You won’t find better parody than that which isn’t intentional. Having spent a short time now observing the actions of The Emerging Church myself and my good friend Luke stumbled across an apparent similiarity between the logo for The Emergent Village and The Onion
Since Emergent theology is rampantly postmodern and you just can’t parody postmodernism since it almost is, by definition, a parody, I did find it quite amusing that the two logos shared such similarities.
If you like a good dose of irony then there’s no better ideology to go to than postmodernism. Consider for a moment holding to a philosophy that effectively defines itself as being undefinable because words do not have any objective meaning whilst all the time using words to define its non definition. Confused? Well, have a look at emergent village’s FAQ page in which they categorically declare their dislike of confessional creeds.
We don’t have a problem with faith, but with statements (read more here).
So far so good right? Well hold on to your ironicometers, they’re about to bust through the roof. The words (read more here) lead to this page in which they lay out their anti-creedal creed. Take that satire!
Please forgive my tone. I don’t want to be thought of as mean spirited. I find the motives of the leaders of the emerging movement to be challenging. They place a strong emphasis on being uncritical of fellow believers and engaging in society changing social action. For that they can be praised. But while they confess the gospel message with their lips the reality of that seems somewhat different. Emergent theology doesn’t try so much to engage with postmodernism as it does be postmodern. And if objective truth is laid aside in favour of subjective interpretation, this writer can’t see any other consequence than for the objectiveness of the gospel to suffer as a result.
Sure, I think we should embrace doubts, questions, uncertainties and even the surety with which we hold our interpretation of scripture. But all the while we recognise that there is objective truth even if we have not yet attained to it. Emergents appear to regard certainty as dogma, dogma as absolute truth and absolute truth as unrighteous arrogance. In short, if there is objective truth, emergents don’t seem to want to know about it.
Which leaves me with one question. If words cannot have objective meaning, what is the purpose of writing books, blogs and sermons that can rightly be interpreted any way you feel it works for you? Take Brian McLaren’s interpretation of John 14:6 in The Secret (read: Gnostic?) Message of Jesus. He denies the exclusivity of Christ and offers a wider and, presumably, better interpretation of Jesus’ words. I might just thank him how well he lays out the case for the exclusivity of Christ and when he says I read him wrong, as a postmodern, am likely to be well within my rights to reply, “That’s not how I read your words.”
A+. People think the creeds are intended to be exclusive, but they’re not. They’re meant as helps. I have trouble believing it all all of the time, and it is good to be reminded and encouraged. That’s what creeds are for.
Creeds are useful. They’re useful for identifying who you’re speaking to rather than having to define it every time.
It’s a problem when they become the focus of the message rather than the gospel.