Years ago, I wrote an article titled "Does Believing In The Fundamentals Make Me A Fundamentalist?" in which I explored all the negative connotations associated with fundamentalism juxtaposed with a desire to get back to basics; to what, in basketball, one would call "the fundamentals". There seemed to be, in our postmodern efforts to eschew fundamentalism, an unwillingness to submit ourselves to tradition and wisdom married to a desire to equate newness with goodness. Did our efforts to live in the moment not put us at risk to simply make it up as we went along? Like jazz musicians who know to learn basic notes and rhythms before they ever attempt to improvise, ought we not also return to the fundamentals before attempting to improvise on faith? Then again, does this "back to basics" approach make us closed off and stagnant, placing rules over relationship and old law over new life?
It's something I still wrestle with, but this excerpt from Slavoj Zizek's Violence helped to articulate what I've been feeling in better words than I could write:
...are the terrorist fundamentalists, be they Christian or Muslim, really fundamentalists in the authentic sense of the term? Do they really believe? What they lack is a feature that is easy to discern in all authentic fundamentalists, from Tibetan Buddhists to the Amish is the U.S.: the absence of resentment and envy, the deep indifference towards the non-believers' way of life. If today's so-called fundamentalists really believe they have found their way to truth, why should they feel threatened by non-believers, why should they envy them? When a Buddhist encounters a Western hedonist, he hardly condemns him. He just benevolently notes that the hedonist's search for happiness is self-defeating. In contrast to true fundamentalists, the terrorist pseudo-fundamentalists are deeply bothered, intrigued, fascinated by the sinful life of non-believers. One can feel that, in fighting the sinful Other, they are fighting their own temptation. These so-called Christian or Muslim fundamentalists are a disgrace to true fundamentalism.
Yeah. What he said. Let us who are Christians, remember that there is no shame in being a "true believer", but that what we believe in is the God who became man so that, in Christ, He might convince and not coerce, He might show us the promise of the Kingdom coming and then offer the invitation to "Come, follow me." Let us take up our cross, lead by example, and live and tell the story of the One in whom the entire universe will one day be reconciled, inviting others to be reconciled to God in Christ and to become ministers of reconciliation even as we have chosen to be. Let us go back to the basics of love of God and of neighbor, back to the hard truths of Jesus' sermon on the hill, back to the kind of fundamentalism that brings hope to the world.
4 comments:
I like the distinction you made between "returning to the fundamentals" and "fundamentalism"... and Zizek's words were brilliant. That's an interesting way of separating one way of being that is an honest attempt to be dedicated to Christ, and an another, that is at best, a zealotry which is only distantly connected to religious ideals. These do not belong in the same "bucket". However, I would go further than classifying the response of the amish or tibetan monks as an indifference to contact with western hedonism. It is that, but it is also a disengagement with the western world. However holy and admirable, I think the biggest problem with this way of life is how disconnected they are with the impoverished (moral, health, etc.). This makes sense for the Buddhist. For Christians, not so much. What I'm having a problem seeing, is how we get from "returning to the fundamentals" to your sentiment of "bringing hope to the world." We cannot do that in micro worlds we create for ourselves to live in. What I am more interested in is how one can live a holy life, and engage to the fullest extent with the lost and dying of the earth. How do we do the "in the world" and not just the "not of the world." To me, this is the essence of Christ.
This is why I am a Christian and not a Buddhist, I do sense a disengagement that is opposite of the incarnation. My example, as a Christian, is Christ. Someone unencumbered and unimpressed by the world and yet with a deep love for the world. Willing to hate "the world" (its ideals and desires and stories) in order to love the world (the creation and the people living in it). The "fundamentals" of Christianity then become "love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength and love your neighbor as yourself". They become the sermon on the hill. They become the proclamation from Isaiah of "good news to the poor and freedom for the prisoner" they become "I was hungry and you fed me" and so on. In our desire to escape fundamentalism, we can forget the fundamentals, and Christianity becomes about good feelings, positive thinking, high self-esteem, the Secret in Jesus' clothing (Joel Osteen). Give me the fundamentalism of the Amish who have one of their own gunned down and respond by going to the shooter's family to care for them. That is Christianity at its most fundamental. That is hope for the world.
Very good stuff. But I'm not sure [the bad kind of] fundamentalism is reducible to one kind of thing that can mark all religions. You may have Christian fundamentalists, Muslim fundamentalists, Buddhist fundamentalists, and so on, but each "fundamentalism" might be significantly different. I don't speak as any kind of scholar of present circumstances, but historically it might precisely Muslim fundamentalism to raid foreign lands, regardless of the temptation they presented. So I'm not so convinced by Zizek that "fundamentalism" is a thing.
That said, whether it is fundamentally Muslim to attack other cities or not, I still believe that they are absolutely a false religion.
I cannot comment as experientially or intelligently on Islam or on Buddhism as I can on Christianity (which is still not as intelligently as many could). All I know is that what Zizek writes about fundamentalism can certainly be applied to Christianity; that being, that a proper understanding of the basic fundamentals means that destruction and coercion of "the other" is out. We live by example and invitation; we are disciples and make disciples. That is at the core of Christian teaching. Again, those words of Jesus, "Come, follow me." I agree that there might be a group (religious or otherwise) whose fundamental ideals are to destroy and conquer. In that case, being a fundamentalist would be a bad thing. If the fundamentals of a faith are "love God, love others, feed the hungry, clothe the naked, proclaim freedom the the prisoner and good news to the poor and go and teach others what I have taught you" then fundamentalism is a good thing. The good or bad of fundamentalism seems to be solely dependent upon what those fundamentals are.
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