[asa] Re: [asa] Christianity: “balance?” of truth and solace

Merv -

Then there's the other extreme. I was told of a pastor who agreed to do a
funeral for a prostitute so that he could proclaim that Christ didn't die
for people like that!

But you point out a real problem. A few pastoral comments -

1) At the beginning of a funeral service I tell the congregation that we
are here "to remember the life of Joe Schmoe (or whoever) and to celebrate
God's promise of the resurrection in Jesus Christ. Both are important. A
funeral is not simply the burial of a generic someone. But what makes it a
Christian service is Christ. Whatever is said about the deceased should not
imply that his/her good works have assured us that he/she is "in heaven" &c.

2) The Bible simply doesn't give us definitive answers about the state of
the dead between death and the resurrection & we have no business being
dogmatic about it. OTOH when spouses, children &c of the deceased say
"she's in heaven right now" & similar things, pastoral sensitivity will
generally keep me from correcting bad theology.

3) How do you deal with funerals of marginal church members or those whose
Christian commitment has been nebulous at best? Some clergy would refuse to
do a service for the latter. I think it's an opportunity to proclaim the
gospel - N.B., gospel, not law. "God's promise of the resurrection in Jesus
Christ" is still valid. What implications that may have for the deceased we
can leave to God.

4) Some years ago I did a service for a man who hadn't been to church for a
long time: He'd told me that preachers always sweet-talked and pussyfooted
& never talked straight or told it like it was. It wasn't clear to me
whether he was a Christian in any real sense when he died. At the service I
mentioned what he'd said about preachers and said that I would honor his
request that I not pussyfoot. Then I read Bonhoeffer's poem "Christians and
Heathens" (which is appropriate for today in any case).

Men go to God when they are sore bestead,
plead for help, ask for success and bread,
for salvation from sickness, guilt and death.
So do they all, Christians and heathens.

Men go to God when he is sore bestead,
find him poor, despised, without shelter and bread,
see him swallowed by sin, weakness and death.
Christians stand by God in his sorrows.

God goes to every man when sore bestead,
saisfies body and soul with his bread,
for Christians, heathens, alike he hangeth dead,
and both alike forgiving.

(The original is:

Menschen gehen zu Gott in ihrer Not,
flehen um Hilfe, bitten um Glueck und Brot,
um erretung aus Krankheit, Schuld und Tod.
So tun sie alle, Christen und Heiden.

Menschen gehen zu Gott in Seiner Not,
finden ihn arm, geschmaeht, ohne Obdach und Brot,
sehen inh verschlungen von Suende, Schwachheit und Tod.
Christen stehen bei Gott in Seinem Leiden.

Gott geht zu allen Menschen in ihrer Not,
Saettigt den Leib und die Seele mit Seinem Brot,
Stirbt fuer Christen und Heiden den Kreuzestod,
und vergibt ihnen beiden.

The English I gave is sort of an interprolation between my own translation &
my remembrance of the one in the Macmillan edition of Bonhoeffer's _The Cost
of Discipleship_. Especially for the ending of the first line of each
stanza and the last two lines of the poem a literal translation doesn't work
very well poetically.)

Shalom
George
http://web.raex.com/~gmurphy/
----- Original Message -----
From: "Merv" <mrb22667@kansas.net>
To: <asa@calvin.edu>
Sent: Friday, April 06, 2007 11:05 AM
Subject: [asa] Christianity: “balance?” of truth and solace

Somewhere among the legions of Dawkins posts, I remember him quoted as
saying that religion may be okay for comfort or solace, perhaps – but
not to be confused with truth. –which, unless memory has deceived me,
would amount to a downright conciliatory thought (for Dawkins).

A friend of mine shares that he has never been at any funeral where a
pastor presides in which the pastor did not gush a stream of certainties
and promises about the heavenly destination where the deceased now is.
It didn’t seem to matter what kind of person the deceased was or what
their state of faith had seemed to be. (AND, my friend notes, even if
the person did seem an epitome of faith, righteousness, and correct
doctrine, we still don’t really know.) So my friend, as a result, has
grown cynical that pastors aren’t interested in truth so much as to say
whatever comforting words people want to hear. Their credibility has
become near zilch in his eyes. Now, while a funeral is probably not
the proper venue for hellfire and brimstone, his (and Dawkins’)
criticisms do have some sting.

The proper answer, of course, will be that we need to be about both
truth and comfort, and to painfully favor truth when that is demanded.
And just because Dawkins may concede the comfort function (even if as
more of a taunt) does not mean we should rush pell-mell to disagree with
him. What, after all, does Dawkins know about theology that we should
take our cues from him? Yes, solace is a part of any healthy church
body. How often is this in tension with truth, and how do we respond?
When a wife already knows what her husband will say in response to “do I
look good in this dress?”, she ceases to ask because she knows (if she
wants a truthful opinion) she will have to seek it elsewhere. Dawkins &
many others say the same of religion. My friend tends to be of like
mind (though, unlike Dawkins, he doesn’t write off faith so much as the
spiritual leadership of various church officials). So much the worse
for the church.

--Merv

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Received on Fri Apr 6 14:45:36 2007