I am equally uneasy with the tendencies in the church today to either shy away from theology altogether as the over-intellectualized inapplicable pursuit of the elite or to alternately make a claim to pure theology for theology’s sake. I hear the first all the time in the church. People proudly claim that what they write or speak about isn’t theology but simply what it practically means to serve God. They decry theology as getting in the way of following Jesus or of our ability to really worship. I even overheard a fellow seminary student recently complaining about having to study theology and philosophy in seminary. As he protested, he came to seminary so he could serve in the church not be bothered with all this intellectual stuff. But then at the opposite extreme there are also those who announce that what really matters is pure theology, untainted by the trivial mundanities of the world. Often assuming strict divisions of the human and the divine, they are quick to dismiss any attempts at practical Christianity as too profane to matter and the people who do such theology as misguided. This quote by Karl Barth sums this stance up nicely,

“Those who urge us to shake ourselves free from theology and to think – and more particularly to speak and write – only what is immediately intelligible to the general public seem to me to be suffering from a kind of hysteria and to be entirely without discernment. Is it not preferable that those who venture to speak in public, or to write for the public, should first seek a better understanding of the theme they wish to propound? … I do not want readers of this book to be under any illusions. They must not expect nothing but theology.” (4)

Obviously both sides are reacting to the extremes of the other. I agree with Barth that theology does matter – we do need better understanding of the God we claim to follow. To assume that theology can be abandoned just because some find it boring or elitist or difficult to understand does a disservice to those striving to be faithful. How we talk about God matters, but precisely for the everyday practical reasons some are so quick to reject. Theology is elitist if it exists for its own sake, or for the sake of a very few. If all theology does is attempt to prevent God from speaking into the lives of people today, then it has set itself up in place of God. If understanding God doesn’t transform our lives, bringing the hope of God to earth as it is in heaven, then theology is just an artifact or a clanging gong, useless for the communion of the church.

At the same time pretending that one’s faith isn’t shaped by a theology – by a conversation of the faithful with the scriptures as well as the philosophies of the world about our understanding of God – is to allow the theologies of the loudest voice to dictate what one believes and how one lives. It is easy to turn the life of faith into, say, a mirror of a particular political and economic system if those in the pews are conditioned to believe they shouldn’t bother thinking about what teachings are shaping what they believe. Insidious theologies take hold when the people are taught to believe that theology doesn’t matter. It’s like that great scene in The Devil Wears Prada where Meryl Streep’s character explains to Anne Hathaway’s character about how high fashion affects her bargain basement shopping decisions whether she is aware of it or not. Meryl Streep says, “It is sort of comical that you think you have made a choice that exempts you from the fashion industry when in fact you’re wearing a sweater that was selected for you by the people in this room.” If we think we can exempt ourselves from being shaped by theology, all we are doing is mindlessly allowing others to determine how we think about God and our faith for us without bothering to hold those ideas accountable to anything.

I appreciate James Cone’s perspective on the significance of what we believe – “The resurrection conveys hope in God. Nor is this the ‘hope’ that promises a reward in heaven in order to ease the pain of injustice on earth. Rather it is hope which focuses on the future in order to make us refuse to tolerate present inequities.” Theology speaks to that hope of God, a hope that is not limited to this world or confined to divine realms. For theology to convey that hope has to be deeply reflective and properly intelligent while at the same time have feet so to speak. Theology cannot be dismissed or exist in a vacuum apart from the very embodied body of Christ it exists to guide. So when I hear preaching against the need for theology or hear embodied theologies dismissed as profane, I can’t help but cringe. God has blessed us with the gift of coming to know Godself, why would we either throw away that opportunity or alternately claim that the gift is meaningless for human existence?

I was born missing my left arm below the elbow. This technically means I have a disability, though I find it hard to identify with the label. Missing my arm is simply what I know, part of my basic everyday existence. I know the limits of my ability, but I see no need to define myself by them. Similarly, I don't mind being asked about my arm, just as I don't mind being asked about a new haircut–I feel no need to be ashamed or apologetic for my physical form.

So it is always a bit jarring when I encounter people who think I should feel ashamed about my appearance. These people, when meeting me, look at my arm and immediately say, "I'm sorry." From their point of view my life must be so miserable that I deserve their pity.

I have church friends (and yes, family members) who let me know that they have been praying for years that God would grow my arm. According to their view, if I only had the faith of a mustard seed then some sort of miraculous arm sprouting would occur. I've learned to take such responses in stride, knowing that their rejection of who I am says more about their insecurities than it says about me. But I struggle more when I hear such things from church leaders.

For instance, Rowan Williams, writing about the eucharistic interdependence of the corporate body of Christ, says that abled people should not respond in fright to handicapped people but instead realize that abled people need the healing of the handicapped for their own good–just as the handicapped need abled people's wholeness for theirs. He calls this the outworking of the sacramental vision.

I could barely read any farther, as his words forced me to realize that he views people with disabilities as "other." Instead of being allowed to be ourselves, we are reduced to a category of people who must be healed before we can be accepted as equals.

Few people would deny that it is hurtful to tell a woman she must become a man or to tell a black man he must become white in order to be a full member of the body and experience wholeness. But some people still assume that people who are differently-abled need to become like someone else in order to be whole.

Our faith celebrates the idea of the word becoming flesh and dwelling among us, yet we reject physical bodies that seem different. It is one thing to say that our condition as human beings is broken. It's another thing to assert that some people are more broken simply because they have only one arm, or use a wheelchair, or have different mental processes. We are all the broken body of Christ struggling to be in communion with God and each other.

God created me to be tall, to be a woman, to have brown hair and a left arm that ends at the elbow. I don't need to be healed of any of that in order to be a member of the body of Christ.

Christi Bowman commented -
“As an American is it possible to not be exploitative…which is where begging for mercy from Jesus everyday comes in…no matter what I do their are countless ways in which I am exploitative and don’t know it and some ways I am exploitative and as of yet have not found ways to discontinue being exploitative…I am responsible for the damage living my life causes those who have to pay the price. I live in Babylon…I am the oppressor! You can step out of the empire in a day but it takes a life time to get the empire out of you (Shane Claiborne)“

And Dave honestly stated–
“What worries me most about the whole issue of justice is that I kind of see “working for justice” as working against me. I can’t shake the feeling that when people cry out against the unjust, the people they’re crying out against are people who live just like me and my friends. This makes me extremely uneasy.”

I admit, it is scary and it makes me uneasy too. Basically I don’t want to have to hear that I am part of the problem – that it is my actions that are what are hurting other people. Because if I know the truth, then I have a choice to make. I can continue hurting others or I can make changes so that I stop. If I am a decent human being who isn’t afraid to be responsible for my actions, then I have no choice but to choose to change my actions. But of course, I don’t want to change because change is uncomfortable and hard. If I were being completely truthful, I’d say I’d rather remain in ignorance and not have to be responsible or change anything. But I know I can’t.

The truth about injustice makes many people so uneasy that instead of taking responsibility they start making excuses for why we don’t need to bother. (and Dave, I’m not saying this is you at all, just some stuff your statement prompted me to respond to) I hear a lot, especially from Christians in this Western individualized world, about how we in reality have no such communal responsibility. That our participation in culture can’t be faulted since that is just the air we breathe. That we need to care just about the individuals we encounter, especially our own friends and family. That there is no reason to be forced to feel guilty about someone we will never meet, systems we don’t control, or events that happened in the past. I understand how a lot of that is based in a mentality of fear and a serious aversion to change, but I’ve also come to see how such attitudes are unfortunately rooted in a culture (religion) of individualism. Our faith even is individualized – all about our personal relationship with God. We’ve lost the idea of being a communal body that cares for all of its members. And we’ve forgotten the idea of corporate sin – our ability to perpetrate sins on a communal level. In fact we are so used to sin being just about personal individual heart things that we assume that the purpose of anyone pointing out issues with our actions is just to make us feel bad about ourselves.

But that’s not the point.

The point of telling the stories of injustice is to help us start living as a community – to admit that we are part of that community and be willing to work with that community. To admit that we are part of Babylon and that like it or not we are involved in the oppression of others. And that if we want to build healthy communities where the needs of all members are respected, then we need to get over this idea that it’s all about just feeling guilty. Change doesn’t come about just because we feel bad. Change happens when we admit we are part of the problem and then do whatever we can to stop. Sure, feelings will be involved, but when we start caring more about how we feel than about the injustices themselves our priorities are seriously messed up. I have a hard time understanding how people can be more upset at me for making them feel guilty about eating chocolate tainted with child slavery than they are about the child slavery. I wish I could just tell them – “Stop making this all about you and just start working to make things better! Be a part of this global community and be responsible for your role in it.”

But it’s hard to challenge individualism and personalized conceptions of faith. It’s hard to admit we’ve done things wrong. And it’s hard to change. I get that this has to be a slow process. I get that we will never create a perfect world. I get that it is impossible to ever step fully outside of systems of oppression and exploitation. I get that we just have to do what we can. I’m all about finding everyday ways to seek justice. I’m all about doing whatever is doable where you are at. I understand it’s messy. I understand that crying out to Jesus for mercy is all we can do at times. But I’m sick of those that use all of those excuses and more to just do nothing. To abdicate responsibility. To wallow in guilt and inaction. To not live as a communal body.

Being part of the Kingdom of God is hard. It is uncomfortable. It takes work. It requires us to get over ourselves and not insist that the world should revolve around our desires. That’s not a popular message in a faith that has attracted followers based on the message that Christianity is all about the wonderful things Christ does for us. But nevertheless, it is what it means to be a part of the body of Christ, and hard or not, it’s how we are called to live.