of the infinite—thus confusing their relation to the infinite with the infinite itself—they have a unique way of communicating, one that has a power “which surpasses in quality and strength the power of any non-symbolic language.”8 Thus, the notion of Christ as symbol is very important. It is a way of speaking about the infinite within the language of Christian faith which can open up levels of reality otherwise unknown to us. What are these levels of reality? What might the symbol of Christ unlock for us as we consider what it means to communicate, as Christian ministers, to our communities and the wider, yet still shrinking, world?

While the notion of Christ is filled with layers of rich meaning and can be expounded upon in many different ways, I want to focus on the Christological trajectory described by Douglas John Hall. Although he considers in more detail a different symbol within the Christian tradition, the Cross, his reflections are intimately bound up, as is the Cross, with the symbol of the Christ. Hall admits that with Jesus Christ “the theologica crucis has both its beginning and its center.”9 Thus, the theological understanding of Jesus Christ reveals something peculiar and important in the Christian faith and in Christian theology.

For Hall, the Christ is the unequaled revealing of God-self, yet it is also a concealing of Godself. He argues, “But if... one says that God reveals Godself supremely in a living person, the inherent and inviolable mystery of that person means that the revealing simply is, simultaneously, a concealing.”10 The simultaneity of revelation and concealment can be noted in the gospel accounts as characters interact with Jesus, “There is a sense of something of infinite significance being disclosed, yet at the same time they know that they are not able to receive this something, to take it and have it...”.11 Today, the situation is remarkably similar. Hall notes that “we want to know others unambiguously: we want to have them, possess them.”12 Here Hall wants to remind us that there is a symbolic union of divinity and humanity in Christ, and that “if it is utterly mysterious, transcendent, it is a mystery concealed beneath its opposite—mere humanity.”13

The Christ, as a unique symbol uniting divinity and humanity, also indicates a tension between these poles. It is often the case, as Hall points out, that divinity gets emphasized at the expense of Christ's humanity. But Hall wants to develop a relational Christology, one which he describes in terms of “representation.” He wants us to see “this unique understanding of God as occurring hiddenly through this genuinely human life.”14 This is because “Jesus is for faith God's representative, that his life is one of a unique relationship with God, a relationship that enables him to relate to us—to humanity—in a manner that is also unique.”15

What does all this mean for Christian ministers as they consider communicating theologically? I think Hall has several suggestions which I wish to connect to the revelation/concealment of Christ as humanity/divinity. To begin, the revelation/concealment found within Christ indicates a loss of absolutism on our part. As Hall writes, “This [Christian] community must try to understand and to articulate the presence and the meaning of one who, by definition, defies the community's power to understand yet who nevertheless (nevertheless!) requires this of his witnesses.”16 Hall continues: “[The Christian community] cannot possess this Truth, but it can and must seek to be oriented toward this Truth.”17 To put this in Christological terms, the revelation/concealment of Christ indicates to us our partial understanding. And this partial understanding drives us toward a humility which requires certain concrete practices.

Hall stresses the need for constant dialogue with the whole tradition in working out our understanding of the faith. He also emphasizes the need to listen to the wider ecumenical community beyond our Christian particularities. These practices provide checks and balances for our own feeble attempts to understand the mysterious and unconquerable reality which is simultaneously revealed to us and concealed from us. Yet I want to stretch this even further. The recognition of our insufficient knowledge and grasp of ultimate reality, although symbolically revealed in the Christ, should drive us to a kind of attitude toward ourselves and toward the wider world. And I believe this attitude is one which can shape the way we, as ministers, engage and communicate with the wider world.

Hall's practical suggestions for dialogue and listening is an important model grounded in, I believe, a recognition made evident to Christians in the symbol of the Christ. Just as Christ, like any symbol, is unable to fully capture the divine—the ultimate—so too it participates in that reality and is able to reveal something of it to us. Yet it is only partial as the transcendent remains unconstrained, not fully knowable, still a mystery. Thus, Christ reveals to us how much more we need revealed. Christ reveals to us an orientation toward the Truth, despite the fact that we are not able to hold on to it and contain it within our grasp. Instead, we are left to talk among ourselves about how best to move closer to this truth in our partial knowledge.

At this juncture, David Tracy's model of conversation is particularly important. Tracy describes conversations as a kind of game. He writes that “It is a game where we learn to give in to the movement required by questions worth exploring. The movement of conversation is questioning itself.”18 Tracy wants to show the way in which conversations with people can become conversations with texts: “We converse with one another. We can also converse with texts.”19 Yet I want to take insights from his model of conversation with texts to show how a particular attitude, informed by the symbol of Christ, can make conversation a valuable and constructive enterprise for Christian ministers.

Tracy notes that “Conversation in its primary form is an exploration of possibilities in the search for truth.”20 To begin a conversation, one must already recognize that truth is to be sought after, that it is not already possessed, in its entirety, by oneself. If the symbol of the Christ informs our attitudes, if it indicates to us that we do not have the fullness of the Truth found in the transcendent infinite which is still mysterious to us, then we will be willing to enter into conversation. For conversation engages the otherness that is all around us, the mystery that surrounds us. Tracy and Hall both recognize the power of the language of “disclosure-concealment.” As Tracy notes: “Such language is designed to challenge claims to full comprehension, to certainty, to mastery and control.”21 And it is a sense of mastery and control which prevents us from truly listening, from being open to the “mutual transformation”22 that conversation needs. We need to remember that it is important “to listen and to wait.”23 Although this is not the entirety of conversation—simply listening, being open, and waiting—it is the attitude which makes conversation possible. It is the attitude which makes genuine interaction a constructive endeavor because it allows for self-transformation. Tracy himself mentions the power and value of Christian dialogue with other religious traditions.24

Thus, we see Tracy extending the reach of dialogue and listening that Hall suggested. A minister, informed by the symbolic power of Christ, takes up a humble attitude before the transcendent mystery of the infinite in order to prepare for authentic, open engagement with diverse traditions and cultures. This is a way of communicating in a “time of many worlds.”25 It is a Christ-informed approach towards worlds which are shrinking together into a complex mix of inter-relations. To avoid conflict, to resist violence, we must learn, as ministers, that Christ offers us a way to approach others which is faithful to our tradition. It is an approach which is open to the disclosure of mystery at any moment with anyone, because we are not in full possession of the Truth—it is still partly concealed.

Our orientation toward Truth, revealed in Christ, orients us toward others within our community of faith, and towards those outside our community of faith. The humility and willingness to listen is what our shrinking world needs as we learn to navigate our future lives in proximity, next to each other. Conversation, authentic communication, can allow us to be transformed by each other, in all our differences and similarities. Yet, as Tracy indicates, conversation is not only about listening and waiting, there is an element of engagement which allows us to speak to our truth, however partial, and participate in the wider discourse between traditions, cultures, and religions. In this witness, our very way of speaking—openly and authentically—is a witness unto itself of our theology rooted in the symbolic power of the Christ. We are opened up by this symbol to the disclosure-concealment of the divine, and, as a result, we can be opened up to the disclosive possibilities of conversations with others as we seek the concealed and mysterious Truth of the infinite.
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1Schweiker, William. Theological Ethics and Global Dynamics (Oxford: Blackwell, 2004), xi
2I do not intend to suggest that communicating theological ideas is meaningless or without value. What I hope to draw attention to is the way in which we, as ministers, might communicate to an audience which sometimes stretches beyond the confines of our community of faith. And in so doing, responsibly maintain a relation to our Christian convictions.
3Schweiker, x
4Tillich, Paul. The Dynamics of Faith (New York: Harper and Row, 1957), 1
5Tillich, 41
6Tillich, 43
7Tillich, 44
8Tillich, 45
9Hall, Douglas John. The Cross in our Context (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2003), 111
10Hall, 114
11Hall, 121
12Hall, 122
13Hall, 121-2
14Hall, 124
15Hall, 126
16Hall, 117-8
17Hall, 118
18Tracy, David. Plurality and Ambiguity (San Francisco: Harper and Row, 1987), 18
19Tracy, 19
20Tracy, 20
21Tracy, 22
22Tracy, 93
23Tracy, 51
24See Tracy, 94
25Schweiker, xi