Peter Rollins: 'Orthodoxy is Correct Praise not Correct Belief'
During a recent visit to Michael Spencer's blog, Internetmonk.com (love the name by the way), I came across a discussion of an interview that Becky Garrison conducted with the emerging church leader and philosopher, Peter Rollins. As suggested in the title, Rollins wants to redefine the term orthodoxy by reflecting on the roots of the words doxology and orthodoxy. Rollins also has some unusual and rather controversial ideas reflecting on what it essentially means to be a Christian. In addition, I will say that his comments on Jesus bringing a religion that signals the end of religion was rather intriguing to me. As much as the interview comments themselves are interesting, you must read on to see the blog discussion thread that follows (Don't worry- its not too long).
While some sympathetic comments are made, it seems that is definition of orthodoxy as praise is deemed to be rather problematic. In usual Scot McKnight fashion, he is able to remain a sympathetic advocate for the emerging crowd, while also basically discrediting Rollins' definition of orthodoxy. McKnight offers some powerful lexical relfections that contrast with Rollins' definiton of orthodoxy.
Anyway, in the end, while Rollins may have few intriguing or intersting thoughts and questions to propose, I find his desire to vacate belief structures from the idea of orthodoxy to be rather unconvincing and problematic. At the same time, I will be investigating Rollins' work a bit further in order to get a full orbed understanding of his ideas; as I always say, powerful critique can only be delivered by those who have taken the time to carefully investigate and understand the position of those whom they question. Consequently, I would really like to review Rollins' forthcoming book, The Fidelity of Betrayal: The Ir/Religious Heart of Christianity; I have contacted Paraclete Press in an effort to secure a pre-release copy, but have been unsuccessful so far, so if either Rollins or Paraclete happen to get a notification by my publishing this post, hook me up with a copy of that book! I really want to review it-please!
Here is the link to the post on internetmonk.com that I referred to:
http://www.internetmonk.com/archive/peter-rollins-on-orthodoxy-doxology-and-the-end-of-religion#comments
3 COMMENTS...:
To wonder out "loud" for a moment, wouldn't the idea of "religion" as something to get rid of a distinctively 21st century issue. It just seems to me that this would be hopelessly anachronistic. Doesn't James, Jesus' brother talk about what "true religion" is, without any hint of our "Christianity is not a religion" cliches?
Well, I think the focus to remove "religion" has a tendency to refer mostly to the institutionalization of Christianity found in, perhaps, the Roman Catholic church, Southern Baptist Convention, et al. My guess is began with the counter-culture movement in the 60's. Also, I think you're right as far as James, he does make reference to religion with no references to a "cliche." Most of the time when you hear someone refer to "religion" it usually has negative connotations, even within Evangelicalsim. We've all heard the phrase, "It's not about religion, its about a relationship."
Thanks for you comment! I also think you raise an interesting and important point. While I don't know how Rollins would respond, I might venture a guess that he would justify his reading of the scriptures on some postmodern theory of appropriating texts. I'm inclined to agree with you though; it does seem a bit anachronistic. Your particular thought did not originally cross my mind when I read the interview, so thanks for your input.
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