Sunday,
September 2nd, 2012 @ 9:30 am in the fellowship hall
Shane Claiborne - The Myth of Redemptive Violence
Shane Claiborne - The Myth of Redemptive Violence
This
Sunday we begin a new format for our Adult Sunday Bible Study. Throughout this fall, we are going to be
interacting with and discussing "prophetic voices" in our culture -
individuals who either entice us or force us to address a controversial topic
of our modern world ... anything from how we treat the poor and disadvantaged
members of our community, to our care (or lack thereof) of God's creation, to
rampant materialism in the Western world.
This week
we begin with a man who has become a popular speaker throughout the country -
at conferences and at churches. He grew
up in the evangelical wing of the Christian household, attending Wheaton
College in Illinois and eventually working at one of the larger churches of
America, Willow Creek. While he was
always known to be a bit different, his life and voice became even more radical
following an experience he had with Mother Teresa on the harsh streets of
Calcutta. Today, he lives in an
intentional Christian community in downtown Philadelphia, and he champions a
radical ministry of poverty and to the poor known as The Simple Way.
His name
is Shane Claiborne, one of America's modern prophets.
Following
the tragic shooting in Colorado this past July, Shane Claiborne wrote an
article for Huffingtonpost.com titled "The Myth of Redemptive
Violence." It was an article
clearly intended to bring a difficult and controversial issue out in the open: violence and gun use in America.
Our
purpose will not be to determine whether or not Shane Claiborne is right. Our goal will be to evaluate the article and
to use the Bible to "test" or measure the article.
As you
read this article, ask yourself: what
parts of the Bible speak about violence and the use of force? Does the Bible have anything to say about
"necessary conflict"? Is there
ever a case when war is "good" in the Bible? Shane
Claiborne includes his own references to the Bible, including the scene before
Jesus' crucifixion where he is arrested and he tells Peter to put away his
sword.
Don't worry if you don't agree with this week's article. I'm going to pull from both sides of the
theological aisle in the weeks to come. Also, if you think of
an article or sermon or book that you think would be great for us to read and
discuss, just let me know. Remember, the
goal is to find articles that seek to address a part of our modern world in a
prophetic way.
And ...
with that ... on to the article. Here's
Shane Claiborne's "The Myth of Redemptive Violence." I'll see you Sunday,
Wes
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The Myth of Redemptive Violence
by Shane
Claiborne 07-24-2012
I had a veteran friend once tell me,
“The biggest lie I have ever been told is that violence is evil, except in
war.” He went on, “My government told me that. My Church told me
that. My family told me that. … I came back from war and told them the
truth—‘Violence is not evil, except in war… Violence is evil – period.’”
Every day it seems like we are
bombarded with news stories of violence—a shooting in Colorado, a bus bombing
in Bulgaria, drones gone bad and the threat of a nuclear Iran, a civil war in
Syria, explosions in Afghanistan and Iraq.
The recent cover story of Time
magazine was "One a Day," showing that soldier suicides are up to one
per day, surpassing the number of soldiers who die in combat. The U.S. military
budget is still rising—more than $20,000 a second, more than $1 million a
minute, spent on war even as the country goes bankrupt.
Our world is filled with violence—like
a plague, an infection, a pandemic of people killing people, and people killing
themselves. In my city of brotherly love, Philadelphia, we have nearly one
homicide a day—and in this land of the free we have more than 10,000 homicides
per year.
This week President Barack Obama
called the shooting in Colorado “evil.” And he is right.
But perhaps it is also time that we
declare that violence is evil, everywhere—period. It’s obvious that
killing folks in a movie theater is sick and deranged, but the question arises:
is violence ever okay?
Our kids keep getting mixed messages.
A few years ago there was a national news story about a second grader in Rhode
Island who wore a baseball cap to school with soldiers carrying guns on the
front. The school authorities ruled that his hat violated dress code, which did
not allow for weapons on clothing, a code established with the kids best
interest in mind for their safety and protection. But then school authorities
pushed for an exception, working to allow for clothing that had soldiers
with guns in the interest of promoting “patriotism and democracy.” No
wonder our kids are confused by our double-speak. Even for those who believe
violence is a necessary evil in our world, maybe there can be a renewed
commitment to still call it evil.
…
We must not forget that Timothy
McVeigh, who committed the worst act of domestic terror in U.S. history, said
he learned to kill in the first Gulf war. It was there that he said he turned
into an “animal.” He came back from war, mentally deranged, and continued to
kill. And then the government that trained him to kill killed him to show the
rest of us that it is wrong to kill. There is something deeply troubling about
our logic of redemptive violence.
…
One of the patriarchs, Cyprian
(African Bishop in the third century), critiqued the contradictory view of
death so prevalent in our culture where we call killing evil in some instances
and noble in others: “Murder, considered a crime when people commit it singly,
is transformed into a virtue when they do it en masse.”
Contemporary thinkers like Renee
Girard contend that this challenge to violence inherent to Christ-like
Christianity is, at least in part because, at the center of the Christian faith
is a victim of violence—as Jesus was brutally murdered on the cross. And
there is a triumph over death as rises from the dead, a final victory over
violence and hatred and sin and all ugly things.
And yet, even in the face the evil
that Jesus endured, he consistently challenged the myth of redemptive violence.
He looked into the eyes of those killing him and called on God to forgive them.
He loved his enemies and taught his disciples to do the same. He said things
like, “You’ve heard it said ‘an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth’… but I
want to say there is a better way,” and “You’ve heard it said, ‘love your
friends and hate your enemies’… but I tell you love those who hate you … do not
repay evil with evil.’” He challenged the prevailing logic of his day, and of
ours. He insisted that if we “pick up the sword we will die by the sword”—and
we’ve learned that lesson all too well.
When one of his disciples picks up a
sword to defend him and cuts off a guy’s ear, Jesus scolds his own disciple,
picks up the ear, and heals the wounded persecutor. Christian theologians have
said Jesus teaches a “third way” to interact with evil. We see a Jesus who
abhors both passivity and violence and teaches us a new way forward that is
neither submission nor assault, neither fight nor flight. He shows us a way to
oppose evil without mirroring it, where oppressors can be resisted without
being emulated and neutralized without being destroyed.
We can take courage that Jesus
understood the violence of our world very well. At one point he wept over
Jerusalem because it didn’t know the things that make for peace.
No doubt Jesus is still weeping.
And lots of us are weeping with
him—from Colorado to Kabul. Perhaps it’s time for a united, nonviolent assault
on the myth of redemptive violence. Perhaps it’s time for us to declare that
violence is always evil—period. There is always a third way.
Opening
Questions:
1. Shane Claiborne says that our
culture sends mixed messages to our kids about guns. Do you agree with him?
2. Do you think the young boy
should be allowed to wear his hat with guns on it to school?
3. How do you interpret the
following command from Jesus: "You
have heard that it is said, 'An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.' But I say to you, Do not resist an evildoer. But if anyone strikes you on the right cheek,
turn the other also" (Mt. 5:38-39).
4. How do you think Shane
Claiborne would explain the violence and judgment described in the Book of
Revelation – especially in such places as
Revelation 18? Do you think God’s ultimate judgment of evil and its apparent destruction
constitutes “redemptive violence”?
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