Now here's a long passage from Terry Eagleton, whose approach to Christian apologetics is rather novel. As a non theistic cultural critic not averse to strongly worded criticisms of Christian faith, he nevertheless insists (against Dawkins, Hitchens and the rest) that counter arguments should enage with real Christianity not ignoramus caricatures; and that hostile critics should tackle real Christianity which at every level including the rational, is a scandal.
"Render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and to God the things that are God's" is a notoriously enigmatic injunction; but whatever it means, it is unlikely to mean that religion is one thing whereas politics is another, a peculiarly modern prejudice if ever there was one. Any devout Jew of jesus's time would have known the things that are God's include working for justice, welcoming the immigrants, and humbling the high and mighty. The whole cumbersome paraphernalia of religion is to be replaced by another kind of temple, that of the murdered, transfigured body of Jesus. To the outrage of the Zealots, the Pharisees, and right wing rednecks of all ages, this body is dedicated in particular to all those losers, deadbeats, riffraff, and colonial collaborators who are not righteous but are flamboyantly unrighteous – who either live in chronic trnasgression of the Mosaic law or, like the Gentiles, fall outside its sway altogether.
These men and women are not being asked to bargain their way into God's favour by sacrificing beasts, fussing about their diet, or being impeccably well behaved. Instead, the good news is that god loves them anyway, in all their moral squalor. Jesus's message is that God is on their side despite thier visciousness – that the source of the inexhaustibly self-delighting life he calls his Father is neither judge, patriarch, accuser or superego, but lover, friend, fellow accused, and counsel for the defense….Men and woman are called upon to do nothing apart from acknowledge the fact that God is on their side no matter what, in the act of loving assent which is known as faith. In fact, Jesus has very little to say about sin at all, unlike a great many of his censorious followers. His mission is to accept men and women's frailty, not to rub their noses in it."
Terry Eagleton, Reason, Faith and Revolution. Reflections on the God Debate (New Haven: Yale, 2009), pp. 19-20.
Now one part of me wants to make this long apologia for the Gospel of Jesus the basis of an essay assignment on Contemporary Mission Strategy and the Gospel of Jesus, with the uncomplicated instruction – "Discuss".
Another part of me is left wondering why an agnostic who is resistant to Christianity makes a far better job of stating the core of the Gospel than many a Christian preacher and / or theologian.
In any case – the book is a tonic – not so much comforting as bracing, and not so much an apologia for Christian faith as an apology for the intellectual sloppiness of much new atheism dogma.
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