A Diversion for Prothero

I need to diverge from the Israel blog series for a couple reasons. One, it is taking me so long to get back to writing about each day that I am suppressing other important thoughts and messages, and two, I am in the midst of an important thought and message, which is the content of this blog. I have every intention of returning to the Israel blog in at least two more insertions, both having to do with my experience in Jerusalem and having been very formative for me ever since, but those will have to wait.

This evening, I attended a lecture by a newly-renowned professor named Stephen Prothero. He is the chair of the Religious Studies department at Boston University, and has written several books that look very intriguing to me, the most intriguing being American Jesus. That book explores the various persona Americans have fit Jesus into. Nonetheless, it was not the topic of his lecture, nor is it the topic of this blog.

The topic of his lecture was his newest book, which I purchased about an hour before the lecture and thumbed through in hopes of getting a feel for his thought before I attended (at this time I feel I did so rather successfully, but I will read the book in full soon), entitled Religious Literacy: What Every American Needs to Know—and Doesn’t. In it, he makes a rather astute observation: Americans are at once very religious (a vast majority claim to believe in God), and yet at the same time very religiously illiterate, both about the religions we claim to be connected to and the other major religions of the world. This, he argues, is a big problem, especially when the most important issues of our day (abortion, stem-cell research, poverty, gay-marriage, etc.) are being discussed by the decision makers in ways peppered with religious—particularly Christian—language. To be fair, he never said this is a problem in and of itself, just that it is commonplace.

Of course, the problem with the two realities (that is, thoroughgoing religious illiteracy and regular usage of "religious rhetoric") is that if they are both true, then hardly anyone has any idea how to engage the arguments that are being made—including the politicians making them. Beyond that, Prothero pointed out that the vast majority of the world operates in religiously charged manners, and religious motivations are far more prevalent than we realize (such as the underlying conflict between Sunnis and Shiites that seemed to "appear" after we established a strong military presence in Iraq).

His premise thus far is a healthy one, in my estimation: religious illiteracy is a problem. That goes for me and my fellow evangelicals as much as it does for the religiously post-modernist in your nearest coffee bar. But his methodology—that is, his way of approaching the problem—is fundamentally flawed. You see, Dr. Prothero claims a very distinct difference between theologians and religious scholars. One, he claims, practices and espouses a certain religion, while trying to understand it—it is more of a direct connection to God. The other simply studies the people of various religions, examining what they believe.

This seems basically okay, until we begin to draw the implications of it out. What Prothero has done is follow the humanistic line that has been unconsciously drawn across all of Western culture: we have decided that we are able, somehow, to categorize the sacred and the secular apart from one another. In other words, we have drawn a line between "religion" and "public life." Regularly throughout the lecture, he differentiated between what might be "religious" concerns and his own, seemingly more noble and even-minded "civic" concerns. From his standpoint, those Politicians who spout biblical analogies to support their agenda are simply using religious rhetoric to court the masses. While this certainly happens on a large scale on both the "left" and the "right" of the political spectrum, it is going too far to assume that religion is only being used as a tool.

In short, Prothero does not have a category for dealing with a reality behind every religious discussion: the category of truth. In fact, every major world religion is a description of reality—the whole scope of reality (this is called a "worldview"). So anyone who faithfully understands his or her religion is committing a crime against it when attempting to separate out some ethical or political issue from that realm of belief. Morals, virtues, ethics, our sense of Justice and character—these all come from somewhere (or, more accurately, from someOne). The line cannot exist if one of these worldviews is true.

It seems, however, that Prothero is willing to eat his own dogfood. In his introduction to both the lecture and his book, he tells the story of a colleague from Europe who noticed a stark difference between American and European students. American students are very religious—many of them faithfully attend church, and yet are radically religiously illiterate. European students are just the opposite—they are very religiously literate, but the vast majority would never consider stepping foot in a religious institution, especially a Christian church. That sparked the book Prothero wrote, and in it he presents a plan to help raise religious literacy.

I couldn’t resist, during question-and-answer time, to ask him if he thought his proposed solution, if applied on a broad scale, would lead to an irreligious people who are knowledgeable about religions, just like European students. He first spoke about how he usually avoids this question, but since he had consumed a few glasses of wine before the lecture, he was willing to answer it tonight: the short answer is… yes. His primary reason for that is the widespread reality, which I regrettably admit, of anti-intellectualism amongst the Evangelical majority. The way the faith is presented in many circles discourages thinking, never once stopping to recognize that Jesus called us to love the Lord our God with all our mind, too.

His answer is both a critique of his premise (the supposed divide between the religious realm and the secular realm) and a critique of the church. If God did create this world, then the most fundamental realities within it will ultimately reflect his glory. Why are we not willing to sharpen our minds, engage our culture, and show them the God who creates and redeems, who is Lord of the universe? To quote the professor whose passions helped sow the thoughts behind this blog, Douglas Groothuis (see "The Constructive Curmudgeon," a link on the right): "Anti-intellectualism is a cruel pox on the face of evangelicalism. It must be removed through teaching, preaching, writing, and living in a way that the truth is rationally and passionately presented." Amen. It’s time to attend more lectures like these with courage, humility, and confidence in the truth. If the Holy Spirit promises to give us the words we need before the world (see Matthew 10:19-20), why are we afraid to go before the judges?

[If you've read through this and find yourself totally lost, wondering what on earth I'm trying to say, I heartily recommend two books that say it much more clearly than I do. The first is called The God Who is There by Francis Schaeffer. This is a must read, in my opinion. The second is by a student of Schaeffer's and is an excellent read, as well. It is called Total Truth by Nancy Pearcey. These works show thoroughly how the "line" between "religious" and "secular" has been drawn, and how it colors the world we are taught to see. Read them thoughtfully: no matter what you do, they will impact your life for the better.]