Musings: Notes From My Daybook

We don't normally think about it, but books like UnChristian  by David Kinnamon force us to think deeply about how non-Christian people perceive Christians.  To be more theologically grounded, the question would be how does God perceive our public witness?  So in light of that, it raises the question of brand.

How are we known?  How do we know ourselves? For an interesting conversation about brand and congregational mission see this essay here.

The term "evangelical" has had quite a ride over the past 50 years.  From its roots in the Old and New Testament, through its reemergence in the Reformation, its use in American Christianity on the frontier, and then its connections mainly through Billy Graham in the 1950's and on, the term has been stretched like a rubber band.  Most concerning has been the  word's use in political circles.

In fact, in recent years, the word has come to mean in American contexts, more about a particular political vision and less about a theological center.  It is that shift that a number of leading American Evangelicals have sought to address in a document called the Evangelical Manifesto.   Announced last week at the National Press Club, this document, seeks to act as a corrective to a politicizing of theological framework.

 For the most part, I think that the framers have done well--though it does strike me as odd that a document seeking to assert a theological vision and create a healthy distance between polictics and church is announced in Washington, D.C.

 More later.

As we move deeper into the national election cycle we shall hear more and more extremism and exaggeration from candidates, from supporters, and from the media.  Sorting all that out and making informed decisions will require moving beyond the black and white that is usually offered to looking deeper into the complexity of issues and the complexity of the candidates themselves.

One good example of that kind of reflection comes from Garry Wills in a New York Review piece where he compares the Illinois senator with an Illinois senator from the 1850's who was also running for president.  At first blush you might find a comparison between Obama and Lincoln to bizarre and construed.  However, if one takes the time to think about they dynamics and contexts around the two speeches that Wills reviews, then I think that one comes to a different light.

I want to make clear that I have no idea who I will vote for in November.  However, I do hope for and will work for  reasoned and thoughtful dialogue.    Thank you Gary. 

David Gushee's article is a good way of remembering Martin Luther King today.

Earlier in March, I had occasion to drive north from Cambridge to Edinburgh while in Britain.  With a couple of hours on hand, I eagerly made my way to Durham to see the cathedral there.  One of the oldest cathedrals in Britain, it offers a beautiful example of Norman construction.  A number of people important  to the Christian community are buried there--including Cuthbert, an early saint and pioneer not only of Durham but of Lindisfarne and Bede, the historian.

But in my time walking through this wonderful space and enjoying the way in which the present Christian community use the building in worshipful and forming ways, I found a stone in memorial of one of the deans of the cathedral that caught my eye.  Spencer Cowper, born in 1713 and who passed in 1774, served as a leader in the Christian community there nearly thirty years.  What I found most riveting was the brief comment on the stone.  Spencer Cowper, Dean of Durham:  "Life spent in the uniform practice of unaffected Piety, Friendship, Humanity, Hospitality, and Charity."

I like that description--the uniform practice of some very basic and valuable virtues.  It can be easy, from time to time, to show piety or friendship.  However, to do so faithfully, consistently every day is no small matter.  To be uniform, consistent, focused, and purposeful about our virtues sounds like high praise.

I hope for something similar to be said about me.