January
15 – We are Evolutionary christians
By naming ourselves as
“Evolutionary” christians, we are hoisting the progressive flag. Not only do we
believe that life is a process and that we grow our whole lives long, but to
say that we are evolving puts us squarely in a non-literalist camp. It is a
deliberate choice to use a word form of evolution. One layer of this
conversation is specifically about how we read the bible.
By
and large, we do not read Genesis 1 literally. We do not see that poetic text
as a literal description of how God made the world in six twenty-four days. We
do not see a controversy between Genesis’ six days and the physicists’ estimate
of 14 billion years. We are able to hold together spiritual truth and
scientific evidence. I said something like this one in a sermon. Actually I
intentionally said, “I do not believe that the world was created in six days.”
After the service, this ninety year old man was heading my way with that “I
want to talk to you” look on his face. I held my breath and steeled myself for
a confrontation. He leaned his head toward me in a conspiratorial way and
almost whispered to me, “I believe that, too!” I wonder how long he had waited
to be able to say that in church.
Three
ideas speak to me about being evolutionary this Sunday: 1. Being bible based
but not bible bound, 2. Having evolved past some of the bible’s limitations,
and 3. Our evolving understanding of our relationship as part of the human
family. Number three lives large this Sunday because of the Martin Luther King
holiday.
We
are bible based because the testimony about the life of Jesus informs and forms
how we live our lives. It speaks to us of God’s untamed, unconditional love. We
understand that the bible is the written testimony of human beings speaking
about their faith and relationship to God. As human testimony it is as flawed
as any human endeavor. Nonetheless God uses this flawed human construct to
continue speaking to us and transforming lives with love and hope. Recognizing
its limitations, we are not bible-bound. The bible is not the only source of
our understanding, knowledge or experience of God.
Our
evolving understanding has moved us past some of the constraints of those
writers. We approach human sexuality differently. We see gender-roles in a
vastly transformed way. We conceive of the community faith based on evolving
assumptions. The UCC (and SCUCC) does not limit the role of women in
leadership, does not prescribe a dress code for appropriate worship, or set limits
on acceptability for membership in the faithful.
MLK
was an eminent example of humanity’s evolving edge specifically in terms of
race relations, though he clearly saw it in the larger picture of peace,
justice, and God’s emerging kin-dom. If Darwin is right that natural selection
allows the stronger (more evolutionarily successful) animals to survive, then
ideas like MLK’s (and Gandhi’s, and Jesus’) are truly evolutionary. They are
the ideas and concepts that survive and beckon us to grow into a better
humanity.
And
I think that is the crux of what being evolutionary christians is all about:
evolving into a better humanity. It is growing into our divinity.
I
imagine one scenario of bringing the “bible-based but not bible-bound” idea to
life is having a woman with braided hair and lots of jewelry and make-up stand
up and start reading scripture. I would interrupt her and quote 1 Timothy 2:8
(“women should dress themselves modestly and decently in suitable clothing, not
with their hair braided, or with gold, pearls, or expensive clothes”). Then
someone with a tattoo, and I would quote Leviticus 49: 28 at them (You shall
not make any gashes in your flesh for the dead or tattoo any marks upon you: I
am the Lord.) Then another woman could begin to speak and I’d quote 1
Corinthians 14:34 (women should be silent in the churches. For they are not
permitted to speak, but should be subordinate, as the law also says.) About then
somebody else gets up and asks me if I’ve read 1 Corinthians 11:14 (Does not
nature itself teach you that if a man wears long hair, it is degrading to him).
The point being that none of us can measure up to all those human standards
imposed by a literal reading of the bible, and we haven’t even broached issues
of sexuality here.
Another
thought I have is that it was one year ago that the beat poet made his
appearance (I remember because it was an MLK poem). Mr. Beat Poet could do a
lot with “bible-based but not bible-bound.”
And
of course when I think about evolution I think about this clip from the
Simpsons: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=faRlFsYmkeY
I think we have used this before, but Homer always makes me laugh. Also, Mr
Deity wades into this, too: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N9P09Sj4-Xs&feature=g-all-c&context=G2a3bd1dFAAAAAAAAAAA
So,
our question for this week is, “How are we evolving? (physically, intellectually,
spiritually…)
Anchor:
We are a community of artistic, evolutionary, revolutionary christians.
Frame:
evolution
Thread:
Never place a period.
I am struggling for one solid scriptural base for this
Sunday. Any thoughts?
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