Living the Love of Christ Among People of Other Faiths Theological Questions

1. Living the Love of Christ Among People of Other FaithsTheological Questions @malmar2010 #call2mission

2. A Central Question ‘How do we combine faith in God as revealed uniquely in Jesus Christ with the confession that God has not left himself without a witness?’ (Bosch, Transforming Mission,2011:500)

3. Questions of Faith • Do other faiths worship the same God? • What do they believe about Jesus? • Is salvation to be found in other faiths? • Do faiths share a common moral basis? • Are shalom and salaam the same? • Should we share significant celebrations? • How can we practice Holiness as Hospitality?

4. Exclusivism(s) ‘…he can’t be a Hindu, a Christian and a Muslim. It’s impossible. He must choose.’ (Martel, Life of Pi, 2002:69) We’re right, you’re wrong!

5. Exclusivism(s) • John 14:6 I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. • Acts 4:12 There is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among mortals by which we must be saved.

6. Exclusivism(s)

7. Exclusivism(s) ‘In dealing with the followers of non-Christian religions, any attack upon…the false should be avoided, as this would only arouse anger in those who believe it to be true.’ (Booth, quoted in Coutts, Our Faith and Theirs, 1965:10)

8. Exclusivism(s) • 1 John 4:7 Beloved, let us love one another, because love is from God; everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. • ‘…anyone who has had intimate friendship with a devout Hindu or Muslim would find it impossible to believe that the experience of God of which his friend speaks is simply illusion or fraud.’ (Newbigin, The Gospel in a Pluralist Society, 1989:174)

9. Karl Barth ‘…by the grace of God there are men who live by His grace…To the extent that this is self-evident in the case of Christians and the Christian religion, we can and must say of it that it and it alone is the true religion.’ (Barth, Church Dogmatics, vol 1.2, 1956:346)

10. Inclusivism(s) ‘If there’s only one nation in the sky, shouldn’t all passports be valid for it?’ (Martel, Life of Pi, 2002:74) We’re right, you’re not entirely wrong!

11. Inclusivism(s) • Acts 17:22-31 ‘The Spirit works in advance of mission beyond the confines of the Christian community.’ (Pinnock, ‘An Inclusivist View’ in Four Views on Salvation in a Pluralistic World, 1996:105) ‘It is Christ alone who is received as light when grace visits a Brahmin, a Buddhist or a Muhammadan reading his own scriptures.’ (Khodr, quoted in Race, Christians and Religious Pluralism, 1993:50)

12. Inclusivism(s)

13. Karl Rahner ‘Christianity does not simply confront the member of an extra-Christian religion as a mere non-Christian but as someone who can and must already be regarded in this or that respect as an anonymous Christian. It would be wrong to regard the pagan as someone who has not yet been touched in any way by God’s grace and truth.’ (Rahner, Theological Investigations, vol.5, 1966:131)

14. Islamic Inclusivism ‘every revealed religion can be named as islam, when it is seen as “a state of submission to God”.’ (Adnan Aslan, quoted in Harrison, Religion and Modern Thought, 2007:204)

15. Pluralism(s) ‘They didn’t know that I was a practising Hindu, Christian and Muslim’ (Martel, Life of Pi, 2002:64) We’re all somewhat right!

16. Pluralism(s) • 2 Peter 3:9 The Lord is not slow about his promise, as some think of slowness, but is patient with you, not wanting any to perish, but all to come to repentance.

17. Pluralism(s) ‘God cannot have left himself without a witness at most times and in most places…most people cannot have been cut off from his saving grace just by the accidents of circumstance.’ (Polkinghorne, Science and Belief, 1994:177)

18. Pluralism(s) ‘…pluralist christology is orthodox in affirming the basic experience and conviction of Christians regarding the true divinity of Jesus, but does so in a non-competitive way. It simply recognises that what God has done in Jesus, God can do in other religious mediations and does.’ (Haight, ‘Outline for an Orthodox Pluralist Christology’ in Christian Approaches to Other Faiths, 2009:57,58)

19. John Hick ‘…the Real as personal is known in the Christian tradition as God the Father; in Judaism as Adonai; in Islam as Allah, the Qur’ānic revealer; in the Indian traditions as Shiva, or Vishnu, or Paramātmā, and under the many other lesser images of deity…’ (Hick, ‘Religious Pluralism’ in Christian Approaches to Other Faiths, 2009:48)

20. Jewish Pluralism ‘to all peoples of the world, God has disclosed Himself in numerous ways. Thus, neither in Judaism, nor for that matter in any other religion, has God revealed Himself completely.’ (Rabbi Dan Cohn-Sherbok) (quoted in Harrison, Religion and Modern Thought, 2007:217)

21. Islamic Pluralism ‘Do not attach yourself to any particular creed exclusively, so that you may disbelieve all the rest; otherwise you will lose much good…God, the omnipresent and omnipotent, is not limited by any one creed…’ (Ibn al-Arabi, 1165-1240CE) (quoted in Harrison, Religion and Modern Thought, 2007:213)

22. Postmodernism(s) ‘I suppose that’s what we’re all trying to do – love God.’ (Martel, Life of Pi, 2002:69) We’re all equally right!

23. Postmodernism(s) ‘The position…is exclusivist in the sense that it affirms the unique truth of the revelation in Jesus Christ, but it is not exclusivist in the sense of denying the possibility of the salvation of the non-Christian. It is inclusivist in the sense that it refuses to limit the saving grace of God to the members of the Christian Church, but it rejects the inclusivism which regards the non-Christian religions as vehicles of salvation…’

24. Postmodernism(s) ‘…It is pluralist in the sense of acknowledging the gracious work of God in the lives of all human beings, but it rejects a pluralism which denies the uniqueness and decisiveness of what God has done in Jesus Christ.’ (Newbigin, The Gospel in a Pluralist Society, 1989:182,183)

25. Postmodernism(s)

26. Postmodernism(s) • Mark 9:40 Whoever is not against us is for us • Matthew 12:30 Whoever is not with me is against me

27. Postmodernism(s) ‘…other religions are to be valued by Christians, not because they are channels of grace or means of salvation for their adherents, but because they play a real but as yet not fully specifiable role in the divine plan to which the Christian community bears witness.’ (DiNoia, quoted in Hedges, Christian Approaches to Other Faiths, 2008:119)

28. Living the Love of Christ ‘I don’t know what’s right and what’s real anymore’ (Lily Allen, The Fear)

29. Living the Love of Christ ‘…the essential contribution of the Christian to the dialogue will simply be the telling of the story, the story of Jesus…it is only the Holy Spirit of God who can so touch the hearts and consciences of the others that they are brought to accept the story as true…she will not imagine that it is her responsibility to ensure that the other is persuaded. That is in God’s hands.’ (Newbigin, The Gospel in a Pluralist Society, 1989:182)

30. Living the Love of Christ ‘We know only in part, but we do know. And we believe that the faith we profess is both true and just, and should be proclaimed. We do this, however, not as judges or lawyers, but as witnesses; not as soldiers, but as envoys of peace; not as high-pressure salespersons, but as ambassadors of the Servant Lord.’ (Bosch, Transforming Mission, 2011:501)