"If our faith does not throw us into the arms of the world, if it does not lead to our experience of responsibility, love, celebration, and our commitment to transformation, then, whatever we call it, we have nothing but an empty shell." PR
I continue to find books and authors that mess me up. Peter Rollins is no exception to that finding. I went through the book to find some of the quotes that I highlighted and I had so many that it was hard to choose. I found some to scatter through my blog, much like Peter Rollins has scattered my brain with this book.
"Resurrection faith is then manifested in a freedom and liberation in which we are able to courageously and fully embrace this world without repression, resentment, and fear. It is a way of living in love, a love that embraces existence, not because it is perfect, but because it is beautiful in the midst of its very imperfection." PR
I entitled this post "A New Way to Navigate the Narrative". I've been listening to Pete Rollins on Youtube and on his Podcast and so much of what he says has been helping me to Navigate the Narrative of Christianity in a very different light. The cover synopsis gives a good overview of Rollins whole direction with a very different message.
"In this incendiary new work, the controversial author and speaker Peter Rollins proclaims that Christian faith is not primarily concerned with questions regarding life after death but with the possibility of life before death.
In order to unearth this truth, Rollins prescribes a radical and wholesale critique of contemporary Christianity that he calls pyro-theology. It is only when we submit our spiritual practices, religious rituals and dogmatic affirmations to the flames of fearless interrogation that we come into contact with the reality that Christianity is in the business of transforming our world rather than offering a way of interpreting or escaping it. Belief in the Resurrection means but one thing:
PARTICIPATION IN AN INSURRECTION"
Rollins offers a radical way of looking at Christianity, not what it has become, but what it needs to be. I thought I was good to toss out the whole enchilada. But there seems to be something redeemable, a new way to navigate the narrative.
This book is already ten years old. I feel like I am very behind. I don't know if I want to find a way back to the "baby or the bathwater", but I don't mind entertaining the idea that maybe the narrative has something for me that I don't need to toss.
"Donating money to the poor without asking why the poor exist in the first place, for instance, allows us to alleviate our guilt without fundamentally challenging the system that perpetuates poverty. As the Brazilian archbishop Dom Helder Camara once said, “When I give food to the poor, they call me a saint. When I ask why the poor have no food, they call me a Communist.”" PR
I want to be brave. I want to say things like this. I want to call out the world for its insane beliefs. But I don't. Maybe that is why I read authors like Peter Rollins. It gives me great hope that there are voices out there like his reaching people with a different way to see and understand.
"For Mother Teresa the work itself was the truth. She feared that if her subjective reflections entered the public world then people might lose sight of what really mattered. Mother Teresa never attempted to run away from her experience of divine loss, but neither did she let it destroy her. Rather she was able to find peace with it. She carried the wounds of her Crucifixion, neither hiding them nor showing them off.
Her strength is not staggering because she was able to banish all her doubts, but rather because she was able to acknowledge them without entering into some nihilistic prison. In her utter devotion to bringing life, protecting life, and enriching life, she utterly lost herself. And in losing herself she found joy, peace, happiness, and life." PR
I long for more role models like Mother Teresa. She was a woman who just did. Her foundation wasn't on her dogma or theology. She loved in spite of her doubts and uncertainties and she wasn't pushing for an end to them as much as she just forged ahead in spite of them. She is to be honored for her doubt, not hidden because of it.
"I would love to see churches take seriously the idea that mystery, unknowing, brokenness, doubt, and mourning should be expressed in the very structure of the church itself. Religion is a system that gives us a sense of being right, of having the answers and knowing how to stay on the right team. I want to see churches that break religion open through the sermons, music, and prayers; churches that bring us face-to-face with the truth of our unknowing and pain. Not so that we despair, but so that, in bringing it to light and sharing it, we can find healing and light. I would love to see churches emphasize that the highest principle is not some object that we need to love, but rather the act of love itself. That in loving we break open the depth and beauty of what we mean when we say “God." PR
I've often wondered what kind of church would entice me into its circle. I miss community. I don't miss the doctrinal expectations or the polarization and division it provided. I don't miss the meaningless to me rituals and addict-like behaviours. I don't miss the certainty gospel and the uninformed, unquestioned, close-minded gospel. I do adore people and gathering of people. I just wish that is all that mattered. I haven't found anything in my world that would offer that to me so I go without.
It seems that Peter Rollins is trying to resurrect labels and identities that I am willing to let die in my own life. Over all this was a great read, challenging and enlightening. I wish I could be as brave... I'm just not.
"To experience is to encounter something. But in the Incarnation, Crucifixion, and Resurrection we discover that God is not something we encounter directly and thus is not something that we experience. Rather, God is that which transforms how we experience everything, i.e., love. God is the name we give to the way of living in which we experience the world as worthy of living for, fighting for, and dying for." PR