My Ten Favourite Reads from 2020

          I find that the annual ten-best and hundred-best book lists are pretty boring. The lists have in common that they’re mostly made up of the same mass market bestsellers. I think there is a direct connection between the amount of marketing dollars the publisher spends and getting on these lists. These books are, by design, intended to have wide appeal, but that means many great “specialist” books and small press books get missed. So here is my very personal list—best books I’ve read in 2020, regardless of when they were published. 

          The list has several themes in common across the themes: religion, anthropology, and race(ism). Hope you find something here that you like!

NOVELS

1. Exit West, by Mosin Hamid. Such a unique and lovely narrative voice! I mean the writing! A melancholy and romantic book about what binds humanity together and what pulls us apart. Set in the Middle East and California, it follows a few characters who move around the world as doorways beyond the control of central governments makes the whole world’s population mobile. Magical realism here, and it works. 

2. Homegoing, by Yaa Gyasi. Lovely and painful. A narrative dive into the lives of ordinary people who both fail and triumph. Most of the failures are due to hatred—systemic racism—and war and colonialism and ignorance, among other human shortcomings. But the way these people keep the flames of hope and love alive is inspiring and beautiful. The unique structure of the novel is also very interesting, as it follows two joined yet separate families through multiple generations. The writing is simple, pointed, and lovely. Best read of the year.

3. The Overstory, by Richard Powers. Well, I can find things to criticize here. The book is a bit too preachy; it reads, sometimes, too much like a botany text; and it is really long and could have used a bit of trimming. Still, this is a magnificent book. Powers creates believable characters who do, at turns, lovely and horrible things to save the world’s trees. Powers hears and shares the language of trees so that I can almost hear them.

4. A Canticle for Leibowitz by Walter M. Miller, Jr. I read this postapocalyptic book in high school, again in college, and then not again till now. It is a book worth reading for its humanity, for its sympathetic portrayal of religious people (perhaps a bit too sympathetic) and for its grand historical sweep. I can't say I share all of Miller's Roman Catholic sensitivities, especially in light of so many recent revelations. But as a study of the complex interplay between religious conviction, civilization, and politics, it can’t be beat. 

MEDIA

5. Reader, Come Home: The Reading Brain in a Digital World, by Marryanne Wolf. The great irony that weighs against this book is that those who might gain the most by reading it never will. They’ve abandoned deep reading for the mesmerizing screen. Wolf is a neurologist who explains in great detail the latest research into why reading is becoming harder and harder for most people in our society. A must read for ministers, teachers, and parents too. Wolf’s specialty is child development.

          A fine companion book to Reader, Come Home, is Digital Mini-malism: Choosing a Focused Life in a Noisy World. After reviewing, briefly, much of the same material that Wolf describes in greater detail, and after explaining Silicon Valley’s corporate aims, Cal Newport offers a step-by-step guide to his media detox plan. I’m going to take it this January, when I begin my sabbatical!

AUTOBIOGRAPHY

6. Born a Crime: Stories of a South African Childhood, by Trevor Noah. As a regular visitor to South Africa, this book revealed, to me, just how much I've missed. I've been to the townships, both in the city and the countryside. I've visited Soweto, Cape Town, Johannesburg and many other towns. But I was always a tourist and I can see I missed mostly everything.

          This is a humane insider’s book about people trying to figure out a new thing with old prejudices and problems. They do better than you'd think, but it is quite a trip. Noah himself turns out to be a totally likeable, yet complex person. His mother? Well, she is a character who leaves me both impressed and sad. Read this. Surprises everywhere. Well written, too.

RELIGION AND PHILOSOPHY 

(or, Doubt and Evil)

7. Unbelievers: An Emotional History of Doubt by Alec Ryrie. A well-written, engaging story with many vignettes along the way. Ryrie argues that as impressive as rational arguments for and against the existence of God might be, most people have become unbelievers for emotional reasons. 

          Ryrie names two that have ancient historical roots: anger (especially at religious institutions, rather than at God) and anxiety (especially surrounding how one can know this or that, given the many opinions out there). I thought his concluding analysis of our society’s turn away from church a bit weak, but for the most part a well-researched and engaging attempt to listen for faith voices other than those of the scholars.

8. Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil, by Hannah Arendt. I made a goal of reading ten classic works this year. Right now, I’m plowing through Dostoevsky’s Brothers Karamazov. Arendt’s book, I’m finding, is a fitting companion to Dostoevsky. 

          She examines the life and trial of Adolf Eichmann in order to try and understand what made him send so many Jewish persons, by rail, to their deaths during World War II. Arendt doesn’t think it was the devil. Her portrait of a man unselfconsciously stumbling into evil is disheartening and important—especially now, as nations around the world sees more and more strong men taking power and their sycophants helping smooth the way.

SCIENCES

9. Ancestors in Our Genome: The New Science of Human Evolution, by Eugene E. Harris. Human evolution has always been a fascination of mine. I sometimes think that career-wise, my greatest regret is that I didn’t become an evolutionary anthropologist.
          The genomic science is challenging for a lay person like me. But the subject is truly fascinating. We all know how DNA can be used to identify certain illnesses, potential relatives, criminals, and even rapists. DNA is a powerful tool for tracing our relationships to and contacts with others. But the same science and tools can be used to determine our evolutionary relationships too. This book covers when the homo sapiens line diverged from the last common ancestor of our us and our cousins, chimps and bonobos. It covers why we know that humans mostly evolved in Africa, and how we are related to other human species that are now extinct, including Neanderthals, Denisovans, and even earlier humans. I loved it.
          Runner up in the evolutionary biology category was Kindred: Neanderthal Life, Love, Death and Art, by Rebecca Wragg Sykes. The title says it all. A marvellously detailed (perhaps a bit too detailed) look at many Neanderthal archeological sites and what we can learn from them.

10. In a different corner of the anthropological world, I was completely absorbed by At the Bridge; James Teit and an Anthropology of Belonging, by Wendy Wickwire. James Teit was an overlooked, turn-of-the-nineteenth century anthropologist who lived with, studied, and advocated for the indigenous peoples of British Columbia and Northwest USA. 

          Wickwire examines Teit’s life, his participant-observer stance among the First Nations, his political engagement with Ottawa and Victoria, and his understanding of the systemic racism First Nations consistently faced. Every page is filled with fascinating stories and insight.

I Love Theology. But.

I love theology. But.

I love theology. I’m not sure where the love comes from, other than that I was born into a healthy religious family. I grew up in a community that valued theology and honored its practitioners, like we might honor a software engineer or neurosurgeon now. In any case, I took to theology early and remain fascinated by it now. I read theology like other people watch TV or play golf.

I think what I liked best about theology, at first, was theology’s straight edges and square corners. It’s my nature to like order. At an early age, theology seemed clear and rational in a way I felt I could master. When I was in the fourth or fifth grade, I wrote a twenty-page (hand-written, of course) discourse on the Heidelberg Catechism’s “logical” approach to the atonement. I loved the sense of it, how human sin needed a human mechanic, and how the horror of human sin needed a divine mechanic, and how both needs were provided for by Jesus. It just fit, like a Rubic’s Cube (which I never did master) or a Lego pirate ship (a type I regularly construct, now, with my grandson). The feeling that theology made a lot of sense lasted a long time for me. I even did a Master’s degree in Systematic Theology—after I finished seminary, because I just couldn’t get enough.

I love theology. But somewhere along the way, the word “systematic” started getting under my skin. Especially the sense that I get from so many theologians (who nevertheless rarely agree with one another) that they get it—most of it, and what they don’t get is also clearly laid out. Their rhetoric usually breathes certainty and often mimics the language (and complexity) of scientific papers. But.

How do you explain a God who is love (one of two direct predications of God in the New Testament, the other being “God is Spirit”)— presiding over a corner of his or her cosmos where souls are forced to endure some sort of eternal torture? How is it that the “ecumenical” creeds rain down anathemas on people who can’t buy the Trinity—and specifically the Trinity covered by layers of Greek “substance” philosophy varnish? Does God, could God, might God really damn someone for getting the Trinity wrong, as the creeds insist? Or for getting the right measure of divine and human natures in the person of Jesus wrong? If this is so important to God, why didn’t God make matters a bit more clear in scripture? And what in the world is the book of Revelations doing there, on the tail end?

Well, of course, I could go on and on, enumerating one theological conflict (even war) after another, all based on “true” readings of scripture. Expecting to be able to put together a systematic theology as a “true” reflection of this scripture, though, seems like falling into the trap of expecting to see the emperor with clothes on. Even though that is exactly what people do.

And yet the stakes are high. That is, for most of the history of Christianity, and for much of Christianity today, the structure of theology is binary. You get the code right, and you’re okay. Get it wrong, and you are outside the pale. Excommunicated. Burned at the stake. Put in jail. Suffer pogroms or impending defeat in an end-time battle. That will put a damper on any curiosity about theological borderlands.

The impact of getting your theology “wrong,” in almost every faith tradition isn’t always apocalyptic, of course. It might just mean losing your seminary or college job. It might just mean having to switch denominations, as in my case. Or it might just mean having to keep your mouth shut if you’re not up to the big switch. I have quite a few letters from pastors in my former denomination who confess to having taken this latter path.

I’m remembering now, as I get on with this Jeremiad, how in my Introduction to Theology class we spent a long week learning about how theology was a science. So of course it had to be systematic. But if it is, it is the saddest science ever, because based on the same evidence, its varied practitioners rarely come out with the same results. If theology is systematic about anything, it is systematic in its inability to reach a consensus.

So why all this emphasis on “systematic?” I never find any systematic theology in the Bible. I find Parables. Wisdom literature. Exclamations of hoped for truth couched in streams of doxology (I’m thinking Paul here). Myth at the beginning and end. Stories about Jesus, sometimes constructed as just one thing after another with a crucifixion at the end (Mark) and sometimes constructed around ciphers (John). But not much by way of systematics as we understand it and churn it out.

So why so much systematizing now? Was it Constantine insisting on a religion that he could successfully wield to unify his empire? Was it a bunch of academics who took Greek substance philosophy too seriously, so that we’ve suffered from trickle-down idiocy ever since? Was it the very rationalistic fabric of Western learning? Was it the rise of the University? Or perhaps evolution of the Roman church and its episcopacy, its lust for power and its rage for order?

Well, it’s a complicated story. And more than a few books have been written trying to make the connections like those I hint at, above. But as far as I’m concerned, the whole systematic turn in Western theology was mistaken from the start. I was reminded, in a book by Catherine Keller, recently, of what Karl Barth (yes, he of the Church Dogmatics, all 14 volumes) ironically wrote: “All theology is theology viaticum . . . It is broken thought and utterance to the extent that it can progress only in isolated thoughts and statements directed from different angles to the one object. It can never form a system . . .” Oh.

Reflecting on this, so far, it strikes me that I might be sounding a bit anti-intellectual. I’m not trying to be. But I no longer prioritize “system.” My approach to theology tries to prioritize the divine whisper I can never quite get hold of when I read scripture or walk through the woods. My theology prioritizes the lovely indirection of parables, the ambiguities of myths, and everything the Bible shouts out from what is hidden between its lines. My approach to theology ignores whatever I find in scripture that does not build faith of hope and love. Mine tries not to skip over the life of Jesus to his death and whatever happened next. Mine tries to reflect on the mysteries of scripture and religion without hanging them out to dry. My ideal approach does not so much seek to pin a list attributes to God as it seeks . . . well, to do almost anything but put that list to paper. The only thing is, I’m not nearly as good at any of this as I’d like to be.

But. I’m having more fun than ever.

What Do We Do about Gretta Vosper?

I just preached a sermon about the Gretta Vosper controversy in the United Church of Canada. She's been in the news, a lot, lately, for her "soft atheist" beliefs. I sat down with her for a cup of coffee last week, and this is what I think, riffing off Luke 6:37-39, just a bit.

           I just finished reading The Illegal, by Canadian author Lawrence Hill, who also wrote the acclaimed Book of Negroes. It’s about a black illegal immigrant, Keita Ali, in a rich white country.

            The book is a terrific read. I won’t give away Keita’s story. But I do want to describe one of the book’s central characters—John.

            John is a good but irritating person. For his high school graduation project, John decides to film a documentary about life in AfricTown, the slum where he, as well as many illegal immigrants, live.

            John is irritating because he is incredibly smart and cocksure about it. He never asks permission. His devotion to his project is so single-minded that people get hurt along the way and he doesn’t seem to care. For example, at one point he hides himself in a closet in order to secretly film what it is like to be a prostitute in AfricTown. He accidentally films a tryst between the white Minister of Immigration, who is trying to deport all the illegals and a black prostitute. Worse, when John is discovered, the prostitute—who is a citizen—is secretly deported anyway.

            This setback doesn’t slow John down. For the rest of the book John follows the Minister of Immigration everywhere, which the minister finds very threatening. In fact, everyone who encounters John feels irritated by him, even though, in the end, he turns out to be a hero.

            We all know people like John—people so devoted to their vision, and so good at getting that vision “out there” that they get under our skin. Gretta Vosper is like that. She’s a United Church minister just east of here, in Scarborough, and she’s an atheist—or as she likes to say, “a soft atheist.” Soft atheism is a lot like the post-theism that Ken Gallinger used to preach from this pulpit. Gretta doesn’t believe in a God who, when asked through prayer, intervenes in our lives. She thinks that the god-stories in the Bible are myths—important, insightful, but not factual. What matters to Gretta is not the God of tradition but more the lifestyle Jesus taught through his words and actions.

            This irritates a lot of people. Some people in the United Church—important people, mind you—would like to remove her from the ministry. Whether they succeed or not, the whole process looks heavy handed and coercive to anyone who isn’t a Christian; and it has created a lot of negative controversy within the United Church too.

            Now, this is where it all gets a bit personal for me. I’ve had my own struggles trying to be a minister in a denomination I didn’t agree with. I tried, for several years, to stay in that denomination, papering over differences and conflicts. I eventually realized that I couldn’t do it. So I sought sanctuary in the United Church. And, I have to say, I’ve found a home here.

            In the United Church I’ve come to experience doctrine not as a rigid set of required beliefs, but as a playground, as an imaginative and inspiring conversation about the meaning of life and how God fits into that—or doesn’t. Unlike Gretta Vosper or Ken Gallinger, I’m a theist—a weak theist in the mold of John Caputo, I’d add—though that is a discussion for another time. Still, my experience of doctrine as a playground is enhanced by Gretta’s questions and perspective. I came to the United Church for just this sort of openness and play, and I’ve found it.

            In anticipation of this sermon, I sat down for a coffee with Gretta last week. We talked about her journey, how it has caused both conflict and growth in her local congregation, and a little bit about her vision for what a church should be. I enjoyed our conversation. Gretta listens well, she’s interesting, and she’s smart. Along the way I learned that her legal costs will be considerable. The Toronto Conference of the United Church—in spite of the denomination’s current financial crisis—is probably paying a lot too. Not much of a playground—this is an intense conflict. I’m really sad about that. And I could tell from my conversation with Gretta that it is taking a severe toll on her, too.

            But, in all fairness, I also see that there is something about Gretta that is really irritating too, in the same way that John was irritating with his gung-ho filming. I think the root of it is that Gretta sometimes sounds less like she’s interested in a conversation and more like she’s an evangelist or proselytizer. Sometimes, in interviews or on her blog, she seems disdainful of those of us who disagree with her. For example, last year she wrote an open letter to the United Church’s moderator at that time, Gary Patterson, after the horrific Paris terrorist attacks.

            In the letter she objects to a prayer for peace on the United Church website, because she blames faith in God for the Paris attacks. She argues that such faith is idolatrous, and we need to be freed from it. She further argues that our religious values have no place in the public square, and that we need to be freed from them. In this letter, she’s not content to be an atheist minister who offers her congregation an atheist model for being a church; no, Gretta insists that her brand of atheism is the one way. It comes off as more confrontational than conversational.

            What is more, the thesis of Gretta’s letter is too simple. She wants to condemn all people who believe in God, and keep their values and beliefs out of the public square, because the terrorists believed in God.

            But the terrorists also had political beliefs and values. Should all political beliefs and values also be excluded from the public square, then, since political beliefs and values are also held by terrorists? Of course not.

            The problem is not “faith in God,” or “faith in a political ideology.” No, the issue is what you believe about God or what you believe about politics—the theological or political values that guide you.

            It is impossible to avoid the fact that everyone’s actions are always going to be rooted in personal experience and learning and values—and so why should, or how could, theism be somehow uniquely excluded from playing its part, while political ideologies or economic realities are not sanctioned?

            In any case, atheism unavoidably comes with its own values too.

            Finally, the letter also ignores the scholarly consensus here, well argued by Karen Armstrong in her book Fields of Blood: Religion and the History of Violence. Armstrong makes the point that it is only very rarely that religion or belief in God leads to violence. Rather, Armstrong argues that political powers use religion—as they use race or weapons or economics—to get their way. In fact, at root, most religions are decidedly not violent however individual adherents sometimes act.

            The bottom line is that Gretta’s letter irritated people. It seemed to step beyond the, “let’s talk about this,” circle into the, “I’m right and you’re badly mistaken,” circle. Irritating—even threatening.

            So what do we do about Gretta Vosper?

            Nothing, I think. With respect to her letter to the moderator, I’d say that every minister stirs the pot about something or other, once in a while. Even playgrounds can get a bit rough sometimes. And when they do it is time for the adults in the park to help us kids step back, cool off, and start the game over. It isn’t time to shut the playground down. What do we do about Greta Vosper?

            Nothing, I hope, unless it is to offer her pastoral support and to ask the United Church hierarchy to stand down.

            Why nothing? For a few reasons, but they are deeply imbedded in the attitude of our text. For starters, Jesus says: “Do not judge,” and I think I could make a case for leaving Gretta alone—and perhaps for Gretta not writing her letter the way she did—on the basis of those words. When it comes to the issue of post-theism or soft atheism or weak theism or even fundamentalism, we ought to keep in mind that most of us have logs in our eyes when it comes to almost everything in the Sermon on the Mount.

            But what really sings for me in today’s passage is its central concern with doing right rather than believing right.  Jesus says, “Why do you call me ‘Lord, Lord,’ and do not do what I tell you?” And he goes on to explain that anyone who hear his words but does not do them is like someone who builds a house without a foundation, so that when the floods come, it is swept away.

            For Jesus, in other words, calling him or God “Lord, Lord,” isn’t the main thing. An orthodox Doctrine of God isn’t what saves the house—the church. Not at all. Rather, trying to put Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount action priorities into play is what Jesus really wants.

            So the kind of house I’d like to build here at LPCC is a Sermon on the Mount House. Our house should be refuge for all, especially during storms that threaten us: racism directed against First Nations or immigrants comes to mind. The kind of house I’d like to build here at Lawrence Park is one that is a sanctuary for people with challenges: parents struggling with special needs kids, or poverty, or students struggling to figure out what sexual morality is all about. The kind of house I’d like to build here at Lawrence Park is one where people who are lonely, who are dying, who are angry, or who are confused will be embraced, and who will in turn embrace others. The kind of house I’d like to build here at Lawrence Park is one where all present are allowed to be unsure about God while being focused on being better people.

            If you want to make the ideals and values of the Sermon on the Mount, which transcend any single religion but are firmly rooted in our faith too, then you are welcome here—whether you say, “Lord, Lord,” or not.

           

            Listen, I’ve left a lot unsaid in this sermon, even if I’ve preached on such themes at other times. For example, I have not explained, today, my own theistic views on God. I have not explored the practical skills we need to enjoy and benefit from each other’s company at Lawrence Park, even if we have large doctrinal disagreements amongst ourselves. And I have not explored here what we are to make of scripture, or its presumption that there is a God, if some of us don't think that scripture is right on that score. Gretta has written tons of stuff and it would take a year of sermons to go through it all and we can’t do that today or even this year.

            But this much I know. Even if Gretta isn’t crying out, “Lord, Lord,” she is trying to follow the best of the program that Jesus laid out. Like us, she’s doing so imperfectly. I won’t –can’t—judge her for that. But as long as she’s trying like I’m trying to do what Jesus did, I’d like to keep her and her friends in the playground. I hope that in the end, the United Church agrees, and remains a sanctuary for both of us.

Those Poor Professors of Theology. What Can They Be Thinking?

            I’ve been thinking about professors of Systematic Theology sitting in their seminary offices lately. What do they think they’re doing?

            I’m not trying to be funny. I’m not trying to suggest that whatever they’re doing, it’s silly. I just wonder.

            There are a few obvious candidate answers. Theology professors will teach the History of Theology—as they see it, of course, with lots of judgments thrown in. Just choosing what history you’re going to talk about requires such judgments. I’m not blaming them. I did it too.

            Theology profs will also want to teach from out of his or her own tradition—likely the seminary’s tradition, too. It might be Barthianism or Fundamentalism or Mormonism. The tradition will come with lots of presuppositions, a certain worldview, and perhaps even an ethnic or class culture. Every tradition is a rich resource for the judgments mentioned above. Again, no theology prof can avoid this, though hopefully they always pass on their tradition with a lot of soul searching.

            Theology profs will probably say that they also want to teach their students to think . . . somehow. I’m not sure which word fits best after “think.” Probably something like “rationally.”

           

John Suk teaching Hermeneutics at
Asian Theological Seminary, c. 2005

Teaching students to think rationally isn’t as critical as it first might seem. Most probably can do so pretty well already, even if they haven’t applied the skill to theology. But rationality gets more complicated if the point of teaching is to pass on a tradition. That’s because unless we’re talking about something that’s truly weird (Jesus was a Hindu mystic) most competing doctrines in different traditions are at least internally coherent. Both Unitarianism and Trinitarianism are rational, for example. “Rational” doesn’t mean, after all, “proven.” To think rationally means that, given certain presuppositions, there is a way to make sense of these doctrines; they are internally coherent.

            In fact, it strikes me that one’s presuppositions, worldview, parents’ expectations, and favorite place to go to church will have a greater impact on both the theology professor and his or her students than the goal of rationality. All these doctrines are rational, after all. Most theology professors then, are probably much more interested in convincing their students (either through careful argument or any of a dozen or so other rhetorical strategies) that the presuppositions the professor holds are absolutely right.

            Except that, if this is the case, are we really doing theology? Or, are we teaching the true presuppositions as somebody or some tradition sees them?

            I remember early on, in seminary, hearing some lectures by one professor on how theology was a “science.” That is, theology was subject to strict methodological rules. It’s object was the examination of scripture (and a tiny bit of creation) in order to theorize about true faith.

            Years later, I read some philosophy of science books. In them I encountered discussions about science’s “craft values.” That is, to be a good scientist, you will theorize in a manner that meets the approval of other scientists. A good scientific theory, for example, needs to be rational (of course), meaning internally and externally consistent. But also simple. Heuristic. It should have unifying power. And it must be falsifiable. Which no theologian truly believes about his or her take on things. If it is a science, rather than a parade of presuppositions, theology is a strange one, for sure.

            I mean, even if the odd theologian claims it, most theology doesn’t go for Occum’s razor. Inerrancy? Very complicated, once you read scriptures, or even just compare the gospels. Trinity? Persons (?) divided, but substances not? Original sin? Honestly, when there isn’t an original Adam and Eve to lean on anymore, this is a doctrine only Rube Goldberg could love.

            No, I don’t think theology is a science. And for most theologians thinking about their next lecture, I’d guess that many are really thinking indoctrination, even if they don’t admit it to themselves. They are thinking about how to pass on a tradition for the sake of maintaining it. To do otherwise, at least in most denominational seminaries, is to face a trial or maybe just be fired.

            In view of this sort of analysis, in the past I’ve suggested that we ought to make theology a playground. Theology ought to be experienced as a holy pastime rather than serious indoctrination. I know that this won’t do much for denominational distinctives, or upholding your sect’s idea of the true facts.

            But upon reflection, I also realize that calling theology a playground isn’t enough. So I’d like to offer some “rules,” for this playground—craft values for having fun with theology rather than doing mere indoctrination.

            So, first, good theology should probably be aesthetically compelling. It should be beautiful. And I don’t mean merely the beauty of something that is internally coherent. I mean it should be good poetry, or art. Theology ought to paint a picture that is worth a thousand “facts.” This quality, in fact, is what makes the work of painters like Van Gogh, or writers such as Marilyn Robinson such good theology.

            Good theology should be creative. If humans—whether in myth or history—were created by God as image bearers, surely human reflections on God should be, in turn,  creative, too. Theology should find new answers to the old questions of the problem of evil, or the nature of Jesus’ presence at the eucharist, or when to get baptized; new answers that break down old barriers and offer new insight or encouragement or joy. Another way of putting this is that every few years or so, good theology should lead to some major paradigm change when it comes to creedal or confessional conundrums.

            Good theology must be meditative. It ought to allow the thinker or the reader or the doer of the theology to step back from the rat race of the parsonage or faculty or student life and engage in seeking God seeking us, instead.

            Good theology should make identifying presuppositions a game, like Finding Waldo. Look, we know they are there in the writing and the teaching. Let’s name them! All! Ironically, it usually takes not only a hard look but also a childlike naivety to identify many presuppositions. Doing so, however, means that they won’t likely get a chance to be as  coercive as an emperor without clothes.

            Good theology should not be primarily thought of as trying to say systematically what the Bible says enigmatically. When it comes to the Trinity, we needed poetry but got a formula based on now-discredited Greek philosophical theories that has about as much connection to the original texts as Derridian deconstruction does.

            Good theology should focus more on ethics rooted in the summary of the law than in hotly debated disagreements about the Bible’s enigmas. If Old Testament Pharisees were too enamoured of the tithe, then the modern Christian academy is too enamoured of propositions.

            A good theologian has a full heart that needs to find expression in the words he or she speaks, rather than in ancient creeds or confessions that must be parsed correctly to be understood today.

            Look, it can’t be easy to be a professor of Systematic Theology. And thinking of theology as a playground rather than an arena is only a partial solution to the theologian’s problems. But theology is fun. Even if that’s just the beginning of the rest of the story.