Riffing off a fifty-year-old project by academic E.D. Hirsch, Liu tries to list at least ten things which he thinks Americans have in common culturally, which any of us should know. And because the Internet has made knowledge fluid and quick to change, he invites his readers to "crowd-source" the list, with everyone contributing ten things which they think every American should know.
I tried my hand at making a list, which included items like the New Deal and Manifest Destiny and even the film Dr. Strangelove.
But interesting as this project was, I thought the idea of trying to capture the knowledge essential for cultural literacy was even more interesting, because of course it raises the question:
What is necessary to understand Christian culture?
I don't mean doctrine here, which has been established by two thousand years' worth of theologians. Rather, I'm referring to the events and people and ideas and phrases that make us who we American Christians are as a culture. (Asian and African and South American Christianity are their own separate cultures.)
Put another way, given increasing religious diversity in the United States, given the fact that fewer and fewer people even identify as Christians, what does one need to know about Christianity in the United States in order to understand it?
If Eric Liu is right (and I believe he is), then knowing about a culture, even one that you don't personally identify with, is key to knowing how to act within that culture. Thus, even people who do not identify as Christians benefit from knowing about Christianity, in that (hopefully) knowing why we act the way we do will help them relate to us from a place of respect and genuine understanding, rather than stereotypes. And people who do identify as Christians will recognize where certain practices and beliefs which we feel are central to our faith actually come from, whether it be Scripture or a politician forty years ago.
So here's my list. Along with each item on the list, I've included a sentence or two about how that item has shaped the practice of Christianity.
1. the Apostles' Creed. Sadly, the Apostles' Creed is little-known in American Christianity. But it articulates the key beliefs which draw all Christians together,. If you want to understand what Christianity is, this is the place to start; it is, quite literally, the place where Christianity started.
2. Martin Luther. Not only did Martin Luther champion a faith based on grace, not works, he championed a faith independent of the pope and accountable to God and Scripture alone (Witness his "Here I am" speech at the Council of Worms.)
3. 'City upon a hill'. John Winthrop used this phrase to capture his hope that the Puritan establishment in New England would be a shining example of authentic Christian community for the rest of the world. Winthrop's view persists in modern American Christianity, in that we tend to see ourselves as standing on a kind of pedestal, with the rest of the world looking on.
4. 'Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God'. Jonathan Edwards was key in the development of American Christianity, and this is his most famous sermon; many second- and third-generation Christians (like me!) read this sermon growing up. Edwards's theology is quite complex, even in this sermon; nevertheless, this sermon figures large in the popular conception of God waiting expectantly to damn sinners.
5. Great Awakenings. It's probably thanks to the two Great Awakenings that America held onto a Christian culture as long as it did. Also, the Great Awakenings gave birth to some of America's most influential preachers (George Whitefield and Charles Finney), as well as American habits of faith such as the idea of a conversion experience, revival meetings, and an altar call.
6. Fundamentalism. Dismayed by modernist tendencies to reduce faith to a system of ethics, void of the miraculous, evangelical leaders in the 1920s doubled down on what they felt was the core of Christianity, emphasizing the inerrancy of Scripture, the deity of Christ, the premillenial return of Christ, and the separation of church from the world. Depending on which circle of fundamentalism you move in, that last belief is particularly strong, leading some Christians (think Bob Jones University) to imagine the Christian life as one lived in obedience to a restrictive moral code.
7. 'A personal relationship with Jesus'. Whether liberal or conservative, most churches in America put less stress on communal faith than traditional churches do, more on individual experience and beliefs.
8. the Romans Road. While the essential beliefs in the Romans Road (the depravity of humankind, the necessity of faith in Christ) are standard doctrine, the stringing together of these beliefs with single verses from Romans is unique to American Christianity, testifying to our love for simplicity and clarity, and our traditional emphasis on evangelism.
9. Billy Graham. The most recent revivalist, Graham spearheaded the mixing of politics and faith, helping first Eisenhower and then Nixon articulate Christianity as a central part of their governing styles. (See Kevin Kruse's One Nation Under God for more information.) Graham also experimented with new evangelism methods, among them using film to reach non-believers.
10. Ralph Waldo Emerson. Emerson's Transcendentalism is grandfather to much of what is considered Christianity in the United States today, including the idea that we each have a divine spark within us and that Jesus was a great moral teacher but not God. The idea that each of us has a "true self", which if we obey we will be happy, also finds its origins in Emerson.
Importantly, this is not a list of things that Christians need to know about their own faith in order to live as Christ intended. I'm working on putting that list together, and will have it up soon.
Till then, I'm curious what you would add to this list, or what you would take off of it. What do you think is necessary, to get what makes us American Christians tick? If I get enough feedback, I'll put up a separate post with your contributions.
No comments:
Post a Comment