My four days with the Episcopalians
In July 2007, I was invited to spend a long weekend talking about faith and politics with a few adventurous members of the Episcopal Diocese of Virginia (the branch of the church that did not leave the fold over the ordination of gay priests). The conference organizer asked me to join them knowing full well that, although I have a strong, working faith in God, I have no scholarly or theological training, and I’m not religious in the least.
I brought along an early draft of part of this piece to use as a jumping off place. I thought those Episcopalians and I might talk about the possibility that it is in our faith—our working partnerships with the Almighty—rather than in our religious beliefs that we find the creativity and guts to reach across the great political divide. In other words, I was a person of faith in God who implicitly challenged the relevance of the Episcopal Church; indeed, of any church.
At the beginning of the conference I suggested a couple of ground rules: 1) We would not spend our time bashing either the current presidential administration or the religious right; and 2) We would try to talk about the meaning of our faith in God without reference to religious practices. I wanted all of us to think beyond any relationship we’d formed with God through habit, upbringing, ritual or doctrine, and be curious about what else there is to it.
Our conversations the first day and the morning of the second were brisk, occasionally spirited, and regularly ran over their allotted times. Then after lunch on day two, three women priests abruptly threatened to leave, saying they were dissatisfied with the conference and with me in ways that were never quite clear to the rest of us.
Thinking about this later, I realized that these women had probably come to the conference tired, beleaguered and grieving. All three were from parishes that had lost congregations to the ultra-conservative Anglican Province of Nigeria in 2006 when the church fractured over the ordination of homosexual priests. I also think these women’s rows have to be difficult to hoe at the best of times, for it is their fatiguing mission to accustom the diocese’s remaining conservative Episcopalians to women priests.
Then, too, we were gathered at Shrinemont, a sprawling constellation of turn-of-the-twentieth-century clapboard buildings and bright green lawns, plopped down among the eastern Appalachian Mountains. It is a place built for healing and personal deceleration. Most of the people at the conference were regulars, and for all the religious debate and exploration that goes on there, I suspect Shrinemont is mainly beloved by its habitués as an inherently safe place to let down one’s spiritual guard. They had perhaps assumed that our discussion would not be pushed outside the roomy box of liberal religious practice.
And then here I came, barging into their sanctuary, a journalist, with no theological training, no religious education to speak of, no history of wrestling with knotty church politics and pressures, and yet I presumed to state that, in my experience, the most useful relationship with God exists entirely independently of religion; and, furthermore, that any religious practice, by its nature, may possibly limit the usefulness of that relationship.
I must have been, to those three women priests at that time, an eek on two feet; my curiosity about the underpinnings of their faith seen as a non-credentialed—and so ridiculous—challenge to their religion’s theological constructs, a pesky assault on their livelihoods, an upstart’s questioning of their worth in this world. I was a person of no standing at all in the theological world, and yet here I stood before them, invited to their Shrinemont by the same diocese they’d just given their heart’s blood defending.
In well-lit hindsight, I can see that from the first session, these women’s participation in our discussion had been mostly delivered in fits and blasts of outrage—although outrage is probably too strong a word, as I don’t think they considered my thoughts worth much more than their pique. I was like a big, fat fly, buzzing around their intellectual and spiritual turf, and so naturally they’d finally swatted at me.
Of course, discomfort cuts both ways. If they were offended by my uppityness, I was certainly put off by their outrage. I, too, thought about leaving, feeling that talking with other people of faith just shouldn’t be so hard.
To give an example of how our discussion herkey-jerkeyed along . . .
I asked everyone why, exactly, they believed in the divinity of Christ—not to challenge, simply to understand. But then the question, itself, was a challenge.
There was a beat of silence, then an eruption of scholarly religious arguments and explanations. The Bible was quoted. Research was cited. Everything said was scholarly and interesting in itself, but none of it answered my question. And from the tenor of the interchange, it would have been clear to a block of wood that I had made most of the group feel defensive, and that the fierceness of their response had made me feel beset. Finally a young male priest piped up and said that he’d never thought about why he believed in Christ; he just always had. And this touched off another round of contention.
And yet, we did not splinter. The three women priests stayed as long as they had planned to stay, as did I. It was certainly not the most comfortable weekend I’ve ever spent, but as I frequently said the Prayer of the Beleaguered (Good God, please help me to act like an adult, to keep thinking and not to be defensive), it wasn’t the least comfortable, either. We all did, after all, share a common faith in God— as well as a drive to have that faith be the means of doing something useful in this sweet old world. That weekend, we demonstrated time and time again that a shared faith bridges even the most passionate emotional and intellectual and religious divides.
Looking back, one other thing that intrigues me about that weekend is how easily those intelligent, educated, open-minded Episcopalians scuttled back to the comfortable, familiar language and structure of Christianity whenever they felt challenged to have their faith operate independently of it. And how easily I—who’d been severely buffeted by organized Christianity as a child—scuttled back to my comfortable and familiar suspicion that anyone who uses such language and relies on such a structure has a hidden agenda that I won’t like.
I can’t speak for the Episcopalians, but I can certainly speak for myself; and I was acutely aware that my old habits of mind were at times part of our problems. What amazed me was that my knee-jerk negative reactions to Christian theology also came with a will to think around them. And this I took, quite simply, as God working with me, for it certainly wasn’t something I did naturally.
I think, looking back, that the Episcopalians and I used our common faith in God to overcome our deep-seated religious differences. In retrospect, my long weekend with the Episcopalians became an actual exercise in what I hope we will talk about over the next twelve weeks: faith considered separately from organized religion, faith as our relationships with God in action—in ourselves and in community.
Martha Woodroof
Tags: Episcopal church, faith, God, God in action, why believe in Christ
I’m partial to the Gods and Goddesses of Hinduism. They have more arms and powers to geterdone! And, when the real demons threaten, it’s the female Dieties who have the coolest powers and most compassion to act on the truth.
It seems to me that many of the comments thus far presume that the authors’ beliefs are true because the author believes them.
The problem we run into is that if we decide “God” is a certain way because we have decided “God” is a certain way, we have only agreed with ourselves about something we have made up.
If we wish to discuss a (or the) “God,” and contend that this is a real entity who is or is not, does or does not, independent of our own imaginations, then a great deal of our knowledge must originate from outside of ourselves.
Who is “God,” and how do we know?
NOTE from Martha: This is a comment that I cannot get to move through to the site, so I’m cutting and pasting and posting it myself — just like the Little Red Hen!
Well this is fun! I happened upon this site after reading what seamed like a teaser for it over as the WaPo’s “On Faith” column. The funny thing was that as I was reading that I thought to myself, “hmmm…sounds like this lady should check out the piskies!”
Anyway, I suspect I’ll have lots to say in this general discussion, but on this posting, I’ll limit myself to a couple of more specifically relevant items:
First, it seems from this posting that the core item of “disagreement” between Martha and her interlocutors was the doctrine of the divinity of Jesus. Martha points out that her question on why folks “believed in the divinity” of Jesus was received as a challenge. I suspect that reception is the reason the question wasn’t well answered. I think the cause of the confusion though is at least twofold: 1.) the notion that belief = intellectual assent (as if saying you believe in the divinity of Jesus is in the same category as saying you believe in the hardness of rocks.) and 2.) the cultural presupposition that interrogation of the faithful is rooted in attack as opposed to curiosity. (Being a part of a split diocese in which the “liberals” have likely been accused of being anti-christ by their “conservative” brothers and sisters probably didn’t make this line of questioning any easier.) Unfortunately, it seems that the session lacked the nuance it may have needed to be meaningful. For instance, the question “why do you believe in the divinity of Jesus?” is really unanswerable on its own. In order to do so, I would first have to know at least what one means by “believe” (more on that below), and what is meant by saying “Jesus is divine.” This is particularly true for a set of good Episcopalians because of their likely commitment to the hypostatic union of Jesus, which indicates quite clearly that Jesus is not divine…of course it also indicates quite clearly that he is. This sort of nuance is important, and simply asking is someone thinks Jesus is divine misses it all.
Also interesting to me is Martha’s brief account of the young male priest who she indicates “said that he’d never thought about why he believed in Christ…” Now that statement is rather different that saying he never thought about why he believed in the divinity of Jesus. (I’m wondering if this is simply a oversight and she meant the same thing with either…if she did, I think the conflation of the two things is part of the problem.) Assuming the young priest did say he never though about why he “believes in Christ,” I think we find a good example of a better way the word “believe” can (should?) be used in regard to faith/religion. I’m sure many who will participate here have read or heard this before. To Believe, is not to intellectually assent to a set of propositions. Rather it is to love, trust, commit to, have faith in, etc. etc. I think that’s a very important distinction. Going back to the hypostatic union, I think there is a significant difference between assenting to the proposition that a particular cluster of cells was somehow also divine, and trusting the idea that the divine can be mysteriously intertwined with creation. I find the former leads to the inappropriate worship of a particular cluster of cells because it is somehow divine, while the other leads to unlimited care and concern for all of creation because it all may somehow mysteriously be intertwined with the divine. Those two very different perspectives come from the same essential doctrine and hinge largely on what we take as the meaning of “belief” in that doctrine.
Finally, I think this distinction is played out by the fact that Martha and her interlocutors “did not splinter.” This, it appears, was the result of their “common faith in God.” Mind you this is not “belief in God” (i.e. intellectual assent that there is a God) . Rather it is trusting, commitment to, and loving of God. That faith is what Martha and the VA Piskies share. In the WaPo column, I read that Martha is concerned with living her faith. That is precisely where the Anglican tradition sits: it is more concerned with orthopraxy (i.e. right practice, or doing faith together) than orthodoxy (i.e. right thinking, or assenting to the same propositions). So I wonder if Martha is really more concerned with the way people live their faith than she is about what people assent to? It is seeming to me that Martha is concerned only when what a religion DOES is that it THINKS (i.e. assents to) certain things. If what a religion DID was LIVE its faith, she wouldn’t have an issue. What I don’t really understand is her distinction between living a faith and religion. Is she implying that a group of people who live their faith together and are unconcerned with the variety of propositions to which the various individuals do or do not intellectually assent is not a religion? If she is, I think it’s possible to say that she thinks Episcopalians (those who remain that is) aren’t religious.
I’m looking forward to more on this site!
Well this is fun! I happened upon this site after reading what seamed like a teaser for it over as the WaPo’s “On Faith” column. The funny thing was that as I was reading that I thought to myself, “hmmm…sounds like this lady should check out the piskies!”
Anyway, I suspect I’ll have lots to say in this general discussion, but on this posting, I’ll limit myself to a couple of more specifically relevant items:
First, it seems from this posting that the core item of “disagreement” between Martha and her interlocutors was the doctrine of the divinity of Jesus. Martha points out that her question on why folks “believed in the divinity” of Jesus was received as a challenge. I suspect that reception is the reason the question wasn’t well answered. I think the cause of the confusion though is at least twofold: 1.) the notion that belief = intellectual assent (as if saying you believe in the divinity of Jesus is in the same category as saying you believe in the hardness of rocks.) and 2.) the cultural presupposition that interrogation of the faithful is rooted in attack as opposed to curiosity. (Being a part of a split diocese in which the “liberals” have likely been accused of being anti-christ by their “conservative” brothers and sisters probably didn’t make this line of questioning any easier.) Unfortunately, it seems that the session lacked the nuance it may have needed to be meaningful. For instance, the question “why do you believe in the divinity of Jesus?” is really unanswerable on its own. In order to do so, I would first have to know at least what one means by “believe” (more on that below), and what is meant by saying “Jesus is divine.” This is particularly true for a set of good Episcopalians because of their likely commitment to the hypostatic union of Jesus, which indicates quite clearly that Jesus is not divine…of course it also indicates quite clearly that he is. This sort of nuance is important, and simply asking is someone thinks Jesus is divine misses it all.
Also interesting to me is Martha’s brief account of the young male priest who she indicates “said that he’d never thought about why he believed in Christ…” Now that statement is rather different that saying he never thought about why he believed in the divinity of Jesus. (I’m wondering if this is simply a oversight and she meant the same thing with either…if she did, I think the conflation of the two things is part of the problem.) Assuming the young priest did say he never though about why he “believes in Christ,” I think we find a good example of a better way the word “believe” can (should?) be used in regard to faith/religion. I’m sure many who will participate here have read or heard this before. To Believe, is not to intellectually assent to a set of propositions. Rather it is to love, trust, commit to, have faith in, etc. etc. I think that’s a very important distinction. Going back to the hypostatic union, I think there is a significant difference between assenting to the proposition that a particular cluster of cells was somehow also divine, and trusting the idea that the divine can be mysteriously intertwined with creation. I find the former leads to the inappropriate worship of a particular cluster of cells because it is somehow divine, while the other leads to unlimited care and concern for all of creation because it all may somehow mysteriously be intertwined with the divine. Those two very different perspectives come from the same essential doctrine and hinge largely on what we take as the meaning of “belief” in that doctrine.
Finally, I think this distinction is played out by the fact that Martha and her interlocutors “did not splinter.” This, it appears, was the result of their “common faith in God.” Mind you this is not “belief in God” (i.e. intellectual assent that there is a God) . Rather it is trusting, commitment to, and loving of God. That faith is what Martha and the VA Piskies share. In the WaPo column, I read that Martha is concerned with living her faith. That is precisely where the Anglican tradition sits: it is more concerned with orthopraxy (i.e. right practice, or doing faith together) than orthodoxy (i.e. right thinking, or assenting to the same propositions). So I wonder if Martha is really more concerned with the way people live their faith than she is about what people assent to? It is seeming to me that Martha is concerned only when what a religion DOES is that it THINKS (i.e. assents to) certain things. If what a religion DID was LIVE its faith, she wouldn’t have an issue. What I don’t really understand is her distinction between living a faith and religion. Is she implying that a group of people who live their faith together and are unconcerned with the variety of propositions to which the various individuals do or do not intellectually assent is not a religion? If she is, I think it’s possible to say that she thinks Episcopalians (those who remain that is) aren’t religious.
I’m looking forward to more on this site!
Martha,
Since your experience of God is really the only kind I’ve ever had (not having been raised with any religion), I’m thrilled to find you articulating ideas and concepts that describe my developing spiritual — but never religious — self.
Where I sometimes run into trouble — at least mentally — is that I regard the whole Christian historical narrative and theology to be so silly that I cannot comprehend why intelligent, educated people would ever believe that stuff. That in turn makes it hard for me to be open-minded when faced with dogmatic Christian beliefs — and dogmatic Christians.
For me, the only point of connection is the idea that Jesus was a teacher of profound truths about human nature.
So, when you write about “intelligent, educated, open-minded Episcopalians,” I am again thrust into that head-shaking disbelief that smart adults not only believe in a fairy tale but base their careers and personal lives on the foundation of that fairy tale. Truly I do not understand.
In any case, my path has been much like that of Brian (below). I spent my childhood and young adulthood supremely unconcerned about questions of God, although I was “bedeviled” by issues of good and evil as the result of childhood-onset OCD. Then, in my late 30s, a few remarkable things happened in my life. One amazed me so much that I thought, “There has to be a God; there is no other explanation for what has happened here.”
At that time, I slowly began accumulating a personal understanding of what “God” is to me. Helped along by a few dips into Unitarianism, Carl Jung, AA, and the Tao, as well as by the loss of some people close to me, I became convinced — and remain so — that we are all part of an interconnected web of being and that it’s from this source that we can draw our strength and our understanding and our solace and our spiritual sustenance. It is this “Great Whatever” (wonderful term!) to which I direct my gratitude and from which I ask for guidance.
As far as theology goes, I believe that “Do unto others…” and “Live and let live” are the two most important principles in human relationships. The first of these, the “golden rule,” is the fundamental core of most of the world’s religions, but it seems to get lost in in so much of the ritual and guidelines that become what I see as the stand-in for humans’ authentic contact with the GW.
I’m looking forward to what I will learn in the next 12 weeks. Many thanks, truly, for bringing this conversation to the Web.
Greetings!
I think we have an immediate problem if we can’t defnite terms. Everyone has some sort of definition of God or it would be impossible to try to be righteous, which is what seems to be the purpose of this inquiry – to connect with God and become righteous without referring to organized religions. Righteousness is an endeavor to reflect God and to do His will. But here we bump up against definitions again. Is God good? Is He evil? Or is He both? How do we definite good? Or limited in understanding, is it impossible for people to define good outside of a revelation from God? If God is good, doesn’t He actually have a responsibility to reveal Himself to us and isn’t it part of His nature to desire to do so? Has He revealed Himself? If He is good, why does He allow evil? How does one define evil except as a contrast to good? Unfortunately this is the stuff of theology – organized religion.
I believe that God has revealed Himself in Jesus. I believe that Jesus revealed that the very nature of God is self-sacrificing love in contrast to the self-centered nature of man. I believe that God has a purpose in allowing evil and that the purpose is revealed in the Bible. Revealed, because without the revelation, it is unknowable by people.
Any church that I’ve had contact with diminishes God. I’ve said for a long time that my cat understands my watch better than I understand God.
I think religion is a result of faith, but not necessarily a pre-condition for it.
I’ve become very Valentinian in my thinking over the past three years and about a year ago I decided that church wasn’t necessarily a mandatory mix to faith and a relationship with the Living Christ.
For those who don’t know Valentinious, he was a second century heretic who felt that water baptism wasn’t the key to salvation. At the time, the belief was that at baptism the sinner was saved and imbued with the Holy Spirit, and it was the evidence of the fruits of the spirit in one’s life that indicated whether or not you were saved. Valentinious wisely observed “Many go under the water and come up dry (wihtout the spirit, and therefore un-saved).”
Valentinious also said that once successfully baptised, church was unnecessary. The saved sinner could live the rest of their lives in consort with the Holy Spirit, following it’s directions and communing directly with the Father thru the spirit and church was highly unnecessary.
Of course, that think would have doome the church and he was declared a heretic.
But I think he was largely correct. About a year ago I came to the conclusion that church was largely irrelevent. But in that conclusion, I’m not beginning to think that both Valentinious and I are in error as well.
I had become rather bored with the liturgy, that was the issue. And while my church was not feeding my needs any longer, that doesn’t mean that there were those in the congregation that needed my presence in their lives. They need my support, and by departing to my own devises I was taking that from them. Therefore, I am in error and need to go back and provide companionship event though I find the liturgy and pedendant.
As for religion and dogma, I am reminded of a statement by a Professor of Paul at Southern Methodist Univeristy’s Perkins School of Theology. I can’t remember her name, but I do remember she was an American Baptist, and, in speaking of the literalist interpretation of scripture, she said “There are two types of Christians. One type really, really loves the Bible and they have Jesus too. The others really, really love Jesus, and they use the Bible as a reference tool.”
In deciding can you have faith without religion, both Valentinious and my Professor friend, pretty much sum it up. If you have been blessed by the spirit, and if you love Jesus, that’s about all you need. Dogma, church teaching, Zig Ziglar teaching Sunday school are all nice. But they are just decorations.
Have faith. Meditate on God’s message. Commune with the Holy Spirit, and go to church to be a benefit to your neighbor’s need. And don’t sweat the small stuff, or televangelists.
Hello Martha:
Your concept of God (and religion) and mine are nearly identical, but we seem to have arrived there by remarkably different routes.
You mention being buffeted by Christianity as a child. I understand why you omitted the specifics; maybe they will unfold as the weeks progress. Knowing your religious experiences thus far would help me to understand your faith today.
I was raised in a distinctly non-religious environment. My father was an athiest, but not stridently so. My mother was raised in the church, but made no effort to pass along any residual beliefs. She was probably an agnostic.
As a child, I was not buffeted by religion, but I wasn’t protected from it either. When I was eight or nine years old, a neighbor kid invited me to attend summer bible study classes with him. This required parental permission, and my father approved. He wanted me to form my own opinion, and I did.
Where does my faith come from? I suppose it is simply from what I see. I am surrounded by Creation. The Hubble telescope is showing us Creation at distances and time intervals far beyond my ability to visualize or understand.
Creation implies a Creator. “Implies” is such a weak word in this context.
There is order in nature. Our solar system has order. And there is randomness and chaos. And there is order within the chaos.
There is a design. I hesitate to use that term, because it is being co-opted by those who would impose their religion on others. Still, there is a design, and that implies a designer.
If the vastness of the universe is tough to comprehend, the complexity of design of the tiniest particles of matter is too. I can visualize atoms. I’m glad someone is exploring the properties of sub-atomic structure, but I don’t even try to understand.
But the similarity of atoms and solar systems, orbiting orbs around a nucleus, to me this is evidence of a design, a Creation, a Creator.
How do I experience my faith? It’s not an everyday thing. There are passages of music that stir me in a way that feels “spiritual” to me. I find inspiration in natural beauty. I don’t pray, because it seems to me that if God hears prayers, he also is in tune with my every fleeting thought. And I do fleetingly acknowledge to myself (and to God) the beauty and wonder and order and chaos of its Creation, as I encounter them.
Does my faith control or influence my behavior or value systems? No. My parents were very good at instilling a strong sense of right and wrong, and a work ethic that Calvinists would admire. I don’t need the threat of “unintended consequences” to stay out of trouble.
I contribute time, materials, and money routinely to worthwhile causes, local and global, not because I expect the Creator to be pleased, but because it is the right thing to do.
In a vague undisciplined way, I believe in Karma, do unto others, reap what you sow, etc. These seem universal, or nearly so.
I will be interested to hear how others relate to God, separate from religion. Thanks for opening the forum.
Brian
oh oh… a technical problem right away on my first response. I did not understand what Website meant, so I did not enter it…
I also did not know how to fill in Mail : I put my email name, but not the carrier….
Then, after a long, thoughtful, and edited reply, I hit Submit. It not only refused my submission because of the aforementioned errors, which would be okay, but it also wiped out my reply…. For those not fully computer-geeks, this is a very discouraging beginning. Is there any way to refuse a submission without losing it? In other words, can it be retrieved? Or could I write it on my Word Processor and cut and paste it into this site? HELP
And,what does it mean “Your comment is awaiting moderation?”
Hmmmmmmmmmmmmm?
Hey Carol — it means I will just give it a quick check to be sure it follows the site’s editorial guidelines, posted on the front page. Which are: Civility and respect are the only criteria for participation. Threats of hell or howls of derision will be deleted. Anything mean-spirited will also be deleted.
I don’t change anything anyone says that meets this criteria. M
Carol,
I’ve had this problem on other websites and have developed this safeguard. Before I click a “submit” button, I always select the text and save it to my clipboard. That way, if my post gets deep-sixed somehow, I can repost it.