Every so often, Pew Research publishes their National Public Opinions Reference Survey, which includes a section on self-identified religious identity. Famously, this poll has been tracking the rise of the “nones” over the past three decades. Since the early nineties, the number of people self-identifying as unaffiliated with any religion has risen from 5% all the way to 28% in the most recent survey, from late last year.
Obviously, this rapid rise in the number of Americans who no longer identify with any religious faith has been the source of speculation for many breathless articles, books, podcasts, sermons, studies, and other forms of verbal angst among religious leaders, especially on the Christian right. The question “what is driving them away?” has been asked, of course, but more often, the primary question being asked – across the spectrum – is “how can we attract them back?” For many churches, the loss of membership is seen as a problem of marketing. How to compete with youth sports commitments and endless entertainment options and the rise of technology? By entertaining and exciting, obviously!
I don’t even need to say much about how this hasn’t worked. Nor am I here to proclaim “This is why they are really leaving, and that is what the church can do to bring them back!” I don’t have answers for this. As I stated in the first part of this series, I’m not trying to bring any answers to questions around doubt and anger and disbelief. I think a lot of people have really good reasons to not trust the church, to not believe in God, to not want any part of this flawed thing called Christianity any more. The church has worked hard to lose its credibility, and in doing so, has allowed the priorities of capitalism and modernity and nihilism to work wonders on the minds and the souls of people.
Neither side of the left-right divide in the American church should be nodding their heads here, because both have worked their part in this collapse. I’ve written many times about the failings of the Christian Right, about their capture by right wing politics and the Republican Party and Donald Trump, about their interweaving of the Christian message with nationalism and bigotry and violence, about the numerous scandals around abuse of power driven by their misogynistic hierarchies that work to keep women out of the pulpit and scared to tell their stories. This plays a big, big role in the decline of Christianity in America, and conservatives who are out there bemoaning the secularization of culture need to take a long, hard look in the mirror.
But, the Christian left has largely abdicated the moral arena as well, becoming captured by the political left all too often, and too often more concerned with stripping Christianity of any metaphysical commitments to the point that there becomes very little to recommend Christianity to seekers over, say, just joining the Sierra Club or SDA. The church has to be more than a social justice service agency with all the moral fervor of a California country club.
All that we’ve encountered so far should be understood as a crisis for the church. When I say crisis, I do not mean something like you would call an ambulance for, or that which causes C-suite types to scramble to put together a team of specialists building a response. Instead, this is a crisis in the Greek sense, a krisis, a moment of decision or choice or discrimination. The church faces a krisis, because the people in the pews are also facing a krisis, and they are choosing something other than church. Not because they are sinners or evil or idolators; but because they are in fact largely good, moral people, who look at the choices the church as an institution has made, and who then encounter a krisis of the heart.
In chapter 6 of The Crucified God, Jurgen Moltmann identifies this as “political and social crisis of the church.” For Moltmann, the crisis facing the church is more than just a question of ethics and social action; it is also a theological and christological crisis, a crisis arising from the church’s understanding of who God is. Our theology inevitably shapes our ethics, and conversely, our action in the world showcases just what kind of God we actually believe in. Consequently, this political and social crisis raises a key question for Moltmann: “Which God motivates Christian faith: the crucified God or the gods of religion, race and class?”
Thinking back to our purpose from the first essay of this series – to think about God in the face of the suffering and hurt of the world – causes us to see just how important this question is, and also to begin to better understand those who deconstruct their faith and reject the church. For the one who stands before the dead body of that child in Dostoevsky, or who sees the news of all the dead children in Gaza, we must ask: which God does this? Those of us who want to posit a loving, merciful and just God must grapple with the reality of those gods of religion, race and class, gods who often find a home in our churches and behind our theology and, most importantly, who come out in our actions. We must remember: those children did not just die unexpectedly. Choices were made, choices that often have those who claim the name Christian behind them. The cry of despair, and the subsequent rejection of God, becomes much more understandable when we begin to realize that the only God many people ever meet is one animated by racism, or bigotry, or hatred, or violence, or love of power. Like it or not, our God – the one we call loving and gracious – is on the hook for those other gods.
Where does Jesus fit into this? Moltmann asks the question: “Who really is Christ for us today?” Any conversation about God must take into account Jesus. But this sets up another crisis. When we look at Jesus, inevitably we also see the cross. In a world of suffering and injustice, we look to the One who we are encouraged to call Savior, and we see more suffering and injustice. Jesus lived among us, and then suffered at our hands. Even he could not escape our false gods, and the death that lurks behind them all. And so our crisis deepens. With Moltmann, we must ask: “What does the cross of Jesus mean for God himself?”
These crises and questions put those of us who still cling to the name “Christian” in an uncomfortable place. How do we grapple with the suffering of the world, without hand waving it all away with empty pious platitudes and cheerful, oblivious theologies of glory? It is well and good to say that God is a gracious and loving God, that God wishes good for us, that God made all the world and rules over it today. But, again, how do we reconcile those claims with the fact of human suffering and death, and even more so, the suffering and death of the one claimed to be God’s very own Son?
Before we attempt to respond to these questions, a reminder: none of the work being done in these essays is an attempt to “solve” the problem of theodicy; that is, the problem of why suffering exists. I want to offer no solutions, or to try to tell you that this is why things happen, in order to put you at ease. Too often, those in the church want to be the ones who make people feel better, and in doing so, they offer rote answers that, while perhaps temporarily satisfying, ultimately fall apart, especially in the face of real suffering. But this is Holy Week; we are moving towards the death of Christ slowly, and we must not skip over Friday and Saturday to get to Sunday. Our task here is to ask these hard questions, to sit with them and the discomfort they stir up, and ultimately, to try to grapple with who God is if hurt and suffering are inevitable parts of life. Perhaps the place we get to will be comforting to some; to others, our tentative conclusions may still lead us to despair, rage, and rejection. Either response is acceptable to me, as the author. I simply want to wrestle with these questions, because I believe in so doing, we gain the courage we need to push back against that suffering, in whatever small way we can.
Our next move takes us into that which Moltmann refers to as “theism” and “atheism.” These are the two common answers to the crises facing Christians and the church. Our next two essays will explore these ideas, before we turn back to two key statements about the nature of God that, while not looking to provide answers to the question of suffering, instead point us towards trying to understand who God is, so that we can better grapple with death.
Justin DaMetz 