Bumper Sticker Theology Conclusion

I've had a good time thinking about the logical conclusions of those pithy sayings that traipse around on people's cars. I hope you have had a good time too. Or at least a thoughtful time, if you disagreed with any of these conclusions. If these musings teach us anything, it's that ideas have consequences. And sometimes, those ideas are horribly empty, and have meaningless or terrifying ends.

For your convenience, I've gone ahead and posted the links to each post in case you missed any, and have included them all in one place for easy reference.

• Bumper Sticker Theology 1- Co-Exist
• Bumper Sticker Theology 2- Justice
• Bumper Sticker Theology 3- Tolerance and Teach
• Bumper Sticker Theology 4- The Bigness of God
• Bumper Sticker Theology 5- Use of Violence

Blessings as you think about the bumper stickers in front of you on your way to work, and blessings to you as you decide what bumper stickers will represent you. I represent the University of Tennessee on my truck.

Bumper Sticker Theology: Use of Violence?

Dear reader, sorry I have been negligent in posting lately. It surely has been a busy summer and blogging took a backseat for a time. But I've got some new bumper stickers for you; I'm sure you've come across them. This week, Jesus and his ethics come strictly into view. One by way of the Mohatma and another by way of Passivism. One I saw this week, and the other was recommended to me.

Gandhi, waxing philosophical in the 20th century takes a page out of Jesus' playbook. He had to, because he didn't have the theological resources to use his Buddhism (or was it Hinduism?) as it came to human oppression. So what kind of ethics did he borrow from Jesus? I point you to the sermon on the mount, the greatest expression of individual human ethics ever recorded: 

"You have heard that it was said, 'Eye for eye, and tooth for tooth.' But I tell you, Do not resist an evil person. If someone strikes you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also. And if someone wants to sue you and take your tunic, let him have your cloak as well... Give to the one who asks you, and do not turn away from the one who wants to borrow from you."

Matthew 5:38-42

Jesus' ethics were so hard; they're not of the light and fluffy ethics we so often hear about. Gandhi studied Jesus carefully. He loved Jesus' ethics. The essence of these hard statements is that a follower of Jesus is to do whatever it takes to do the opposite of retribution. Don't payback, love extravagantly. This is hard. The Mohatma's clever wordplay on Jesus' ethics is a challenge to us all. Do not repay evil for evil, but overcome evil with good (Romans 12:21). Do you know anybody that does this on the highway, at work, or in the home?

And so Gandhi is challenging our violent notions for retribution. No doubt Gandhi meant this in a broader sense than Jesus did. Jesus is talking about individual ethics in the sermon on the mount- how a follower of Christ is to behave to other individual humans. Is Gandhi extrapolating the principle, then, beyond it's intended purposes to create a movement for non-violent and passivistic resistance on a state or corporate level? I think so, but before we fully answer that question let's look at the next bumper sticker.

This one reads "When Jesus said 'Love your enemies', he probably didn't mean 'kill them'." Someone else seems to be reading the Bible. I direct you to the verses right after we just left off in the sermon on the mount:

"You have heard that it was said, 'Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.' But I tell you: Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be sons of your Father in heaven...And if you great only your brothers, what are you doing more than others? Do not even pagans do that?..."

Matthew 5:43-48

Wow. Jesus is a hard man to follow. Don't just tolerate our enemies but love them too? Again, it is important to distinguish the fact that Jesus is talking about individual ethics here, clearly evidenced by greeting enemies and praying for them. So how are we to take this bumper sticker in light of Jesus' ethics?

I assume too that this bumper sticker is making a statement about passivism. It is more holy, more righteous, to not engage in war than to engage in war, so goes the argument. This is a valid opinion, and Christians are divided on it. Some Christians, such as anabaptists and Mennonites, would concur with these ethics. War is indeed unjust and Christians ought never to engage in it. Other Christians, standing in the tradition of the great theologian, Augustine, believe that there are some just causes for war, and it can be so engaged in under certain pre-conditions. This theology is developed from a few biblical places, most notably in Romans 13. It is indeed the theology that I subscribe to.

Simple analogies will explain: if someone came up to my mother or sister or wife, and began to physically abuse them, and I found this out, my defense mechanism would probably be in the line of as much physical abuse on the perpetrator as possible. If the fight were to carry on, death of the perpetrator may result. The Bible, in many places, distinguishes between "killing" and "murder." Thou shalt not murder, but if thou must, under hard circumstances, thou may inflict harm if it results in greater justice.

That being said, I love these bumper stickers anyways. Most people don't take the Bible seriously these days. Most people don't take Christian ethics in the marketplace of ideas seriously these days. At the very least, hopefully these bumper stickers spark others to actually read the Bible, the sermon on the mount (Matthew 5-7), and think about what it means in public discourse and policy. So that's a start.

But the other issue is this: there's way too many fundamentalists out there, "Christian" or Muslim. There is no justification for the individual and cold-blooded murder of another: whether it's the murder of an abortion doctor, or the senseless murder of thousands of people in buildings, trains, and Jerusalem market places. Clearly, Muslim fundamentalists do not subscribe to the sermon on the mount.

But I admit that this is a hard and messy issue. I submit to philosophical humility in our use of violence, but also realize that violence is the only language that evil people understand.

Bumper Sticker Theology: God and Bigness

I hope you are enjoying the mundane ruminations of this rush hour philosopher. I just keep seeing this bumper sticker about God, and my mind gets going. Here's the newest iteration:

It reads: God is too big to fit into one religion.

It's a nice thought. Many in our cultural ethos just want all people, all world religions, to simply get along. We state a proposition about God that must be true since we should all be nice to each other. This is a good desire. It is a thought that many people feel subconsciously even if they don't put it on a bumper sticker.

Too bad it's false. Let me submit to you an idea: what if only one religion said that God was as big as he possibly could be? That He created time and matter and the entire known and unknown universe? What if this religious worldview posited that God was indeed infinite, self-existent, and totally distinct from all known things? If this were true, would any other religion be needed to make God bigger? If one religious worldview claimed that God was as big as possible, would any others be needed?

No. And a few religious worldviews make this claim to God's bigness, and they're the monotheistic heavy-hitters: Judaism, Islam, and Christianity. As a matter of fact, Anselm of Canterbury in the 12th century said as much in his argument for the existence of God. A rudimentary way to state his argument might be: think of the biggest, most outlandish thing you could possibly think of. If you can think of it, it must be God. And because you can think of it, God must exist.

Other religions, though, point to the smallness of God. Pantheistic (everything is god) and monistic (everything is unified into an impersonal force) kinds of religious views found in New Age, Hinduism, and forms of Buddhism assert this. God isn't a person, but an impersonal force found in everything, the grass just as much as humans. All take part in the godness of the world. This is an immanent, or small, view of deity. And then note the distinction, God can't be both personal and creator of the world in an open system and also an impersonal interpenetrating oneness with all things in a closed system. Both can't be true, so to say that God is too big for one of them is to assume that these ideas of God are the same, or that they contribute to a larger picture of whatever God is. They are contradictory views. They do not make anything bigger. They make everything a mess of common sense.

And that's the irony here: if you want a big God then be a Jew, or a Muslim, or a Christian. I suppose you could believe in a God of your own making, but then you'd be saying that God is big enough for one person, and that'd contradict your own point.

If you want an impersonal godness (ie Atman is Brahman), then look into Eastern religions. If you want no god, then become an atheist. And if you want a personal God, then you'll have to rule Islam out. The essence of Christianity is that God is the biggest thing possible but He's also intensely personal.

Notice, then, that Christians aren't trying to fit God anywhere. We're simply trying to get a grasp on how He's revealed Himself already- in history, in nature, and in the inner witness of the human heart. We're not claiming an exclusive view of God for our religion. God is doing that, claiming an exclusive view of Himself to the whole world. He's saying He is definable in true ways, with real attributes, and in big ways.

And he's saying that He's a person, with characteristics and attributes becoming of a person, He's saying he can be known. And He's saying He's the biggest thing going. Christians call him Jesus.

Bumper Sticker Theology: Tolerance and Teach

Disclaimer: I couldn't find good images of these so follow the link to "tolerance" and "teach," respectively.

So ever since I posted on "co-exist", I've had my eyes open to all different kinds of bumper stickers. So I saw the "tolerance" and "teach" bumper stickers recently, and both are iterations of the more popular "co-exist." To see my earlier posts on bumper stickers, go here and here.

On the face of it, "teach" seems to be a better lesson than both "co-exist" and "tolerance." "Teach" implies that there's something to genuinely learn in other people's beliefs, which is certainly a virtue any person should practice. On the other hand, it seems ignorance is the fuel for the other two. For example, I just can't see a Christ-follower or a true Muslim putting these bumper stickers on their cars, because they are well aware of what they believe and why they believe it.

Does the idea of tolerance work for th Christian? Not really. A Christian knows that he or she must practice a radical love of neighbor as Jesus presents in the parable of the Good Samaritan. And Jesus also demanded ultimate allegiance to Himself, and didn't leave much room for accepting alternative viewpoints. So Jesus makes exclusive truth claims about Himself and ultimate metaphysical reality but one of those truth claims is to radically love unlovable or undesirable people.

"Tolerance" is fine if it means that we should be generally be nice people. But if it means we should tolerate all religoius viewpoints as equally valid truth claims, then I'm out. I see evil in the reincarnation of Hinduism, as it has explicitly and implicitly persecuted the Dalits in India for centuries. And I see evil in the jihad of Islam as it wars against all infidels. And if you agree with me, you also agree with Jesus. And ironically something begins to happen: you see that you can't have love without justice, and you can't have justice without love. Love is not disinterested in the outcome of how innocents and untouchables are treated. Love means a stark outcry against these evils. And so tolerance falls.

If you agree with all that, then you possess the ethical values of Christianity, even if you aren't a Christian. Whether you knew it or not, the ethical values of Christianity have intrinsically been embedded in you. If that is indeed the case, then you will see that tolerance is a weak command, but love and justice are supreme ones.

Bumper Sticker Theology: Getting Closer

Last week I took a cursory glance at a popular bumper sticker- co-exist- and had one of my most visited blog posts ever. That was certainly unexpected. Though bumper stickers have their communicative problems, they are still a highly used form of expression and statement. As such, they are interesting pieces of culture to think about (some people apparently don't think so, and exercise their ignorance by being mad when other people have thoughtful things to say in disagreement- I don't write for ignorant people, though). Among "co-exist's" many problems is that it exerts a moral code on others while asking for them to temporarily or partially dismiss their own religious moral code. In other words, "co-exist" fails the rebound effect; it can't live up to its own standard.

Well, today, I saw this bumper sticker to your left: "if you want peace, work for justice." I mused upon this one as well, and came to the conclusion that, though imperfect, it is a better statement than the low goal of co-existence.

Let's talk about the imperfections first. In our postmodern epoch, this bumper sticker totally relies on the reader's definitions of "peace," "work," and "justice." If these words had absolute definitions, the bumper sticker would be an adequate statement of biblical morality. But, these words do not share universal definitions to many in our era of relativistic thought.

For instance, does "peace" mean the cessation of war or a larger goal of racial, socioeconomic, and social hegemony? Does "work" mean governmental action and volunteering or does it leave room open for "war" in a just sense? Does "justice" mean governmental action or mere fairness reached across socioeconomic, social, and racial lines? You can see the difficulty here.

I suspect that the creator of this bumper sticker has in mind a general cessation of war- a universal get-along-ness of humanity. Working for justice probably means acting on a local level to be nice to those who are different than you are. Lastly, I suspect that the bumper sticker was created to be a strong statement of non-violence. But I also want to be charitable here. My analysis on the intent of this bumper sticker may be mistaken. That said, regardless of my analysis, the imprecision of bumper sticker communication is betrayed by a usage of important words with many definitions.

But what's good about this bumper sticker? If "peace" really means ecological, social, racial, socioeconomic, and spiritual wholeness, then I completely agree. If "justice" leaves open the promotion of absolute and objective moral goodness with a fierce eradication of evil, then I completely agree. And if "work" doesn't just mean my own work but is in fact petitionary towards the work of Jesus, then I completely agree. But then again, I'm defining "peace" and "justice" and "work" in very biblical terms here, and that may not be the bumper sticker's intent.

In summary, I'll repeat that I've never found bumper sticker messages to be great forms of communication or expression. I often joke that bumper stickers express what someone wants you to believe about themselves. And if this is really true, I apparently believe only in the University of Tennessee.