ellen haroutunian

A friend commented recently on the fact that I spoke of Obama in such glowing terms in my post on Obama in Cairo. It just got me thinking about a Monty Python line: “He’s not the Messiah, he’s a very naughty boy.” In other words, I do not think Obama-Biden-Messiah are all good and Bush-Cheney-Satan and their administration was all bad. (I am joking about the names here – lighten up!) That kind of polarized thinking is rarely helpful to us, because our assumptions (which become our certainties) shut down conversations and kill hope of unity. So, while I make no apologies for the fact that I do like this President, rest assured I do reserve the right to critique him as is my patriotic duty and right.

However, even when posting about political issues, my first concern has been and always will be the Church. The Church has too often defined herself in political terms and policies that have taken us far from our first love. It is not necessarily the particular political stances that harm us – it is a way of thinking (dualism) that has kept us from a truly Christian worldview. For example, many of my tribe assume that the conservative, even the Republican worldview is the “Christian” one. They are no more so than any other, ‘cept Jesus. There is no one political, religious or philosophical ideology that is big enough to hold the wild gospel! And remember that they are my tribe – I come from conservative roots so I understand the thinking – which is why I address them more often. But I feel strongly that it is our way of thinking that has changed our self-understanding and how we show up in the world.

I do feel strongly that my tribe in particular has lost her identity, her true Face, at least in part, by merging with the older modernistic as well as conservative worldviews. Neither of those are fully bad (see first paragraph) but to meld our minds with something else does compromise who we are as “peculiar people” in Christ. The way of thinking of the modernistic era has subtly intertwined absolutism with Christian thought (hence all the polarizing and dualism) and conservatism has become almost synonymous with what it means to be an evangelical in America. (Interesting to note that in other western countries, those who have conservative theological beliefs about Jesus tend to have pretty liberal views politically. Interesting!) Anyhoo, I think all of this has come into play to reduce our focus to mere issues and ideologies, and to lower our gaze onto an obsession with others’ sin and the subsequent “handling” of them, versus imagining radically different Kingdom love and grace. Isn’t it hugely ironic that that is also something we dislike about Islam?

The issues here really reflect a difference in worldviews and the ability to speak into worldviews. Bush was like a final hurrah of the modernist times and thinking which was reflected in his language and thinking as well as that of McCain (whose language and perspective were also from a generation ago despite his moderate leanings…I think that’s why he lost and Obama won. Ok, and there was the Palin issue, LOL.) Worse, Bush seemed unteachable (stay the course...). His perspective says that to apologize or back down shows weakness. As Christians, this shouldn’t be a shameful thing. And there has been a HUGE, undeniable and unstoppable shift in worldview over the last half century or so. We are living in a postmodern, postcolonial, post-Christian world. The modernist worldview is one that no longer speaks to these times. But Jesus always does.

My friend pointed out that Bush had used some of the same language as Obama when it came to acknowledging what is good about Islam, and that we need to build bridges. The problem is, few over there truly believed Bush, nor did he succeed in truly rallying his followers here to that perspective. Deep suspicion remains. I believe it is because despite the choice of words, he spoke from that same old posture of us vs. them, we are right and you are wrong, etc. No amount of rhetoric can truly hide core beliefs. Likewise, the perspective that conservative Christians have bought into is that others must come to see our point of view. We are right and they are wrong. Truly listening to the “other” is tainted by this posture. Obama, with a more postmodern perspective is able to move a bit beyond the either/or and beyond the binaries and that is a huge need and boon in these days. Whether you like him or not, that is why his words carry more weight when he says such things. And, Obama is a true child of this era. He is both black and white, he’s Christian yet has Muslim family, and he was raised in both the East and the West.

I do not think Obama is perfect (he’s not the Messiah, he’s a very naughty boy) and I expect there will be great disappointments. Nor do I think postmodernism is necessarily a better perspective to have– at best postmodernism doesn’t even know what postmodernism is yet! At worst it is a “great dark dissolvingness” that does obliterate some boundaries that perhaps should not be obliterated and loses some certainties that perhaps should not be lost. But the cracks in modernistic thought that created rigid absolutes and thus the boundaries that exclude and create harm are being exposed and that is good for us. It is opportunity for us to try to tease apart what is cultural influence (in how we think) and what is really Jesus.

When it comes down to it, people are afraid. People worry that Islam is not truly as peaceful as it claims to be and that justifies a posture of exclusion. But as Christians I think we need to look at our own logs in our eyes first. Are we as peaceful as we claim to be? Many of the proponents of the Iraq war were Evangelical Christians. Jesus became a God of war. What do we expect others to see in us? Again, I believe we need to tease apart our political and religious biases from Jesus our Living Orthodoxy to begin to show up in a truly “Christian” (little Christ) way in this world. And is our sin really much different? We also seek to eliminate the “other” through more palatable means (shutting out voices, dualistic either/or perspectives, etc.) We are all far more like terrorists than like Christ if we understand our own view of the heart of sin. But, rather than argue about whether Islam peaceful or not, can we focus on the more important question that is, how do we love them as Christ? How do any of us love who we see as the “enemy” or those we don’t trust? We really need that conversation. (Note: Islam was heavily influenced by Aristotle, and Greek dualism continues to impact Christian thought in the West to this day! We are more alike than different.)

There is also the criticism about Obama’s handling (really, the lack of handling) issues regarding women’s rights in the speech, given the atrocities against women that are rampant around the world. Now I am all about women’s rights. The criticism is that he addressed the problem that Muslim women have been denied the right to wear Hijab in some countries and did not address any of the horrors. Even so, I believe this was a bridge building thing. To speak to them where they have felt slighted is hopefully an attempt to “hear” their hearts. It is about making space for them to be. This wasn’t the time to address the bigger issues. That must be a whole speech (and hopefully multiple speeches) in itself. Many religions do oppress women but those who do the oppressing are not going to listen to enemies telling them what to do. But will they listen to friends? Maybe. Or perhaps, as a Baptist friend once told me, resolving these issues won’t happen till “we blow them off the face of the earth”. I am hoping for a better solution.

I hope the conversation about women carries into the Western church, too. It’s that log thing again. Our own theological positions regarding women have helped to feed this stuff. In Africa, the fact that domestic abuse is accepted and male promiscuity (a husband may sleep around if he wishes) and thus the proliferation of AIDS are a huge problems that are fed by this misogyny. I have seen this up close. And what so often comes bundled with the conservative Christian perspective (which was taught by Western missionaries there) is a “secondary” view about women….there’s another whole conversation to be had, I know! But to be a “peculiar people” in this world we must live as radically as Christ did, embracing the enemy (as He did on the cross) and embracing each other in the fullness of who we are – full voice, full freedom in gifting, full participation as both male and female. We can have a major impact on gender-based injustices by being true to Christ and letting go of our hierarchies.

Jesus opened his arms in an embrace on the cross – for those who were murderous towards him and hateful towards their fellow man. One insightful friend remarked that the horizontal piece of the Cross seems to pull east and west together. Could it be that we just can’t bear the thought that following Jesus means we are asked to do the same? What will it mean to love “the other” (any other) in that way? There are surely many conversations to be had there. These are difficult days. I don’t know any easy answers but with the loving, creative hearts I have encountered in so many Christ followers, there are lots of possibilities.

It was for this world that Christ had died; the more evil you saw and heard about you, the greater glory lay around the death. It was too easy to die for what was good or beautiful, for home or children or a civilization—it needed a God to die for the half-hearted and the corrupt.
~ Graham Greene, The Power and the Glory