A Follow Up on Matt's Response to Tony Jones

As many of you already know, my friend and co-writer, Matt Wilcoxen, attempted to take up Tony Jones’ challenge to cite an example, in print, where Tony himself has ever said something that is considered beyond the bounds of “classic, historic orthodoxy”. In response, Tony Jones kindly acknowledged Matt’s examples as having at least a degree of substance, warranting a substantive reply. Since then, I have been following the comments on Tony Jones’ blog, and I felt that for the sake of healthy interaction and discussion, that I would attempt to offer some of my own thoughts and questions both in response to Tony and the subsequent commentary.

Before I offer my thoughts, I want to say up front that perhaps Matt’s comments were a bit caustic, but I can say, and I’m sure that Matt would agree, that it was unnecessary in retrospect, and I hope that we can still have healthy dialogue on the issue.

As far as the issue at hand, my first observation is that the discussion on Tony’s blog itself is evidence of the confusion that his ambiguity on certain issues has produced. For example, a number of people commenting on Tony’s blog are emphatic about the fact that Matt’s criticisms fail to show that Tony has ever said anything suggesting that he stands beyond the bounds of classic orthodoxy. At the same time, there is a tension between those comments, and number of other comments eluding to the likely possibility that Tony Jones may not even believe that a stable orthodox set of beliefs “exist out there”. My first thought is how can anyone really assess the value of Matt’s criticism until Tony first clarifies his own position; if Tony Jones does not believe that a stable orthodoxy exists “out there”, then how can he say that he say that he has not fallen outside of that boundary with any real conviction or concern. If this is his position, then it does not matter whether he adheres to historic orthodoxy or not because it’s simply the product of an antiquated contextualization anyway. The fact that he sought to defend himself suggests to me that he is in fact aware of a stable set of orthodox beliefs that exist within the church, supposedly contextualized or not. Ultimately, it seems (relatively) clear that his epistemological convictions affect the way he wants to define the term orthodoxy, yet he remains reticent to openly admit that fact, which, to me, implies that he is either concerned that his unorthodox positions will become obvious, or that he simply feels that people will reject his reasoning.

Another related concern is the issue of the term orthodox itself; let’s begin by granting the notion that all instances of orthodoxy are contextualized. Let’s grant that there is no stable, objective, orthodox position from which to speak about theological beliefs. If this is the case, then why speak about orthodoxy anyway because the term is vacuous under these circumstances. The term orthodox implies that one can identify examples of heterodoxy, but if there is no stable orthodoxy, then there is no stable point from which to say that anything is unorthodox- is this what people should take from Tony’s epistemological and theological convictions. It all remains unclear, and I can’t find a point from which I can understand why Tony would defend his own orthodoxy if he is not convinced that orthodoxy is a valid way to identify Christianity from heresy. And if he is convinced of this fact, then his seeming relativism appears to be problematic.

As a further example, again granting credence to postmodern philosophical convictions, let’s suggest that orthodoxy is whatever the church wants to make it be within a certain place and time within the stream of history and tradition. Taking this idea, let’s ask ourselves the question as to whether or not Tony Jones Christian convictions coincide with what the contemporary mainstream, majority church believes about Christianity itself. If Tony’s views are deemed consistent with what today’s Christian church has to say, then perhaps he is orthodox. If not, then I would have to conclude otherwise. And let me also add that I do not believe that the views of the emergent church represent the majority despite the rhetoric and attention. Finally, I do emphatically believe that there is a collective, protestant orthodoxy that is both stable and “out there”.

If nothing else, I think this should show Tony that he does need to articulate himself very clearly, in order to both eliminate confusion and give people the opportunity to interact in a substantive way with his positions.

As a second point of contention, I think that while the comments that Matt cited may have been an example of hyperbole or rhetoric (as mentioned in Tony’s blog), I still think that the comments were inappropriate coming from someone who wishes to minister people in the church. In addition, I think it would be rather naive to think that there is not at least a small underlying seed of Joy that Tony derives from his antagonism. Let me make a suggestion at this point; if Tony Jones, or anyone else, is going to “deconstruct” the beliefs of those less knowledgeable than himself in the sphere's of education that have led him to his convictions, then he has a responsibility, to the church, to do what he does in a way that is both constructive and helpful. This means, in my opinion, that he must be willing to explain his philosophy, theology, and efforts to minister, in a way that is clear and readily accessible, even to those “church ladies and M.Div students” that he seeks to ‘bomb intellectually’. This is the intellectual and spiritual right of those whom one ministers to; anything short of this is simply intellectual and spiritual rape.