The Logic of Intersubjectivity. Darren M. Slade

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СКАЧАТЬ The Philosophy of Religion

The most basic assumption of this study is that McLaren is, in fact, a philosopher of religion.81 Being different from an academic study of theology, the philosophy of religion systematizes the logical and philosophical rationale underlying a belief system’s basic ideas, as well as the criteria used to evaluate those beliefs.82 In the West, this undertaking has traditionally employed logical formulas to justify religious assumptions.83 However, with McLaren’s philosophy of Christian religion (often termed a “religio-philosophy” in this book), an academic survey of his beliefs must specifically investigate how McLaren approaches his Christian faith, the rationale for why, and the evaluative criteria he uses to assess Christian paradigms. The assumption here is that McLaren’s belief system actually resembles a “body politic” where his beliefs and practices unite him to a particular subculture within American Christianity, being the overarching ideology that permeates his perceptions and interpretations of reality.84

Underlying this method is what Howard Kee refers to as social interior-exterior dimensions: “(1) the interior dimensions of social groups, by which groups form, merge, evolve, and by which leadership and group goals emerge and change; and (2) exterior aspects by which group identity develops in relation to the wider culture.”85 From these dimensions, this investigation will utilize social-scientific data (where appropriate) to identify the evolutionary development of McLaren’s religiosity.86 Nonetheless, because of its academic nature, the study will remain theologically impartial regarding his beliefs in order to focus on discovering, simplifying, and systematizing his reasoning processes within their socio-historical context.87 As expected, however, any discussion of McLaren’s work must also address his fictional novels.

      1.6.2 McLaren’s Fictional Writings

By acknowledging that his writing style is closely aligned with Søren Kierkegaard (cf. MRTYR §1, 27‒28; PTP, 125), McLaren makes an explicit distinction between his nonfictional material (“signed” discourses) and his fictional “dialogs.” This book views McLaren’s novels as an indirect method for challenging the status quo of American religiosity by disturbing its culture-religion and exposing readers to the strengths and weaknesses of divergent approaches to faith.88 The trouble is with how to identify McLaren’s actual viewpoints from the fictional interactions of his characters. Mimicking Kierkegaard, McLaren states in one novel, “Please don’t assume that any of these characters can be fully identified with the ‘I’ who wrote this Introduction” (NKOC §Intro., xxvi).89 In a separate novel, however, McLaren explains, “Nearly all [the book’s] conversations were drawn from the many real-life conversations I have participated in over recent years” (SWFOI §Pref., xiv).90 Therefore, applying the “principle of coherence” derived from historical Jesus research, this study will presume McLaren agrees with a fictional character’s contention if it coheres to one of his signed discourses.91

Underlying this method is a distinction between the historical (or “empirical”) author and the aesthetic (“implied”) persona of McLaren’s veiled arguments. Narrative literary critics often argue that the “implied author” of a story can never truly be identical to the “empirical author” because the book’s narrator, as well as the varied fictional characters, embody different cultural and emotional dimensions. The implied author becomes the voice behind the story, who regulates which information to consider, which questions to ask, and which value judgments to accept concerning particular plot points and ethical decisions. Stated differently, McLaren reasonably expects his audience to allow the embedded persona of his novels to guide readers toward self-reflection over their own beliefs. This tactic allows readers to appreciate the ethical-religious world of the plot’s narrative and to understand the perspective of its characters, even if the reader does not ultimately agree with the book’s conclusions.92

      1.7 Summary

      Ultimately, McLaren contends that there exists an incongruity between what Christians profess to be true and what Christians demonstrate to be true in their personal lives. For him, conventional paradigms have capitulated to modernity, which has tarnished the way believers express their faith in both word and deed. Here, conventional paradigms have prioritized arguments about God so much that believers now cognitively declare their religion “true” but live as though their faith is not real enough to transform them personally. As McLaren explains,

      What many experience in religious communities on a popular level seems closer to the opposite of love. Religion as they experience it promotes conflict and selfishness rather than generosity and otherliness. It teaches them to prioritize their own personal salvation and religiosity over the well-being of others. It teaches practices and beliefs that make some fear, dehumanize, and judge others. (NS §2, 15)

      In this sense, Christianity has become more of a culture-religion than an embodied relationship with the divine. Thus, the thesis of this book is that McLaren is an abductive rationalist and phenomenological empiricist, who deliberately creates controversy through rhetoric and satirical provocations to stimulate the rethinking of conventional paradigms, such as when he questions whether God himself is an atheist (GI, 200). Here, McLaren is not anti-conventionalism; he is simply post-conventionalism, meaning he wants to retain what is good in older paradigms while jettisoning what is bad.

      Significantly, both conservative and postmodern Christians alike object to McLaren’s ideas and his provocative writing style. The problem for many is that McLaren is deliberately ambiguous and controversial in his writings, which often leads to distortions about his actual beliefs, such as when McLaren writes, “As I get older, I confess that talking about God is getting increasingly uncomfortable, even painful at times” (GI, 178). Moreover, he purposely complicates his philosophy in order to be scandalous, capitalizing on inflammatory rhetoric in order to capture his readers’ attention. One problem is that many of his critics do not realize he is intentionally engaging in generalizations, irony, and humor when critiquing conventional Western Christianity. Thus, his critics often complain that he merely reflects an increasingly hostile culture without the proper nuance of actual scholarship.

In short, what is argued here is that McLaren’s philosophy of religion suggests a faith-based intersubjective relationship with the divine ought to result in an existential appropriation of Christ’s religio-ethical teachings. When subjectively internalized, this appropriation will lead to the assimilation of Jesus’ kingdom priorities, thereby transforming the believer’s identity into one that actualizes Jesus’ kingdom ideals.93 To accomplish this new paradigm, McLaren enlarges empirical categories to include mysticism and divergent theological perspectives. In other words, numinous experiences become a type of “empirical” evidence for McLaren because they involve sensory data. Since many derive their religious beliefs from these sensory encounters, McLaren seeks to utilize both his own intuition and experiences, as well as the intuition and experiences of others, in developing a new philosophy of Christian religion.

      In axiomatic structure, which will be elaborated and clarified in the following chapters, McLaren’s religio-philosophy is divisible into two main sections:

      A.An authentically beautiful and plausible Christian belief system that is both objectively true and subjectively meaningful will derive from the faith-based paradoxy of the incarnation, signifying that

      i.Jesus Christ is the ineffable embodiment of transcendent Truth,

      a.who stimulates divergent theological perspectives to correct the myopia of human dogmatism, thereby compelling

      b.an intersubjective relationship with the Creator and his creation

      c.in pursuit of existentially embodying Christ’s kingdom values,

      ii.which reprioritizes Christianity from a system of doctrinal esoterica to a suprarational organism that

      a.evolves over time as people’s experiential intimacy with Christ deepens their spiritual СКАЧАТЬ