Came across this quote by Lebanese theologian/politician/philosopher Charles Malik at Noll's book "The Scandal of the evangelical mind" (the scandal was there's not much of a mind left), and thanks to Jeremy for sharing it.
"I must be frank with you: the greatest danger confronting American evangelical Christianity is the danger of anti-intellectualism. The mind in its greatest and deepest reaches is not cared for enough. But intellectual nurture cannot take place apart from profound immersion for a period of years in the history of thought and the spirit.
People who are in a hurry to get out of the university and start earning money or serving the church or preaching the gospel have no idea of the infinite value of spending years of leisure conversing with the greatest minds and souls of the past, ripening and sharpening and enlarging their powers of thinking. The result is that the arena of creative thinking is vacated and abdicated to the enemy. Who among evangelicals can stand up to the great secular scholars on their own terms of scholarship? Who among evangelical scholars is quoted as a normative source by the greatest secular authorities on history or philosophy or psychology or sociology or politics? Does the evangelical mode of thinking have the slightest chance of becoming the dominant mode in the great universities of Europe and America that stamp our entire civilization with their spirit and ideals?
For the sake of greater effectiveness in witnessing to Jesus Christ, as well as for their own sakes, evangelicals cannot afford to keep on living on the periphery of responsible intellectual existence. (Charles Malik, “The Other Side of Evangelism,” Christianity Today, November 7, 1980, p. 40)"
"I must be frank with you: the greatest danger confronting American evangelical Christianity is the danger of anti-intellectualism. The mind in its greatest and deepest reaches is not cared for enough. But intellectual nurture cannot take place apart from profound immersion for a period of years in the history of thought and the spirit.
People who are in a hurry to get out of the university and start earning money or serving the church or preaching the gospel have no idea of the infinite value of spending years of leisure conversing with the greatest minds and souls of the past, ripening and sharpening and enlarging their powers of thinking. The result is that the arena of creative thinking is vacated and abdicated to the enemy. Who among evangelicals can stand up to the great secular scholars on their own terms of scholarship? Who among evangelical scholars is quoted as a normative source by the greatest secular authorities on history or philosophy or psychology or sociology or politics? Does the evangelical mode of thinking have the slightest chance of becoming the dominant mode in the great universities of Europe and America that stamp our entire civilization with their spirit and ideals? For the sake of greater effectiveness in witnessing to Jesus Christ, as well as for their own sakes, evangelicals cannot afford to keep on living on the periphery of responsible intellectual existence. (Charles Malik, “The Other Side of Evangelism,” Christianity Today, November 7, 1980, p. 40)"
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We, evangelicals, are afraid to think great thoughts and understand great thoughts. I do not think we are "anti-intellectualism". We are actually "intellectual-phobia."
We are afraid to explore new avenues of thoughts because we are so afraid it will shaken our precious theological construct. So instead of making an attempt to understand something that does not agree with our theological construct, we attack first. That which we cannot destroy, we discredit.
Oops. Sorry for the rant.
Blessings for Lent
There is also another extreme, however, and a related pendulum swing in response to intellectual phobia... And what i'd like to call a intellectual "lack of nerves" craving for respectability that virtually throws caution and biblical fidelity out the window.
It accepts the assumptions of what's cool in the spirit of the age, and then ask how the faith fits in nicely, often in a domesticated form without a countercultural edge...
God save us from phobia and cowardice, resting confidently in the fact that all truths are God's truth :)
Thank you for your comments. I agree with you about intellectual cowardice and sticking to the status quo. Unfortunately we have a religious tradition of burning people who do not agree with us on the stake. That definitely is the fastest way to end an argument.
blessings
on the OTHER hand, sometimes it takes courage and hard work to defend an 'unpopular' traditional truth, just like it takes both as well to integrate what we've always valued most with new learning/theories, etc.
Which is probably why many of us look forward to a meeting between ppl like Brian McLaren and Ng Kam Weng this weekend to help forge even better "third alternatives" - walking the narrow road between narrow-minded orthodooxy which shoots anything that moves differently and invertebrate heterodoxy which lacks integrity.
better to make people talk, than make them burn, huh? ;>)
Yeap! Have a nice conversation tis weekend, I've got a good Agora fren's wedding to attend so will have to sadly skip tis one hehe...
Frankly I dunno any 'narrow minded orthodox' fundy today who wanna torch heretics at the stake so not very sure if that's a bona fide "burning contextual issue" we need to grapple with here...
But definitely, we need to walk tat narrow road between dead orthodoxy and living heterodoxy. And that calls for some keen exploration on wat orthodoxy means... awkward questions tat need to be asked even if it be politically incorrect sometimes :)
the question (pun!) is, whether both partners at play will entertain them.
and if they entertain questions (which does not necessary entail accepting the premises behind the questions), it is whether they will respond with the grace of the swans or with smugness that lies behind "let them eat cake."
surely, replying humbly with seepch seasoned with salt is not being "politically correct" :)
Pass the salt please!!
you eat cake with salt! That's a new thought. Concerning the 'burning issue', you will be surprised to discover that it still goes on in our communities of faith. Only nowadays we don't use matches.
alwyn and anonymous,
dialogue is good and it is good to find a 'third alternative'. But talk is cheap. We can dialogue with generous orthodoxy until the cows come home and yet achieve nothing. Brian and Kam Weng talking on the stage sounds good but so what?
(just checkin' tat we are talking about metaphorical stakes here, cos these poor folks have got enuff bad press already and dun need to be associated with fundamentalists of the suicide bomber type!) hehe...
I suppose nothing can be 'guaranteed', but just like how books (or songs or movies or other ppl) can change a person's life such that he behaves/thinks/talks different (and hopefully better), so maybe the likes of McLaren and Ng can mutually encourage/inspire each other.
I guess, depending on the problem, if ppl can be nudged (ever so slightly) in the right direction, then it's something to smile, cheer, praise God about. Of course, expectations are also important (no one expects McLaren to stop being postmodern emergent overnight and NKW isn't going to give up Calvinism anytime soon!).
Did I answer yr question?
"So after all this chatting, wat practical, missional will come out of it?"
Or is it just another seminar, where we meet and talk, no action emerges from it at all...
just clarifying the 'so wat?'
Thanks hedonese, I am asking a pragmatic question, which is the former.
What practical, missional thingee are we expecting from the conference?
The conversation partners (and Brian) should be focusing on praxis-oriented issues, tasks, action-steps. We have been 'briefed' (smile) to ensure that the discussions don't get too abstract and theoretical.
It's being made very clear that we're not there to argue and really more to share tactics, 'swap notes', trade war-stories and so on.
But then again there are people who MAY wish to pick the panels' brains on the theological foundations of their approaches, their sources, etc.
Hope this helps?