Secular Urge, Religious Language

By DON ROLLINS

It’s a quandary, the slow but steady secularization of America. On the plus side, ’80s-style Moral Majority theology has been exposed for the angry, exclusive, agenda-driven belief system it always was. And we are a better, more diverse nation for it.

But with the gradual decline of fear-based religion has come a diminished use of religious language altogether - an understandable baby-with-the-bathwater reaction given history, but one that in turn take “God talk” as literally as the fire-breathers.

What’s lost in translation is the power of religious vocabulary to describe (not define) the depths of human experience, both individually and collectively. What’s lost is an entire body of metaphorical language that has animated liberalism for centuries. And what’s lost is an impetus for prophetic change in what surely must be the most soulless America in the modern era.

But we need not lose that vocabulary. Although rendered almost invisible by the daily circus that is Trumpism, some within the ranks of progressive mainline Christian traditions are being energized, even galvanized by their use of theological terms.

Four examples:

• In the name of sins inflicted by their forebears, earlier this fall, United Methodists in Ohio returned holy land taken from the Wyandot 176 years ago;

• Stirred by the desire to be a force for grace in an often graceless world, the United Church of Christ has established a medical debt forgiveness program on the South Side of Chicago. The total distributed to date is $5.7 million;

• Following the example of Virginia Theological Seminary (Episcopal Church), Princeton Theological Seminary (Presbyterian Church, USA) last month announced the establishment of a $27 million endowment, “making sacrifice” for investing in Southern banks and the greater slave economy;

• Although losing ground since the resolutions were first approved, activists within the Presbyterian Church (USA) still give prophetic witness on behalf of Palestinians, and denominational investments in fossil-based corporations.

In each instance the change agents are refusing to surrender religious language to the rigid literalists: sin is wronging the holy other; grace is being a conduit for justice and compassion; making sacrifice is a step on the path to reconciliation; prophetic witness is invoking the Hebrew tradition to call out greed and hate.

If there’s a sermon here, it’s about the ownership of theological language. What the folks above are telling us is that long before God talk was shaped into a weapon, it was the language of mystery, suffering and overcoming. It was the language of Sojourner Truth, Dorothy Day, Lincoln and King. It was the language of the disposable.

In hundreds of ways this trend toward secularism is to be welcomed with open arms. If shallow thinking and knee-jerk shaming are among the casualties, count me in. But to be truly whole, progressivism must remain open to the things of the spirit. And the language to give it voice.

Don Rollins is a Unitarian Universalist minister living in Hendersonville, N.C. Email donaldlrollins@gmail.com.

From The Progressive Populist, December 1, 2019

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