In the circles I run in, hardly anyone believes in original sin. But what do they believe? Mostly they believe in not original sin. This is where simply deconstructed theology gets iffy because not believing in original sin means that you can believe in a whole host of other things that most folks not believing in original sin don't stop to consider. Here's just a few:
- Born perfect, then we get messed up because of...
- Human weakness
- Human ignorance
- Distance from God
- Presence of evil
- ...but can be saved by:
- Human willpower
- Enlightenment
- Connection to God
- Cleansing from evil
- Born perfect. End of story.
- Born human. Things get messy. Die human - imperfection implied. Thank God for grace.
There are plenty of other scenarios to consider but that's just a few. But consider the radically different implications of all of these philosophies - Do people need saving? Who/what saves them? Can anyone be saved at all? What's God's/the church's/the individual's responsibility in all this? Consequentially speaking, what theological stance leads to healthier behaviors for the world? Or put more faithfully, what's best for bringing the Kingdom?
Personally, I'm more in the 1st and 3rd buckets above. But I have found that a lot of my fellow Universalists, especially those in the Unitarian Universalist denomination, fall into bucket #2 without even thinking about it. Consider the implications of this sign that I recently came across**:
I could not think of a more theologically slippery statement if I tried. This church does not save people. This church helps people explore their own perfection. Wow - has this church ever met any people? Why not just write - "We welcome all upper middle class families who are either comfortably in a state of denial or already in therapy elsewhere."
Pastor Nadia Bolz-Weber, who is fast becoming a mainline denominational rockstar, had this to say about us in a recent Denver Post article:
As a young adult, she was a hard-drinking ne'er-do-well. Clean and sober for 19 years, she said, one awakening led to another.
She tried out the Unitarian Universalist Church, where they have "a high opinion of humans" that didn't fit with her experience. People are flawed, she said.
"It's dark in there," she said tapping her chest over her heart. "We're all simultaneously sinners and saints. We live in response to God's grace. Nobody's climbing the spiritual ladder."As an addict, Rev. Bolz-Weber has a clear theological view on human nature. We would all benefit by figuring out ours - individually and collectively. What do you think? What is the good news that you are helping to bring into the world?
**(this sign was created by a congregant of UUs of the South Bay, although it has come to my attention that it is a web-generated sign.)
Anna,
ReplyDeleteThe problem here may be assuming that we were "born perfect" and somehow have fallen. We could benefit at looking at the naturalistic perspective offered by the author of the college evolutionary biology textbook Evolution by Douglas J. Futuyma.
Futuyma (when commenting on an early experiment involving natural selection and bacteria) made the following comment:
This experiment conveys the essence of natural selection: it is a completely mindless process without forethought or goal.
If we were created by material processes that appears to be blind, mindless, and purposeless, then perhaps we are not fallen from some perfect state. We may be an imperfect product created by an imperfect process.
Yes, it can be dark in our hearts, be there also can be light there too.
ReplyDeleteOriginal Sin affirms that we all, including infants, are evil and depraved. That we are all born to die. Acknowledgements to Mom and Dad for bringing me to hell on earth and later hell in hell. As a retired therapist, I've seen enough of the damage Original Sin does.
A church for Perfect Souls would be kinda empty. Do they do background checks? Would someone with a perfect soul need to explore theirs? A good church should save souls, even a Humanist UU church. If they're not, they'll lose souls in the pews....
Good analysis, Anna. From knowing my granddaughter, who is coming up on her first birthday, I go with bucket #1. She was born perfect, and is only slightly less perfect now. The kingdom of heaven belongs to her.
ReplyDeleteLove this, Anna! I was just talking about this issue with a dear friend and fellow UU today -- how we seem to be a religion of fixers who don't know that we are broken and in desperate need of grace. We seem to have forgotten (or just don't care) that Jesus was a healer, not just a reformer. I see evidence all around me that our congregations do not know what to do for or with those who come in need of healing, grace and redemption. The encounter is all about "how can we meet your needs" rather than "Welcome and join us as we all seek healing and wisdom together, with heads bowed in humility and awe." Rock on.
ReplyDeleteFor my 2 cents, I read the sign differently. I read the sign as saying we all have some perfection in ourselves that we could explore. I think that there are too many people that tear themselves down, that need to find the joy in living. Not that we are all perfect.
ReplyDeleteWonderful reflection. I remember well the time I was in Clinical Pastoral Education. I was in a hospital setting. Lots of emotional stuff one weekend. Marta came to see me, leaving DC and heading to the hospital where I worked on the Eastern Shore. The gory details of what made the weekend so difficult need not be told. I was in CPE, in a hospital, working as a chaplain, while still in seminary. And that weekend was full of stuff. Marta and I went on a Sunday morning to a UU congregation (that won't be named here). Lay-led as far as I could tell. Basically took the summer off. We entered the church and 10 or 12 folks sat in a circle. We joined them. Not a hymn was sung. Not a prayer was offered. No silence was invited or offered. No opportunity for confession or reflection or grace or challenge. Instead a group sat around talking and talking and talking about a school board election coming up. The good guys were named. The bad guys were named. I had no earthly idea what they were talking about or why. I just wanted a little 'balm in gilead.' Marta and I left, and not knowing what else to do, we went to a big United Methodist Church downtown to cleanse our pallette. Of course there are stories I could tell of many moments of grace in Unitarian Universalist congregations, some of which happened in big churches and small. But this idea that PB points to--that folks come in looking for healing and grace and redemption. I certainly walked in to that eastern shore congregation seeking grace and wholeness and integration and so on and i was met with absolutely nothing to hold on to. I have tried to remember that and put lots of music/silence/prayer/reflection time for folks in my services. But I realize that I all too often fail in that regard...Lord, hear my prayer.
ReplyDeleteBorn human. Things get messy. Die human - imperfection implied. It's a good thing science, politics, and the will of strong individuals are moving us forward as a species.
ReplyDeleteMost of us human beings experience life as shameful. Many of us human beings have a redemptive experience in which we learn that we can put down the burden of shame because we are, in truth, neither better nor worse than everybody else. We are worthy of love.Of course, such grace does not last; shame returns. How to escape this cycle of shame and grace is beyond me. Religious thinking has to be able to be with people at point of the cycle. Promoting the idea that we have perfect souls is like telling people they will be fine if they just inhale continuously. There are those who preach the opposite -- only exhale. Just as every inhalation requires a following exhalation; we have to hear the confessions of the people because confession leads a person to redemption, which leads back to shame. Ever notice that while Liberal Religion preaches our inherent worth and dignity ("you are already saved"), it regards itself as shameful -- mostly smug hypocrites who fail our best intentions through laziness and self-satisfaction? We are waiting for grace and redemption, the knowledge that we are no worse, not better, than anyone else. Blessings on this inquiry.
ReplyDeleteThat's a web-generated church sign. I've been to the website and made similar ones myself. Is it your own reconstruction of an actual sign you saw, or is it a straw man? If the latter, it takes something away from an otherwise strong argument.
ReplyDelete@fausto - good to know! No, this was a sign that someone else posted on the UUGrowth Lab (uugrowthlab@groups.facebook.com)it says "UUs of the South Bay By Mar Cárdenas Loutzenhiser". Among the comments on the sign are "That's my elevator speech!" But, had I fabricated this sign myself, that would have really proven my point of human imperfection! ;)
ReplyDeleteI've updated the blog with the link to the sign: http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=1801139072949&set=a.1549741588169.72079.1373993297&type=1&theater
ReplyDeleteOur intellects tell us the doctrine of Original Sin is clearly false. Our experiences tell us the myth of Original Sin is just as clearly true.
ReplyDeleteOur task is to recast the truth of the myth in a way that honestly acknowledges our human imperfections and struggles and that leads us to deal with them compassionately and effectively.
The disbelief in original sin is one of the oh so few religious beliefs I can say I actually believe.
ReplyDeleteI suppose I'm somewhere in point 3.
Because I don't think anyone is perfect or is supposed to be perfect - what a boring life that would be. Being imperfect is what makes us perfect.
As I understand it, original sin is the notion that Adam and Eve sinned, and because of that original sin, all human beings thereafter are tainted with their sin. The notion of original sin is sometimes linked to the notion of substitutionary atonement, that is, that Jesus gave his life to atone for our sins. (Sure I'm oversimplifying a little -- original sin is a doctrine with a centuries-long history, and no way am I going to capture all that in less than a hundred words.)
ReplyDeleteI'd have to say that the problem of original sin poses an overlapping but somewhat different set of questions from the problem of whether humans or born perfect or not. And I'm not quite sure that the notion of being born perfect (or not) is really at the heart of the point I think you're making here.
From my point of view, religious liberals fall into difficulties, not because we think they are born perfect (I honestly don't know many religious liberals who claim to be born perfect), but because we believe too strongly in the power of reason, and/or we believe too strongly in the infinite perfectibility of human beings in this lifetime, and/or we believe that we are pretty completely in control of our destinies (or that we could be in control of our destinies, if we could just take the right class or get the right job, or...). It's easy to show these beliefs are problematic, and I'd say they are not serving us well -- yet we continue to place a great deal of faith in them.
So from my vantage point, I'd argue that these are the deeper problems -- not so much original sin, not so much whether we're born perfect, but rather the related problems that we place too much faith in reason, and human perfectibility, and individual control over one's life.
For me, as a Universalist in the tradition of Hosea Ballou, I'd want to say that what's important is that God is ultimately in control (and I go beyond Ballou in opting for a religious naturalist and/or process view of God); that reason is essential to understanding the world, but that it is not the only legitimate way to understand the world; that humans are not solely creatures of reason (just ask any psychiatrist or neuroscientist); that we don't have to be infinitely perfectible (or even greatly perfectible) because God is gonna save us anyway, whether we deserve it or not.
Like Ballou, I completely reject original sin (and substitutionary atonement) -- but that still doesn't mean I think I'm born perfect, or that I'm even perfectible, it just means that God is good -- and powerful. Or, as it says on the altar table at Ferry Beach, the Universalist conference center founded by Rev. Quillen Shinn -- God is love.
My $.02 worth. Your theological mileage may vary!
This UU does believe in Original Sin, which I define something like this. We are born into and raised in a family, community, and world not of our own making. These structures and details of existence are already fully formed before our arrival, though they continue to evolve. They have been being formed by all humanity before us. They shape us in lots of negative ways not of our choosing. If there had been a literal Adam and Eve, it would have started with them. The myths point in the right direction. Our lineage is the bearer of unchosen sin.
ReplyDeleteThe non-existence of a literal Adam and Eve and the non-existence of a literally interpreted forbidden fruit has nothing to do with it. Since we are shaped by these influences mostly beyond our control, the fact that we are not necessarily born with all those elements as part of our DNA doesn't matter.
The big thing the Church got wrong through the ages was the idea that a little bit of water accompanied by a magic spell (sorry, Trinitarian formula) could get rid of Original Sin and the idea that it (the Church) could broker the taking away of this sin. It is a permanent part of our makeup as humans. Our task is to struggle to overcome the bad stuff we had no choice concerning. It is a struggle that is never done. It is both anthropological and psychological, in our society, that is, and in our minds.
The work of repairing the world is not for ourselves (we have already been shaped by the negative realities we've encountered and now can only deal with the fallout). Rather, it is for future generations not yet shaped.
"A church for Perfect Souls would be kinda empty."
ReplyDeleteWell I know of at least one Unitarian*Universalist church that is a church for Perfect U*U Souls. . .
Sorry but I just couldn't resist that cheap shot. :-)
You GO Girl!
ReplyDeletePerhaps inadvertently so. . .
You write -
Why not just write - "We welcome all upper middle class families who are either comfortably in a state of denial or already in therapy elsewhere."
And I somewhat waggishly write - Talk about Truth in advertising. . . I mean isn't that exactly what many if not most U*U churches do these days? ;-)
Well, it was almost my elevator speech as published by the UUA - which was actually: Our faith is not interested in saving your soul - we're here to help you unfold the awesome soul you already have.
ReplyDeleteBeing human is a messy business - and I'm glad we have each other to help us through it.
This raises the sticky question that I always have about UU services: when do we ever take stock of ourselves in an honest way (confession or acknowledgement) and then forgive ourselves and each other or at least say, "Tomorrow is another day and I will try to be the best person I can be." We're so afraid of being negative in a service that we never "go deep" for people and the needs of a lot of folks are not met.
ReplyDeleteI will never forget a throw away line that J.K. Rowling said in an interview once when asked what it was like to go from food stamps to being the richest woman in the world? She said, "the worst part of being poor is the constant anxiety and worry. Being not-poor means I don't have those constant worries about the immediate future."
The constant upbeat energy of most UU services feels false to people who are struggling, either against tough situations or against themselves. They need to feel ritually that they can face their demons and survive.
I would hope that church would be the place where deep honesty and real sustaining hope can be experienced.
The way I interpret original sin is actually more historical in terms of, "What do I, as a privileged white person, owe to those whom my racial or ethnic ancestors have belittled or conquered?" "Do we have a responsibility to feel some guilt or shame for what has gone before, and if so, what are we gonna do about it" I say, yes, and if we are truly justice-seeking people, we take that justice-seeking personally. It shouldn't be just an intellectual argument, it should be something we feel in our gut.
:This raises the sticky question that I always have about UU services: when do we ever take stock of ourselves in an honest way (confession or acknowledgement) and then forgive ourselves and each other or at least say, "Tomorrow is another day and I will try to be the best person I can be." We're so afraid of being negative in a service that we never "go deep" for people and the needs of a lot of folks are not met.
ReplyDeleteWell Ellen, please *forgive* me for saying so, but if U*Us *really* want to "go deep" they should be seeking forgiveness from the people they have harmed in one way or another before even thinking about "forgiving" themselves. Personally I see little difference between *self-serving* U*U "self-forgiveness" and quite conscienceless sociopathic behaviour. . .
:I would hope that church would be the place where deep honesty and real sustaining hope can be experienced.
Well I see very little evidence of that when it comes to the response of the U*U "church" to the widespread anti-religious intolerance and bigotry in the U*U World or the U*U church's less than just, equitable and compassionate response to clergy misconduct victims of ALL kinds.
...and forgive us our sins as we forgive those who sin against us... God loves you, Robin. Allow yourself that grace. I would be happy to keep you in my prayers if you would appreciate it.
ReplyDeleteRobin makes a good point in that forgiveness needs to be asked for, but I'd be happy if we would even just acknowledged our "less than perfectness" though a ritual of some kind and spend some time thinking about those whom WE need to forgive... At a UU worship workshop I was at recently, some people freaked out at the notion of spending time during worship silently acknowledging weakness or moral frailty. I worry that in our effort to be a happy, safe place, we deny the needs we all have for introspection. I'm not saying we should wallow in it, simply build something into worship that allows for it. I think it's healthy to honor the struggle that is Life. This important aspect of worship is often missing, giving visitors the misguided impression that we are smug and complacent. Or are we?
ReplyDeleteBe careful what you ask for Ellen lest U*Us get it. ;-)
ReplyDeleteI can assure you that I know far too many smug and complacent U*Us, including U*U clergy and top level UUA administrators.
Yes U*Us should spend some time thinking about those whom U*Us need to forgive, but they also have to spend some time thinking about whose forgiveness they need to seek. I might add that they need to spend some time thinking about real accountability for U*U sins of commission and sins of omission, especially those committed by U*U clergy and other church leaders.
Anna, I thank you for your offer to keep me in your prayers but what I, and indeed other people who have been victimized by U*U clergy, *really* need is for you and other U*Us to write letters to the UUA and MFC demanding that they provide real and tangible restorative justice to people that U*Us have caused harm to. An institutional apology for victims of non-sexual forms of clergy misconduct is long overdue and I believe that individualized apologies and other forms of restorative justice are also required. Blanket institutional apologies seem to be just another form of self-serving "self-forgiveness" when no real accountability and no real restorative justice is provided to the victims.
And God knows the UUA owes an apology to the numerous liberal Unitarian and Universalist theists who have most ironically found themselves to be far from genuinely welcome in U*U Welcoming Congregations. . .
Anna, I had a similar response when I saw this proposed sign. I come to church to save my soul. It isn't perfect when I walk in and I don't expect or need it to be perfect when I walk out. What I do need is for the congregation to acknowledge that I am hurting from the wrongs committed against me and the wrongs I've committed. "You are already perfect" is a message that feels like patting someone on the way in to a cancer biopsy and saying "You're going to be fine"--it's so obviously untrue that the hearer feels not reassured, but abandoned.
ReplyDeleteAll of that said, I do believe that in a deeper sense, one can assert "You're going to be fine"--"You are good and worthy exactly as you are"--and be telling the truth. It is possible to be fine in this deep sense even as the biopsy delivers the worst possible news, even as one is dying of cancer. I think this is what Julian of Norwich is getting at with her perplexing "All will be well and all will be well . . . " But that kind of reassurance it has to come on the other side of pain and sin, not as a dismissal of them.
Thanks for stimulating an interesting discussion!
Amy
Perfect soul but imperfect spelling ...Gouls? How about Ghouls. Every human should recognize both the light and dark, love and hate, creation and destruction etc. of the unverse.
ReplyDeleteSoul existence implies God - Wow, a UU church that hints at the "Unitarian" meaning. Of course, that is unlikely as to what was meant.
Explore your perfect soul...hmm...by what method?
All secular social justice political activity or a real
practice...be it prayer, meditation, ritual etc?
I think I know the answer.
Perfect soul but imperfect spelling ...Gouls? How about Ghouls. Every human should recognize both the light and dark, love and hate, creation and destruction etc. of the unverse.
ReplyDeleteSoul existence implies God - Wow, a UU church that hints at the "Unitarian" meaning. Of course, that is unlikely as to what was meant.
Explore your perfect soul...hmm...by what method?
All secular social justice political activity or a real
practice...be it prayer, meditation, ritual etc?
I think I know the answer.
Robin makes a good point in that forgiveness needs to be asked for, but I'd be happy if we would even just acknowledged our "less than perfectness" though a ritual of some kind and spend some time thinking about those whom WE need to forgive... At a UU worship workshop I was at recently, some people freaked out at the notion of spending time during worship silently acknowledging weakness or moral frailty. I worry that in our effort to be a happy, safe place, we deny the needs we all have for introspection. I'm not saying we should wallow in it, simply build something into worship that allows for it. I think it's healthy to honor the struggle that is Life. This important aspect of worship is often missing, giving visitors the misguided impression that we are smug and complacent. Or are we?
ReplyDeleteThis UU does believe in Original Sin, which I define something like this. We are born into and raised in a family, community, and world not of our own making. These structures and details of existence are already fully formed before our arrival, though they continue to evolve. They have been being formed by all humanity before us. They shape us in lots of negative ways not of our choosing. If there had been a literal Adam and Eve, it would have started with them. The myths point in the right direction. Our lineage is the bearer of unchosen sin.
ReplyDeleteThe non-existence of a literal Adam and Eve and the non-existence of a literally interpreted forbidden fruit has nothing to do with it. Since we are shaped by these influences mostly beyond our control, the fact that we are not necessarily born with all those elements as part of our DNA doesn't matter.
The big thing the Church got wrong through the ages was the idea that a little bit of water accompanied by a magic spell (sorry, Trinitarian formula) could get rid of Original Sin and the idea that it (the Church) could broker the taking away of this sin. It is a permanent part of our makeup as humans. Our task is to struggle to overcome the bad stuff we had no choice concerning. It is a struggle that is never done. It is both anthropological and psychological, in our society, that is, and in our minds.
The work of repairing the world is not for ourselves (we have already been shaped by the negative realities we've encountered and now can only deal with the fallout). Rather, it is for future generations not yet shaped.
Our intellects tell us the doctrine of Original Sin is clearly false. Our experiences tell us the myth of Original Sin is just as clearly true.
ReplyDeleteOur task is to recast the truth of the myth in a way that honestly acknowledges our human imperfections and struggles and that leads us to deal with them compassionately and effectively.
That's a web-generated church sign. I've been to the website and made similar ones myself. Is it your own reconstruction of an actual sign you saw, or is it a straw man? If the latter, it takes something away from an otherwise strong argument.
ReplyDeleteMost of us human beings experience life as shameful. Many of us human beings have a redemptive experience in which we learn that we can put down the burden of shame because we are, in truth, neither better nor worse than everybody else. We are worthy of love.Of course, such grace does not last; shame returns. How to escape this cycle of shame and grace is beyond me. Religious thinking has to be able to be with people at point of the cycle. Promoting the idea that we have perfect souls is like telling people they will be fine if they just inhale continuously. There are those who preach the opposite -- only exhale. Just as every inhalation requires a following exhalation; we have to hear the confessions of the people because confession leads a person to redemption, which leads back to shame. Ever notice that while Liberal Religion preaches our inherent worth and dignity ("you are already saved"), it regards itself as shameful -- mostly smug hypocrites who fail our best intentions through laziness and self-satisfaction? We are waiting for grace and redemption, the knowledge that we are no worse, not better, than anyone else. Blessings on this inquiry.
ReplyDeleteWonderful reflection. I remember well the time I was in Clinical Pastoral Education. I was in a hospital setting. Lots of emotional stuff one weekend. Marta came to see me, leaving DC and heading to the hospital where I worked on the Eastern Shore. The gory details of what made the weekend so difficult need not be told. I was in CPE, in a hospital, working as a chaplain, while still in seminary. And that weekend was full of stuff. Marta and I went on a Sunday morning to a UU congregation (that won't be named here). Lay-led as far as I could tell. Basically took the summer off. We entered the church and 10 or 12 folks sat in a circle. We joined them. Not a hymn was sung. Not a prayer was offered. No silence was invited or offered. No opportunity for confession or reflection or grace or challenge. Instead a group sat around talking and talking and talking about a school board election coming up. The good guys were named. The bad guys were named. I had no earthly idea what they were talking about or why. I just wanted a little 'balm in gilead.' Marta and I left, and not knowing what else to do, we went to a big United Methodist Church downtown to cleanse our pallette. Of course there are stories I could tell of many moments of grace in Unitarian Universalist congregations, some of which happened in big churches and small. But this idea that PB points to--that folks come in looking for healing and grace and redemption. I certainly walked in to that eastern shore congregation seeking grace and wholeness and integration and so on and i was met with absolutely nothing to hold on to. I have tried to remember that and put lots of music/silence/prayer/reflection time for folks in my services. But I realize that I all too often fail in that regard...Lord, hear my prayer.
ReplyDeleteLove this, Anna! I was just talking about this issue with a dear friend and fellow UU today -- how we seem to be a religion of fixers who don't know that we are broken and in desperate need of grace. We seem to have forgotten (or just don't care) that Jesus was a healer, not just a reformer. I see evidence all around me that our congregations do not know what to do for or with those who come in need of healing, grace and redemption. The encounter is all about "how can we meet your needs" rather than "Welcome and join us as we all seek healing and wisdom together, with heads bowed in humility and awe." Rock on.
ReplyDeleteGood analysis, Anna. From knowing my granddaughter, who is coming up on her first birthday, I go with bucket #1. She was born perfect, and is only slightly less perfect now. The kingdom of heaven belongs to her.
ReplyDeleteAnna,
ReplyDeleteThe problem here may be assuming that we were "born perfect" and somehow have fallen. We could benefit at looking at the naturalistic perspective offered by the author of the college evolutionary biology textbook Evolution by Douglas J. Futuyma.
Futuyma (when commenting on an early experiment involving natural selection and bacteria) made the following comment:
This experiment conveys the essence of natural selection: it is a completely mindless process without forethought or goal.
If we were created by material processes that appears to be blind, mindless, and purposeless, then perhaps we are not fallen from some perfect state. We may be an imperfect product created by an imperfect process.