Is Diversity-Equity-Inclusion Politics Christian? (Part Four)

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My goal in the first three essays in this series on diversity-equity-inclusion philosophy* was to lay a descriptive and analytical foundation for assessing the claim that these values are consistent with and even mandated by Christianity. In my role as a professor of theology in a Christian college I deal with people every day who assert that diversity, equity, and inclusion are unambiguously Christian values. They are surprised when I do not join them in their uncritical acclamation and are puzzled, if not offended, when I ask them to prove their assertions. My goal in the next few essays is to assess this contention methodically and thoroughly. This process will take a while.

The Nature Theological Assessment

I am a Christian and an academic theologian. The business of a theologian is assessing theological proposals for their Christian character. People make all sorts of claims in the name of Christianity, the Bible, the church, and the Spirit. No rational person should accept a claim simply because someone makes it. But it is the special task of Christian theologians to subject theological claims to critical judgment in light of the original documents of the Christian faith, the Old and New Testaments of the canonical scriptures. I will accept no other standard of measurement.

I am fully aware that not everyone who claims to be a Christian or a Christian theologian agrees with me about the work of a theologian or the standard by which to assess the Christian nature of a theological claim. But I am laying my cards on the table, and I think those who disagree should do so as well. Those we wish to persuade deserve to know the source of our theological opinions and the norms by which we agree to have them judged.

The Difference between Theological, Ethical, and Political Statements

We must first disentangle the many entwined and overlapping meanings of diversity, equity, and inclusion. When someone advocates or rejects DEI philosophy, we need to know whether they are speaking theologically, ethically, politically, or some combination thereof. To speak theologically is to speak about God or about the relationship of something to God. The subject of ethics is the set of moral obligations humans have to each other. Politics has to do with how human beings order their lives for the common good. These areas are sometimes combined to create the subject areas of theological ethics and theology of politics. To engage in a productive debate, we need to be clear about what mode of speech we are using and to which set of norms we are appealing. In the previous essays I highlighted the reason I believe the topics of diversity, equity, and inclusion evoke such intense controversy at the present time. In American culture the debate is primarily political in nature with theological and ethical arguments tossed into the mix in an undisciplined way.

No Political Neutrality

No one would believe me if I claimed to harbor no political opinions and that I could present a theological analysis of DEI philosophy in a politically neutral way. I admit that I am not neutral. In the literature of Social Justice and Critical Race Theory that I have read and the discussions in which I have participated, diversity, equity, and inclusion are presented as desired outcomes of a social/political process that can be achieved only by direct or indirect government action. It is an outcomes-based political program opposed to the traditional American rules-based program. DEI theorists argue that the social system governed by such classic liberal rules as fairness, equal civil rights, merit-based rewards, economic freedom, etc. has not and cannot produce diversity, equity, and inclusion. Liberalism’s inability to produce the desired outcomes is proof that it is systemically racist, sexist, and homophobic. Hence government, corporations, and universities must use their power to reward those who implement DEI and punish those who do not attain these social outcomes.

I am not neutral between these two political philosophies. I embrace the classic liberal tradition of politics—the historic tradition of both major American parties and many minor parties—as greatly superior rationally, psychologically, morally, and theologically to the anti-liberal, utopian, coercive, and divisive DEI philosophy. I understand that traditional liberalism cannot produce the perfect society. I am clear that it is by no means identical to Christianity. Nor does it rise to the heights of Christian agape. The full range of the Christian faith and life can be practiced only within the church and even there only imperfectly. Unlike the church, the political sphere embraces everyone in a society, and people within American society differ widely as to their religious beliefs and personal preferences.

Liberalism deals with this diversity by granting everyone as much freedom as is consistent with the freedom of others. And imperfect people will sometimes use their freedom in imperfect ways to produce imperfect social outcomes. In response to DEI’s charge that liberalism produces imperfect outcomes, liberal political philosophy argues not only that freedom is a social good in itself, desired by all people, but that allowing millions of individuals to make billions of free decisions–governed by the rules of fairness, equality, and merit-based reward systems–will produce a better society over the long term than allowing a small group of government planners to dictate those decisions.

“The perfect is the enemy of the good.”

Traditional liberalism embraces the truth of the saying, “The perfect is the enemy of the good.” In contrast, the philosophy of DEI aims at the unattainable goal of perfection and in doing so becomes the enemy of the good. DEI is not rational, because it mistakes its utopian visions for politically achievable plans. It is not psychologically sound, because it assumes people will in the long run acquiesce to having their property and positions taken away and redistributed to others in the name of diversity, equity, and inclusion. It is immoral in that it employs coercion, racial prejudice, theft, and injustice to achieve its goals. Hence DEI politics is most certainly not mandated by Christianity. And in contrast to liberal political philosophy, it is not even compatible with Christianity.

*The three previous essays were posted on May 26, 27, and 29.

Is the Good News Still Good?

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Explaining Our Faith or Repeating Words?

In my experience most church members have never heard a serious discussion of the atonement. In a recent Sunday class I reviewed seven of the most prominent theories of how Jesus’s suffering and death save us from sin, death, and the devil. Hardly anyone had heard of even one of them. Indeed, the very idea that the historic church had held different theories of the atonement was surprising to most. Of course every Christian is familiar with liturgical phrases that assert in some way that “Jesus died for our sins.” However if you ask them how this works they have no answer.

The closest thing to an atonement theory that appears in evangelical churches can be heard in songs, sermons, prayers, and Eucharistic liturgies. Jesus “took our place,” in him “the wrath of God was satisfied,” “he bore it all,” and many more. All of these assertions derive in some way from the Bible as filtered through traditional Protestant theology. All of them contain an element of truth, but also, as I argue in The New Adam, place greatly distorted images in our minds. And what is just as problematic, hardly anyone who sings and prays them understands them or could explain them in a way that makes sense to an outsider. How can Christians explain to the world why the gospel of Jesus Christ is good news when they do not understand it themselves? I wrote The New Adam to address this problem.

From the Introduction to The New Adam:

Soteriological Dead Ends

Two options dominate the field for making sense of sin and salvation in contemporary Protestant Christianity, the evangelical penal substitution (PSA) and the liberal moral influence theories of atonement. Each theory proposes its own analysis of the problem to which Jesus Christ is the answer. Evangelical soteriology argues that sin offends God deeply and that to be true to his perfect justice God cannot merely forgive but must punish sin as it deserves. However in his great mercy, God sent Jesus into the world to endure in our place the punishment sin deserves and earn our forgiveness. In this way, Jesus Christ embodies God’s love and satisfies his justice in his one act of dying on the cross.

In contrast to this evangelical perspective, liberal atonement theory views sin as individual imperfection, ignorance, and sensuality or as unjust social structures that foster racism, sexism, economic disparities, and other evils. God is not an angry judge but a loving Father. Jesus helps us overcome sin by teaching about the love of God and living in a way that inspires us to live the way he lived. Jesus died on a Roman cross not to divert God’s wrath away from us and onto himself but to witness to God’s justice and love. God did not kill Jesus. The Romans killed him because he would not compromise his message. The way he died demonstrates his unwavering faith in the love of God and inspires the same confidence in us.

In my view, neither evangelical PSA nor liberal moral influence theory can meet the challenge we face today, that is, how may contemporary theology help the church to restate its soteriology in a way true to the apostolic faith and comprehensible to people living now? Since the evangelical theory pervades not only evangelical theology but also evangelical sermons, song lyrics, and personal piety, I devote two full chapters to documenting, analyzing, and criticizing this viewpoint. Despite its claims of biblical faithfulness, traditional rootedness, and theological soundness, I argue that evangelical PSA falls short in all three areas.

Nor can it be made understandable to people inside or outside the contemporary church. Since liberal theology and mainline churches are the default religious options for those looking for alternatives to evangelicalism, I devote a chapter to liberal soteriology. Liberalism rightly senses that traditional soteriology makes no sense to modern people, so it attempts to translate Christianity into present-day terms. However in my view, it evacuates the substance of the apostolic faith in the process. Nor does its simplistic diagnosis of the human condition take seriously the human capacity for evil. Consequently, its solutions strike me as superficial.

My Life Project and Why I Chose It

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As regular readers know, my book The New Adam: What the Early Church Can Teach Evangelicals (and Liberals) About the Atonement was just published. In the next few posts I plan to introduce the message of this book by quoting and commenting on sections of the introduction and conclusion. These are sections not available in the Amazon.com preview. I hope these posts will motivate you to read the book and tell others about it. I don’t get invited to appear on Fox News, CNN or MSNBC. There are many thousands of books published every day. So, my book and most others find their way into the hands of readers by word of mouth recommendations. Many early readers have already done this, and I am grateful. Books like mine don’t make money…but in certain cases they change lives. I wrote this book for that individual who at this moment in their life needs this message. I pray that they find it.

Let me tell you a bit about the book. As a young adult I realized that churches within my circle had focused nearly all their thinking and teaching on small doctrinal differences at issue among Christians and taken for granted the central truths of the faith and the Christian way of life. I sensed that someday these central truths would no longer be generally accepted by the majority of a fast-evolving post-Christian culture. I came to believe that within my lifetime, believers would be forced to explain and defend the basic affirmations of their faith to a hostile audience. They were not prepared to do this then and they not prepared now. Many have and will fall away for this reason. As I was writing these lines the solemn words of Jesus recorded in Matthew 24 came to mind:

9 “Then you will be handed over to be persecuted and put to death, and you will be hated by all nations because of me. 10 At that time many will turn away from the faith and will betray and hate each other, 11 and many false prophets will appear and deceive many people. 12 Because of the increase of wickedness, the love of most will grow cold, 13 but the one who stands firm to the end will be saved.

Though the immediate occasion for these words was the impending divine judgment on Jerusalem and the Temple, they express the perennial situation of those who seriously embrace the way of discipleship to Jesus.

So, I made it my life project to think through, defend, and explain the basic teachings of Christianity to my contemporaries and the next generations. For the past twenty years I have been writing about the major topics of Christian doctrine: God, Trinity, creation, providence, and church. I aimed to read the best, highest level thinkers on each topic and write at the highest level I could while keeping the book readable by students, ministers, and interested others. For years I’ve wanted to write on the atonement. Only after I wrote the other books and attained the age of 64 years did I think I was ready to begin this profound topic so central to Christian faith. That was six years ago. I am now 70 years old. The New Adam contains the fruit of that labor. Here is the first section of my Introduction along with a teaser from the next section:

Friends sometimes ask how long it takes to write a book. “A lifetime!” I reply without hesitation. We bring everything we have learned to each project we take up. In writing this book I have been acutely conscious of this truth. I have been listening to the Christian message of sin, salvation, and atonement my whole life. I heard it in church services and college classes. I read about it in the Bible and in books of theology. All along I thought I understood what my teachers were saying. A few years ago, however, after having taught theology for over a decade, I realized I did not understand at all. Whenever I taught about the atonement, I found myself repeating phrases taken from Scripture and describing textbook theories of atonement apart from a lively sense of their truth.

Nor was I able to help my students understand. I began to pay closer attention to the ways contemporary preachers, teachers, and popular authors explained the message of salvation. I concluded that they understood it no better than I. At that point, I determined that I had to write this book. It has been a long journey, and there were times when I thought I would never achieve the breakthrough I was seeking. But the moment came when I saw a little light, a glow that grew brighter as I moved toward it. Now when I contemplate the salvation that has come into the world through Jesus Christ I rejoice with my mind as well as my heart.

I hope this book can help others understand the Christian message of salvation in a way that resonates with their experience and strikes them as good news. I offer it as a guide for professors, students, pastors, teachers, and church leaders in their ministries. The book aims to help readers gain a sense of rapport and continuity with the community created by the original gospel events and discover new ways of presenting this good news to those outside. In working toward these ends, I desire to be faithful to Scripture, respectful of tradition, and consistent with reason. Of course, many other writers care about these matters and hold dear these values. I engage with their ideas to affirm or criticize, accept or reject. However, two theological viewpoints on salvation require extensive examination because of their outsized influence and largely negative impact on contemporary Christianity. I consider them soteriological dead ends, and we must move past them if the light is to grow brighter.

Soteriological Dead Ends

Two options dominate the field for making sense of sin and salvation in contemporary Protestant Christianity, the evangelical penal substitution and the liberal moral influence theories of atonement…[to be continued].

Woke Dictionary Entry: “Inclusion” Means “Exclusion

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As I pointed out in the earlier essays in this series, one of the most effective strategies employed by change agents is commandeering words with familiar and positive meanings and redefining them so that the same word carries a very different meaning from the one it previously carried. Like a designer virus, its external familiarity and traditional authority disguises its alien nature long enough for it to infect and reprogram the genetic code of the institution. It is the preferred method of hijackers and heretics.

Inclusion as a Feel Good Word

Today I will examine the third member of the Woke trinity. The word “inclusion,” perhaps even more than the other two members of the triad —“diversity” and “equity”— resonates positively with most people. However, set within the context of social justice theory its meaning changes radically. In this essay I will contrast two different understandings of inclusion.

Most people understand the word “inclusion” in contrast to the word “exclusion.” Inclusion resonates with other such positive words as compassionate, generous, kind, caring, accepting, and loving. Exclusion connotes harsh, arrogant, cruel, rejecting, and disparaging attitudes and behaviors. All of us remember disappointing and humiliating experiences of being excluded and rejected from a sports team, a college, a club, or a set of friends. And we have experienced the affirming feeling of being included and recognized by peers and friends. Hence in everyday language and apart from critical analysis, “inclusion” designates a good act and “exclusion” points to a bad one. But critical analysis tells a different story.

Inclusion as Exclusion in Disguise

Don’t They Teach Logic Anymore?

In my experience inclusion is used in social justice talk as if it were an absolute value, an axiomatic foundation to which every subsequent idea must conform. Policy changes become morally imperative as soon as it becomes clear that they facilitate greater inclusion. Acts of exclusion are always wrong and acts of inclusion are always right. In institutions that accept the inclusion axiom, whoever can sustain their claim to the more inclusive position holds the moral high ground in debates over policy, and whoever represents the less inclusive position bears a huge burden of proof. Indeed, since the axiom declares inclusion to be good and exclusion to be evil, the discussant defending the less inclusive position will be pictured as defending immoral policies.

But inclusion is not and can never be an absolute value. It is logically impossible because the categories of insider and outsider mutually define each other. They are correlatives; you cannot have one without the other. You cannot include someone in an institution, school, club, or church unless there are boundaries that distinguish between those inside and those outside. Groups are defined by what they are not as well as what they are. In fact, this is true of every finite thing. Only the Absolute itself escapes the relativity of all other concepts and things.

Inclusion as a Rhetorical Ploy

In actual practice advocates of social justice theory are very exclusive. Five minutes in a faculty meeting in any contemporary university will teach you that. They use the rhetoric of inclusivity when they wish to break through boundaries they do not like and the rhetoric of demonization and the practice of cancelation to exclude those who defend those boundaries. And it is no mystery where those boundaries lie. As I argued in a previous essay, social justice theorists apply “inclusion” only to people who have been rejected, overlooked, condemned, or marginalized by traditional society. It does not apply to political conservatives of any ethnicity, to traditional Christians and Jews male or female, or to anyone religious or non-religious who defends traditional sexual morality. White men are automatically excluded unless they signal that they are among the woke*and confess their original sin of being born into the dominant group in a systemically racist, sexist, homophobic, and transphobic society.

The Bottom Line

The real issue to be decided, then, is not whether to be inclusive or exclusive. Every institution is both. The question that must be answered concerns the identity and mission of the institution being discussed. Clarity about the identity and mission of the college or church or business or club or service organization will settle the question of boundaries and hence of who may be included and who must be excluded.

*One currently popular way to signal your wokeness is placing your “preferred pronouns” in parentheses after your name in your email signature.

Next Time: I have now finished the analytic and logical critique of the DEI philosophy. I can proceed to my Christian response to it.

Conflicting Visions Diversity and Equity

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Words do not define themselves. As vocalized sounds or written letters, apart from a context, they say nothing good or bad. For they have no precise meaning. Consider the word group, diversity, equity, and inclusion. If American culture were not so deeply divided over Critical Race Theory, Social Justice Theory, cancel culture, and the negative reactions to them, hearing the words diversity, equity, and inclusion would not trigger the emotional response that it does.

Two Meanings of Diversity

Apart from that conflict, the idea of gathering a workforce with a diversity of perspectives and a variety of experiences would be considered an important strategy for achieving the goals of academic or business endeavors: discovery, innovation, and efficiency. Everyone knows that “two heads are better than one.” But it is not just a matter of numbers. Different voices challenge and balance each other to produce a better product…as long as diversity serves as a means to fulfilling the mission of the institution. The mission is the principle of unity, the end toward which all the activity aims. Harmony is dynamic, cooperative movement produced by a creative combination of unity and diversity.

However when diversity becomes an end in itself, the original mission is eclipsed or even aborted. Chaos reigns. Social conflict arises when against all common sense diversity is proclaimed to be an absolute value. Since diversity cannot possibly fulfill this role—it would produce total chaos—people begin to wonder what the real agenda is. Diversity must be contained and regulated. If the type and amount of diversity is not regulated by faithful execution of the mission of the institution, who will regulate it and to what end? We begin to suspect that it will be regulated arbitrarily in service of the private interests of now pervasive diversity officers.

Two Meanings of Equity

Apart from our situation of conflict, the word equity would strike a chord in most people similar to that evoked by the words “fairness” or “justice.” Equity pictures a state of affairs in which society’s rewards and punishments are allotted according to what one deserves because of one’s inherent dignity, character, achievements, and abilities—not on the basis of factors that have nothing to do with merit. Perhaps equity would also connote a subtle sense that fairness and justice have to be achieved by resisting the universal human tendency toward selfishness, unfairness, and injustice.*

However, apart from our polarized situation I do not think most people would think that the ideal of equity should be applied to identity groups as collectives because the measures of what one deserves, of what is fair and just—that is, dignity, character, achievements, and abilities—apply only to individual persons and their unique situations. While in the Western world all members of identity groups are believed to possess inherent dignity, individuals within groups differ greatly with respect to character, achievements, and abilities. Ironically, pursuing equity among identity groups creates inequities at the individual level. Social goods are no longer distributed fairly and justly, that is, according to an individual’s deserts as determined by dignity, character, achievements, and abilities.

Rewards and punishments would be distributed proportionately according to group identity. Implicit in this change in how rewards and punishments are distributed is also a shift in the location of the decision making process and enforcement authority. Decisions can no longer be made within the institution on the basis of individual merit and solely in service the mission of the institution, which make sense according to common sense intuitions of fairness and institutional logic. The institutional mission and common sense notions of fairness have been suborned to the external logic of identity group equity backed by government authority.

In the name of equity, fairness and justice—understood as receiving what one is due as measured by dignity, character, achievements, and ability—would be cast aside. Rewards and punishments would be distributed according to an alien principle having nothing to do with individual deserts. The same word “equity” used in different contexts means completely opposite things. One person’s good is another’s evil. What for one person is just is for another unjust. Fairness in one context is unfairness in another. No wonder there is controversy and confusion!

*Note: I am describing something similar but not identical to the concept of equity found in common law, which appeals to the ordinary person’s sense of fairness in situations where the legal system seems to be unfair.

To be continued….

Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion—Christian Ideals or Golden Calves?

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Deceitful Words

Almost every day I have to endure listening to non- or even anti-Christian meanings being poured into traditional Christian words. Even worse, I hear words whose meanings are determined by non- or anti-Christian contexts proclaimed as the height of Christian orthodoxy, piety, and virtue. This experience is as painful to me as I imagine Moses’s experience was to him as he descended mountain having heard the very voice of God only to discover that Aaron and the Israelites had made a golden calf and were worshiping it as the God who brought them out of Egypt (Ex 32). Today we have a multitudes of “Israelites” and plenty of “Aarons” within Christian circles who are only too happy to assimilate Christianity to the pagan culture surrounding it. And playing word games is one way of disguising the substitution.

Some Contemporary Golden Calves

Traditional Words Are Given Alien Meanings

Some years ago I had to study the works of some very liberal theologians. One theologian, Langdon Gilkey (1919-2004), kept using the word “salvation” in an odd way. He kept saying that there is salvation in all religions. What did he mean? Did he mean that the adherents of all religions would achieve what the New Testament offers as liberation from sin, death, and the devil? Do all religions lead to the arms of Abraham, to resurrection of the dead, to union with the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, to eternal life in fellowship with the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit? However as I kept reading I realized that Gilkey meant something quite different. He meant that all the major religions humanize, elevate, and spiritualize their followers in this life. These religions provide meaning, purpose, and identity. They create community, human solidarity, and ethical guidance. And this is what Gilkey meant by “salvation.” Jesus saves, Buddha saves, and Mohammed saves. They all make people better and happier.

Later in my historical studies, I discovered that retaining a traditional Christian word while shifting its meaning has been the strategy of liberal Christian theology from its beginning in around 1800 until today. In the liberal dictionary,

“Resurrection” means not that God raised Jesus bodily from the dead and that Jesus reigns as lord but that Jesus’s influence lives on and exercises a powerful force in the world.

“Atonement” is not about God actually changing the world through the death and resurrection of Jesus but about the positive impact of the teaching and example of Jesus.

The “Holy Spirit” is not the powerful presence of God witnessing to Jesus Christ and transforming people into his image but for all practical purposes is identified with the progressive spirit of the times.

“Justice” in the Bible means individual behavior that measures up to the letter and the spirit of God’s just laws. Today it has come to mean “social justice,” which is an agenda for reordering society toward equity, diversity, and inclusion.

Words with Secular Meanings Declared Christian

As examples secular/pagan meanings being imported into Christian churches and such parachurch organizations as Christian colleges I will examine the pervasive call for diversity, equity, and inclusion—aka social justice—in all spheres of modern society. As someone who lives and works in higher education—today’s literal counterpart to the mythical Pandora’s Box—I hear this triad invoked at least three times a day as a self-evident moral ideal. In the modern university you can blaspheme the Holy Trinity of Christianity or burn the American flag with impunity but questioning the axiomatic nature of diversity, equity, and inclusion is to commit the unforgivable sin and become subject to cancellation or termination (of employment).

Hence I am constantly amazed when I hear Christian people invoke diversity, equity, and inclusion as Christian ethical imperatives. They do this uncritically and seemingly without awareness of the radical political context within which this triad gains its meaning. In its secular context the triad sets the agenda for the fundamental reordering of society at all levels through political coercion, accompanied with violence if needed. Equity is not identical to the traditional ideals of equality before the law and freedom of choice; it is a condition within which equal proportions of society’s goods are distributed among different communities of identity—especially communities determined by race and gender.  Diversity means that the membership of every institution in a society—business, club, school, etc.—reflects proportionally the diversity of identity groups in society at large. Inclusion refers to the intentional effort to include sufficient representatives from every identity group contained within society at large, especially from those groups whom society tends to oppress, overlook, or marginalize.

Clearly, achieving diversity, equity, and inclusion at all levels of society cannot be left to meritocratic and free market forces or freedom of choice or speech. The interplay of these forces has always led and will always lead to lack of diversity, inequity, and exclusion. Left to themselves historical prejudices, natural affinities and competition always produce insiders and outsiders, winners and losers, oppressors and oppressed. Hence the government must position itself as a counterweight to these forces in service to the ideals of equity, diversity, and inclusion.

Next Time: Are equity, diversity, and inclusion Christian Ideals? Hint: The answer is no.

“That is Your Reality” and Other Silly Expressions

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The 2020/21 school year has ended. Exams have been checked and grades have been posted. I finally have time to write about some issues that have been on my mind for the past year.

No Nonsense Allowed

As readers of this blog know, nothing gets under my skin more than illogical, irrational, and unclear assertions presented as axiomatic truths. I do not like it when this type of speech is used to discuss any subject area or to communicate any message. It offends my aesthetic sense.  However, when such nonsense appears in theological or moral contexts, it awakens my prophetic ire. In my very first post on this blog on August 08, 2013, I made this clear when I said:

I really don’t like...

Dishonesty, hypocrisy, double-speak, self-deception, narcissism, cynicism, misrepresentation, confusion, ignorance, humbug, obfuscation, deception and other intellectual and moral vices.

I really like…

Clarity in thinking, precision in speaking, honesty, truth, common sense, intellectual humility, thoughtfulness and fairness.

So, at least for the first part of the summer I plan to unmask, deconstruct, and poke a bit of fun at some of the humbug, ignorance, and obfuscation that has plagued us for the past year.

“That is Your Reality”

Many expressions current in popular culture drive me crazy but none more than “that is your reality” or some variation thereof, such as “that is your narrative.” Like all catchy expressions, it contains a grain of truth. But it is the effect of combining that grain of truth with a bucket full of nonsense that gets to me. In any proper use of language, the words “real” and “reality” refer to the way things are in themselves apart from perceptual distortions, imaginary constructions, or wishes. Reality serves as the objective standard, the judge, and the reference point for all fact and truth claims.

All assertions are judgments about what is or is not. A judgment always takes the form X is Y. Hence to refute someone’s judgment that “X is Y” by dismissing it with “that is your reality” fractures language and insults logic! Instead of agreeing with the judgment or asserting the contradictory judgment, “Not[X is Y”], it says, “For you but not for me [X is Y].” What does that mean?

Is this just another way of saying, “That is just your opinion, so I am free to ignore it”? I think this is the effect. You get to dismiss the force of an argument without going to the trouble of refuting it. Strictly speaking, to assert that a judgment is an opinion is to assert that the judgment in question is supported only by probable arguments about which reasonable people could disagree. This is a sophisticated distinction. I doubt that most people rise to this level of logical sophistication. Most people use the word “opinion” to mean no more than a subjective preference, unexamined prejudice, or unformed impression.

Reality as Metaphor and Ideology

But why use the word “reality” in the current expression “That is your reality”? I can think of two possibilities. (1) Perhaps this expression is designed to escape the force of an argument without insulting the person making the argument. You can acknowledge the other person’s rationality, sincerity, and their subjective certainty without accepting the objective truth of their judgment. In this case you are using the word “reality” metaphorically to signify the practical certainty with which the other person holds the belief in question. For them it seems so real that they are willing to act on this basis. You are acknowledging their certainty as a sincere driving force in their lives. Still, it seems a bit condescending to soften your rejection of their judgment with a verbal pat on the head.

But there is another less benign possibility. (2) The expression could be a popular derivative of the postmodern theory that reality, truth, knowledge, good, and beautiful are merely conceptual instruments of oppression invented by the dominant class or race or gender to gain and maintain their dominance. According to postmodern theory, those who have power and privilege determine what is taught as real, true, and known. And these concepts by definition demand submission of mind and body. But these definitions are merely ideologies whose sole purpose is to express and preserve the power interests of the dominant class, racial, or gender.

When a thoroughgoing postmodern thinker says to you “That is your reality” they are charging you with living according to an order of moral and aesthetic values and assumed truths designed and constructed to reinforce your position of power and privilege. This order seems real to you because it tells you what you want to hear, and it tells you what you want to hear because you and people like you wrote the script to fit yourselves. And it is so persuasive that you think your own propaganda perfectly reflects reality, the way things are apart from perceptual distortions, imaginary constructions, or wishes

Why Silly?

Why, then, does my title label the expression “That is your reality” as silly? The word silly applies to judgments or behavior that sets forth absurdities so obvious that they evoke riotous laughter. Using the word “reality” metaphorically to mean “illusion” with a straight face is indeed silly to the point of the farcical. But using the word “reality” to mean an “illusion constructed for an evil purpose” presses irony into the service of sarcasm. And sarcasm unlike irony aims to destroy rather than instruct. It’s too serious, to be silly.

The Author’s Dilemma—An Autobiographical Reflection on the Maxim, “No Good Deed Goes Unpunished”

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As readers of this blog know I recently published two books, Rethinking Church and The New Adam: What the Early Church Can Teach Evangelicals (and Liberals) About the Atonement (Cascade, 2021). Although I felt compelled to write and publish those books and I believe they are worth reading, I have a hard time feeling good about promoting them. Part of my hesitancy arises from imagining that other people might view me as promoting myself, seeking honor, or placing myself above others.

This fear was reinforced about a week ago. I posted a link to the Amazon.com page for The New Adam to a FB group to which I belong. (It is important that you know that this is a church group.) One person commented on the link something like this:

“I wish people would stop trying to sell their Bulls…ty books to this group.” [BTW to protect this person’s identity, I’ve deleted the original post and all subsequent comments.]

What do you say to a comment like this? I said something like this:

“I did not know bulls…ty was a biblical term. Perhaps, even if you read my book you would still think that it is bulls…ty, but surely you cannot know this before you read it.  I wonder what you want from authors and teachers. Should they cease writing and speaking and hide their thoughts from the world for fear that someone will think they are merely seeking attention or placing themselves above others? I think about all the great books I’ve read and how much I appreciate the labor that went into them and the insights I received from them. Indeed, no human being is without sin. Everyone loves honor and enjoys attention, and no author’s heart is entirely pure. But isn’t too cynical to judge the work of every author, speaker, and teacher—even when you have not studied their works—as exclusively self-aggrandizement?”

I agree that there are too many books. Libraries are full of them, and millions more are printed every year. Many of them repeat what has been said hundreds of times already. Most do not grab my attention. With rare exceptions, I read only the best books I can find on whatever issue I am thinking about at the time.

Why then do I write more books and essays? Is it because I need attention and confirmation? Perhaps this is a factor; I won’t deny it. But there are other reasons as well. When I was a young person I had many troubling questions. I needed answers. I asked my teachers, and I searched in books. Within my circle at that time I found no one who could help. And there were so many books in the library I did not where to start. Soon realized that to make progress I had to think through problems for myself, and I discovered that the best way for me to do that was to write. I also discovered through experience that other people could benefit from my work of thinking and writing.

What drives me to write and publish, besides the need for attention and affirmation? I want to understand my Christian faith insofar as I can and I believe that helping others to understand is one of the best things I can do for them.

Do I believe that by thinking about the issues surrounding the atonement I have achieved greater insight into my faith in Jesus Christ and the salvation he offers? Yes. I do. Do I want you to read The New Adam? Yes. I do. Do I want you to tell others about it? Yes…because I want them see what I have seen and experience what I have experienced. I pray the Lord will forgive me for my less noble motives. And if there is any bulls…t in my books I pray that my readers will forgive that as well.

Note on the definition of B.S.: In his famous essay “On Bs…t,” Harry Frankfurt defines this mode of speech as focused not primarily on truth, as the liar and the truth teller are, but on conveying a favorable impression about the speaker to the audience. One who speaks this way carelessly blabs confidently about things he does not really understand (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2005).  

Was Jesus Punished for Our Sins?

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From the Publisher:

Have you ever found yourself repeating expressions such as “”Jesus saves”” or “”Jesus died for our sins”” without really understanding them? When popular speakers “”explain”” how Jesus’s death satisfied God’s wrath so you could be forgiven, do you ever think to yourself, “”I don’t get it””? If so, you’re not alone, you’re not dumb, and the problem is not with you. Ron Highfield reframes Christian teaching about the atonement so that it comes alive with fresh meaning. Drawing on biblical and traditional sources, Highfield explains why our frustration in trying to understand how Jesus’s death satisfies God’s judicial wrath is inevitable . . . because the idea doesn’t make sense and the Bible doesn’t teach it! Instead of viewing the atonement as the solution to God’s problem of how to forgive sins while remaining perfectly just, Highfield argues that the atonement is God’s solution to our problem. In Jesus, God rewrites the human story, forgiving our sins, correcting our mistakes, and realizing our destiny. As one of us, Jesus lives a perfect life, passes through death, and enters into eternal life. As the new Adam, he invites us to join his family, share his life, and enjoy his victory

How Does Jesus Save?

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After six years of work my book on the atonement The New Adam is finally in print. I hope you will check it out and recommend it to others. We often repeat such statements as “Jesus saves” or “Jesus died for our sins” without understanding what they mean. Perhaps we think we don’t need to understand. However I believe that the first Christian believers understood, and I believe we can also understand. This book will, I believe, deepen your understanding of how Jesus saves and what salvation means. I will be blogging for the next few weeks on some ideas from this book.

At the time of this post the preview link is not working. Go directly to Amazon.com and search for Ron Highfield, The New Adam.