Culture or Faith?

General Christian Theology
Hats Off
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Culture or Faith?

Post by Hats Off »

In the August/September issue of Family Life, Jonathan Stoll, in the "Insights and ideals" column asked the questions "Isn't faith a matter of the heart? Are we confusing a way of life with spiritual things? Are we just living a culture?" He also refers to "Cultural Assimilation" and says it is altogether real and one of the biggest threats to Anabaptism. He wrote a good 2 pages on this topic and I found it hard to disagree with his conclusions.

Any thoughts on this?
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Peregrino
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Re: Culture or Faith?

Post by Peregrino »

Can you scan the article and put up a link to it? Or would that violate copyright laws?
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MaxPC
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Re: Culture or Faith?

Post by MaxPC »

Hats Off wrote:In the August/September issue of Family Life, Jonathan Stoll, in the "Insights and ideals" column asked the questions "Isn't faith a matter of the heart? Are we confusing a way of life with spiritual things? Are we just living a culture?" He also refers to "Cultural Assimilation" and says it is altogether real and one of the biggest threats to Anabaptism. He wrote a good 2 pages on this topic and I found it hard to disagree with his conclusions.

Any thoughts on this?
We've had several teachings and writings in Catholic World on the same thing. I think the Holy Spirit is trying to give the churches a hint. The secular culture is full of poisons for the soul and discipleship. But we're so surrounded by the secular messages it will take a concerted effort to separate ourselves from those values and that effort needs encouragement and support.

We know we're in trouble when we start rationalizing doing some of the things that secular culture values. "I don't think it will hurt if I (do this or that), after all it's just a minor thing..." is one of the first warning signs.
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Re: Culture or Faith?

Post by Bootstrap »

Peregrino wrote:Can you scan the article and put up a link to it? Or would that violate copyright laws?
Or perhaps summarize the part that resonates with you? Apparently, it is not online?
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Hats Off
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Re: Culture or Faith?

Post by Hats Off »

It is an Old Order Amish publication so no, it is not online. I don't have a flat bed scanner so can't copy it either. I may try to sketch out some of his main thoughts.
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KingdomBuilder
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Re: Culture or Faith?

Post by KingdomBuilder »

Cultural identity is something I really see of no value in for those in the Faith.
It seems that most/ all CA groups have an excessively large cultural component, and I can't say I'm a fan.
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Wayne in Maine
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Re: Culture or Faith?

Post by Wayne in Maine »

Jesus proclaimed the Kingdom of God. Isn't a kingdom a culture?

It may not be the solely the Hutterite or Amish or Mennonite culture, and members of those cultures may very well not be members of God's kingdom, nevertheless, I think discipleship and the Kingdom of God create a culture not merely a heart felt religion.
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Re: Culture or Faith?

Post by Bootstrap »

Wayne in Maine wrote:Jesus proclaimed the Kingdom of God. Isn't a kingdom a culture?
I think the New Testament answer is no, it's not.

Culture was one of the things that threatened the Kingdom of God in the early New Testament days, leading to disputes between Jews and Greeks and others. The Revelation tells us who we will find in heaven:
After this I looked, and behold, a great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, with palm branches in their hands,
So it's not a culture in the sense of one shared language or nation, and the Kingdom of God does not eliminate existing tribes and peoples and languages. In the Kingdom of God, some pray in German, others in Greek, others in Arabic, others in English.

I think the Epistle of Mathetes to Diognetus puts this well:
For the Christians are distinguished from other men neither by country, nor language, nor the customs which they observe. For they neither inhabit cities of their own, nor employ a peculiar form of speech, nor lead a life which is marked out by any singularity. The course of conduct which they follow has not been devised by any speculation or deliberation of inquisitive men; nor do they, like some, proclaim themselves the advocates of any merely human doctrines. But, inhabiting Greek as well as barbarian cities, according as the lot of each of them has determined, and following the customs of the natives in respect to clothing, food, and the rest of their ordinary conduct, they display to us their wonderful and confessedly striking method of life. They dwell in their own countries, but simply as sojourners. As citizens, they share in all things with others, and yet endure all things as if foreigners. Every foreign land is to them as their native country, and every land of their birth as a land of strangers.
— what the soul is in the body, Christians are in the world. The soul is dispersed through all the members of the body, and Christians are scattered through all the cities of the world. The soul dwells in the body, yet is not of the body; and Christians dwell in the world, yet are not of the world. The invisible soul is guarded by the visible body, and Christians are known indeed to be in the world, but their godliness remains invisible.
Or maybe I don't understand what you are getting at:
Wayne in Maine wrote:It may not be the solely the Hutterite or Amish or Mennonite culture, and members of those cultures may very well not be members of God's kingdom, nevertheless, I think discipleship and the Kingdom of God create a culture not merely a heart felt religion.
What do you mean by "culture" here? The first disciples of Jesus remained Jews, yet left everything to follow him. Did they create a "new culture" by wandering around and preaching to people? Did the church in Jerusalem or Galatia create a "new culture"? I think discipleship and the Kingdom of God create worship, thanksgiving, genuine love, holiness, the fruit of the Spirit, and entrusting ourselves completely to God, calling us to serve other people and put God first in everything. And that may be easier in some cultures than others, but culture alone only creates old wineskins, and the Kingdom of God is always new wine that cannot be confined by the wineskins of culture. Cultural Christianity is a contradiction in terms.

Discipleship is never described as creating a new culture in the New Testament. We need to define discipleship as the New Testament does.
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Re: Culture or Faith?

Post by Hats Off »

One of Jonathon Stoll's conclusion was that you can't separate faith and culture in the plain Anabaptist setting. Culture is driven or informed by faith. The culture to a large extent is how faith is lived out.
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Re: Culture or Faith?

Post by Bootstrap »

Hats Off wrote:One of Jonathon Stoll's conclusion was that you can't separate faith and culture in the plain Anabaptist setting. Culture is driven or informed by faith. The culture to a large extent is how faith is lived out.
Can you say more about how he comes to that conclusion? Are there New Testament passages that he sees as an admonition to build a culture, or equate the Kingdom of God with a culture? Is he thinking of culture in a way that is radically different from the way I am?

I can't speak to the plain Anabaptist setting, I have too little experience with it. I grew up with a different kind of cultural Christianity where everyone I knew went to church and we all thought we were living as good Christians but we didn't know how to be disciples. The fervent faith of our grandparents and the culture they had created wasn't doing it for me.

I was very influenced by a book called "The Problem with Wineskins" - here's a quote:
God is a God of newness. On the one hand he is the Ancient of Days, “the Father of Lights with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change” (Jas. 1:17), and Jesus Christ is “the same yesterday and today and forever” (Heb. 13:8). But this does not mean that God is static or stationary. The history of God’s people in the Bible and the history of the Christian Church show just the opposite. In every age the true biblical gospel is a message of newness and renewal.

God has not stopped doing new things. The Bible says, “We wait for new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells” (2 Pet.3:13). Many of the Old Testament prophecies already cited were fulfilled in part with the coming of Christ and the birth of the church, but the prophetic fund has not yet been exhausted. Unfulfilled prophecies and promises of new things remain. At the end of the Bible God is still saying, “Behold, I make all things new” (Rev. 21:5).

Every age knows the temptation to forget that the gospel is ever new. We try to contain the new wine of the gospel in old wineskins — outmoded traditions, obsolete philosophies, creaking institutions, old habits. But with time the old wineskins begin to bind the gospel. Then they must burst, and the power of the gospel pour forth once more. Many times this has happened in the history of the church. Human nature wants to conserve, but the divine nature is to renew. it seems almost a law that things initially created to aid the gospel eventually become obstacles — old wineskins. Then God has to destroy or abandon them so that the gospel wine can renew man’s world once again.
I worry that any cultural Christianity might become wineskin Christianity. Do plain Anabaptists have ways of protecting against that danger?
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