The last several posts on here have touched on the issue of belief, particular beliefs and practices we understand to be “Brethren” in nature. Rather than talking about particular beliefs, I’d like to take a step back and foster some discussion on belief in general.
Recently I stumbled across this excerpt from a recent Rolling Stone interview of comedian and satirist Steven Colbert:
Rolling Stone: A lot of people view what you do as liberal vs. conservative. But what you’re saying is that the show is really about people who are flexible in their beliefs vs. people who are fixed in their beliefs?
Colbert: If there’s a target in our present society, it’s people not willing to change their minds. If you’re not willing to change your mind about anything, given how much is changing and how the sands are shifting underneath our feet, then that dishonesty is certainly worth a joke or too.
It got me thinking about how having flexible beliefs in the midst of our quickly changing, shifting world relates to being people of faith.
Every day we interact with people who might have vastly different beliefs than we do. I’m not just thinking of broad religious beliefs (Christianity, Buddhism, etc.) or political/social beliefs (conservatism, liberalism, progressivism, etc.) These kinds of beliefs, while certainly capable of being questioned, are often core to our identities. I’m not trying to say that such beliefs and identities can’t or shouldn’t be flexible, but I don’t think it’s these beliefs Colbert refers to and it’s not where my interest lies.
What I want to know is this: If some amount of flexibility in our beliefs is such an expectation of our culture, why is there such a stigma about changing our minds? Why do we find it so difficult to enter into dialogue with a sense of vulnerability, allowing ourselves to be informed and formed by the wisdom and experiences of the other? Does our faith / theology support or object to such flexibility of belief?
I’m still working on formulating my answers to these questions. What are your thoughts?
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November 12, 2009 at 8:12 pm
Matt
Because changing our mind means we admit we were wrong. Our culture values being right so much it injects the right/wrong dichotomy everywhere, even in places it perhaps has no place being.
As for faith supporting or rejecting flexible beliefs, I think this depends a great deal on which beliefs those are.
November 12, 2009 at 11:37 pm
Dan Finkbiner
I think this has to do with our emphasis on competition as well as deeply intrenched dualistic philosophy. One gets ahead in our culture by winning in their particualar field of competition, and because there are only two sides of reality there are only winners and losers. Every day the central focus of the average American is to be winners and avoid being losers in every aspect of society. Gotta keep up with the Jones’s so to speak. This includes our religion. We want to be with the winners (those who get into heaven), and to do everything to avoid being losers (unbelievers). Because our way is the only way of course everyone else is a loser and is going to hell.
I know that I have just steriotyped people with unflexible beliefs, but it really appears to me that people actually think this way. It doesn’t make them bad people. There is so much in our society, in our media, and in our sporting events that reinforces both competition and dualism. It is almost impossible not to let these things leak into every aspect of our lives.
November 13, 2009 at 12:21 pm
Kurt Ritchie
Beliefs should not be so much flexible, but growing. As we experience things differently, reflect, and change our perspectives, beliefs change and grow. Flexible is OK as long as we keep the root strong. Without a strong base, at least most of the time, we can become ambiguous about things, or paralyzed by inaction, having too many options.
I think one of the reasons that there is so little tolerance for changing ideas is that we are so unloved. If have not learned to love ourselves, or others, change is too threatening. If love is complete, our essential self is not threatened by change.
November 13, 2009 at 1:33 pm
Faith and Flexible Beliefs | From Bits to Bites & Windshields to Worship
[...] (Original post available here) [...]
November 13, 2009 at 2:53 pm
Ang
Great snippets from this post:
right v wrong
comparing ourselves to others
growth
love
I liken it to a plant/tree. . .roots for foundational grounding (God), unique spread of branches (us), life cycle of changing colors, falling off and budding again (growth). . .
In my work with essential oils, I’ve learned that EOs are the “life force” of a plant– protecting it from virus/bacteria and then healing it when necessary. The constituents of each EO are as unique as the plant that they come from– and vary ever so slightly with the growing seasons. my own discipleship journey is comparable, each experience, lesson, interaction I have with God makes up the “life force” I have inside of me.
My daughter’s kindergarten class just went on a field trip the AZ Botanical Gardens– they learned basic lessons about plant life and the intricacies and values of each. “the magic is hidden in plants” was their song (Yellow Brick Road tune!). . .Truly, let the blessing of a healing Life force settle into our spirits. =)
November 13, 2009 at 10:33 pm
danacassell
Being flexible is sometimes just scary. If I let go of this one thing I thought was true, how many other things are going to unravel right here in my hands?
Or, maybe it works the other way – if I let go of this one belief or practice, what all is God going to require of me? When I find myself being stubborn and stone-faced about something that probably needs to change, I can usually trace my reluctance to either plain fear of change or wariness about the responsibility that this particular change is going to require from me.
I just came across a quotation from Thomas Merton: “All I want, Jesus, is more and more to abandon everything to You. The more I go on, the more I realize I don’t know where I am going. Lead me and take complete control of me.”
There’s a kind of parallel realization – realizing how little we know leads us to concede to or seek out flexibility. I suppose that being flexible means admitting that we don’t know what’s ultimately right…and that takes a lot of humility.
Does anybody watch Mad Men? The whole show is centered around the drama of the early ’60s, when the world was being turned upside down. Editorials talk about how closely this resembles our own time – people are torn between holding on to old social conventions and venturing out into some new way to deal with the changing world. There’s an aura of fear and impending doom cast over the whole series, and the people who weather the change the best are the ones who are willing to give up old securities and venture forth into something new.
Isn’t that what we’re supposed to be doing as the people of God? Relying on God’s knowledge and guidance and walking humbly with the Holy Spirit through uncertainty and destruction, toward a new creation? Seems to require an awful lot of flexibility to me.
November 14, 2009 at 4:02 am
Dan Finkbiner
I just commented on a friends blog, who happens to be spending a few weeks in Rwanda. She had read a couple books about conspiracy theories comming true and Christians comming under persecution. She believes that things are getting increasingly hostile toward true followers of Jesus, and we need to wake up prepare ourselves for those times that are just around the corner, because our soft lives haven’t prepared us to stand under persecution.
I have some questions for people who buy into that. Have conditions ever been good for true followers of Christ? Has anyone ever been able to openly renounce worldly citizenship without incuring persecution? Is anyone a true follower who hasn’t given up all their possetions and taken up the cross? Has this ever been easy for anyone anywhere at any point in time?
Preparing for the persecution is not hardening ourselves to resist it. It is softening ourselves in order to accept it when it comes without resisting. True armor is not just an outer shell. There must be some kind of padding under it. A bullet-proof vest is actually made out of many layers of kevlar, a kind of cloth. In our faith we need to be flexible enough to absorb persecution when it comes, and yet to be inflexible enough to actually stand up to it (with love and forgiveness of course).
I don’t think it’s really a matter of our culture being too soft or too rigid. The problem is in our division. I think it was in one of Daniel’s visions where he saw a statue made out of both soft and rigid materials. It represented a divided nation. In Christ those of us who are too rigid need to soften, and those of us who are soft need to become more rigid. The divisions of the world shouldn’t translate into divisions in the body of Christ.
November 15, 2009 at 1:36 pm
jblevins
I think that our faith pretty clearly speaks to a growing, changing set of beliefs. While being grounded in the experience of the Triune God … what that means is a constantly shfiting target. It is contextual. You see Jacob wrestling with God. You see the disciples slowly growing into their faith. And you see the early followers in Acts and through the letters of Paul struggling with just what this faith means …. and the growth has only continued from there.
I think part of the struggle is that people have based the reality of God on their being right, and others being wrong. And when that is the basis. Their knowledge of God, and their proof, so to speak, of the reality of God, is based on a set way of living, and a set way of being. When that starts to be picked apart, the entire system of belief begins to crumble … and that is hard for people.
But I believe that if our faith is to adequately respond to the world around us, changing and growing in that faith is going to be vital. It is a hard balance to strike … laying that foundation (what needs to be there) against what can grow and change. But it is a challenge that we must wrestle with, not unlike Jacob.
November 16, 2009 at 2:04 pm
Joshua Brockway
One of my favorite readings from my introduction to philosophy class was an essay by Charles Peirce called “The Fixation of Belief.” There he talks about the anxiety which ensues when beliefs are challenged or confronted by new information. I think that is one reason why I tend to describe beliefs in terms of understanding rather than convictions. Once convictions are confronted the anxiety produced tends to build walls. When we can see beliefs as categories for understanding the world and God’s relationship to the creation then I think we are on a better footing for change.
Ironically though, that means I have to state clearly my own fundamental convictions about God that guide this understanding of belief. First, God is bigger than my own beliefs or convictions. Second, God reveals and acts today. Thus, our interaction with God always brings about new understanding.
November 16, 2009 at 3:53 pm
danacassell
I inadvertently attended a lecture by Marcus Borg last night, and though I’m not a huge fan, he ended his lecture with this little tidbit about “belief” that reminded me of this discussion here:
The usage of the word “believe” has changed significantly in the last 400 years. Before 1600 (aka, pre-modernity), it meant something more like “belove.” Believing wasn’t an assent to a particular statement or doctrine, but more of a proclamation of being in relationship with a particular person or thing. So, the Latin/Greek root of the word “creed” – “credo” – could be translated as “I give my heart to.” Borg suggested substituting “I belove” for “I believe” when reciting creeds, or talking about “beliefs”
And, he said, loving someone or something necessarily leads to transformation, which, I assume, requires flexibility…
November 16, 2009 at 8:44 pm
Haley
I am left, after reading everyone’s posts, with one phrase quoted from Marcos Inhauser, in a sermon in 2007, as he reflected on the Last Supper, “All Jesus left us, was the table.”
November 20, 2009 at 3:01 pm
Paul Stutzman
Thanks for the questions, Matt. I find the posts by Kurt, Ang, and Dana (#2) helpful as I consider the questions.
It is vital to maintain some level of rootedness/groundedness in our lives. We must be anchored. (“In every high and stormy gale, my anchor holds within the veil… On Christ the solid rock I stand, all other ground is sinking sand.”) Jesus spoke of this when he told the parable of the wise and foolish builders. Of course, he wasn’t speaking so much of “beliefs,” but rather the actions that flow from beliefs.
What hasn’t been named so far is the importance of prioritizing beliefs when we speak of flexibility. Some beliefs must remain firm, while others are open to discussion and amendment. True Christians are never “flexible” on the belief that Jesus is Lord. This is an absolute truth that must be maintained, even in an age that finds it ridiculous to speak of absolutes. We must remember the confessors of the early church (and other martyrs throughout the ages), who were willing to suffer and die because they would not recant their belief that Jesus is Lord, and not Caesar. On the other hand, other things are comparatively less important for Christians: worship style, leadership questions, mission and vision, how to spend money, etc. This is not to say that choices in these matters are inconsequential, but rather that it is possible to enter these choices with openness, vulnerability and flexibility.
A seventeenth-century quote (often misattributed to Augustine) says things well: “In essentials unity; in non-essentials liberty, in all things charity.” Of course, the real wisdom is determining what is essential and what is not.
P.S.
Haley, since I don’t know the context of Inhauser’s quote, it is hard to understand. While I agree that much of what Jesus left the church can be found in table worship, I don’t know that I would say that ALL Jesus left us was the table. What does “the table” mean to you?