Why Did Jesus, Moses, the Buddha, and Mohammed Cross the Road?: Christian Identity in a Multi-Faith World by McLaren Brian D

Author:McLaren, Brian D. [McLaren, Brian D.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Religion / Christian Theology - General, Religion / Christian Life - Social Issues, Religion / Comparative Religion, Religion / Ethics, Social Science / Sociology Of Religion, Religion / Christian Theology - Ethics
ISBN: 9781455513949
Publisher: FaithWords
Published: 2012-09-11T00:00:00+00:00

So for John, baptism is hardly a second-rate tribal rite comparable to sitting on Santa’s knee. It is the radical reversal of identities of exclusion and hostility. It is a defection from all exclusive, hostile, and elitist identities—whether they be establishment or antiestablishment in nature. It is a sign that one is repenting of all hostile identities, knowing that those identities can only lead to violent cataclysm. By de-identifying with oppositional identities—by dying to them, one can identify with something new: the kingdom, reign, or commonwealth of God—which is a call not to separation and exclusion, but rather to solidarity and reconciliation, as we have seen again and again.

In most of our traditions, Christian baptism is little different from temple baptism. It represents identification with the clean, the orthodox, the good, the “us.” In some, baptism is more akin to Essene baptism, representing identification with the superclean, the hyperorthodox, the holier-than-others, the elite and exclusive “us.” What would happen if we rediscovered baptism in this alternative way of John and Jesus: discovering a new identity in the transcendent and inclusive kingdom of God, an identity that locates us in solidarity with all people everywhere?

If we reformulated baptism in this way, what kind of catechism would prepare us for it? How would that subversive catechesis guide us to face and repent of our prejudices, our racisms, our nationalisms, our political and economic antagonisms, our hostilities of every sort? How would it help us discover a new identity as people “born again”—not entering an elite human ancestry or exclusive religious pedigree, but passing through water and the Spirit so that we are joined once again to all humankind (and to all creation), to be ever marked by human kindness? How would the history of the last two thousand years be different if this understanding of baptism had been sustained?

Baptism in this sense means far more than immersion into Christianity or a Christian religious institution. It signals immersion into Christ, so that from now on, inside the identity of Christ, we look out at the other through his eyes, so to speak. It is immersion into the kingdom or commonwealth of God, so that we now see all people from the perspective of this new filial citizenship. “In Christ” and “in the commonwealth of God” are far deeper realities than “in Christianity” and “in the Christian religion.” Irish theologian/philosopher Peter Rollins captures the difference quite starkly, reflecting on Paul’s proclamation that in Christ there is neither Jew nor Greek (religious identity), slave nor free (socioeconomic identity), male nor female (sexual identity):6

This vision of Paul’s is often domesticated by those who would wish to turn this radical vision on its head and claim that he really means we must lay down all earthly identities in order to take up another identity, that of being a Christian. All identities are thus rendered impotent in relation to this unique super-identity.

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