Catching up on Recent Conversations--Part 3: The Politics of Jesus

The first post I wrote on this was swallowed whole by Blogger.  I know that I can't reconstruct it, but I'll start by simply copying my original post (which was a reposting of something written by another). As you'll see, there's another important topic referenced here, besides The Politics of Jesus by John Howard Yoder.  

Miriam Iwashige

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I read this book decades ago. Reading this article by Swartz reminds me that it was more formative for me than I realized. I haven't reviewed the book recently, probably because I was repulsed by the wrongdoing of the author, and the failure of others around him to hold him to account. These things are deeply troubling. Yet I believe that the basic premise of the book is sound.

Here's a quote from the article:

"Critiquing the Constantinian merging of church and state, Yoder argued against the Christian coercion of society. The state, to which Christians do not owe a reflexive obedience, is inherently corrupt, Yoder maintained, and entanglement in the state is fraught with danger and compromise. Jesus’ greatest temptation was to wield political power, or as Yoder provocatively suggested at a conference at Calvin College, to become a Calvinist.

"Instead, Jesus ultimately worked toward the visible restructuring of social relations within the Church. This example, which ought to be central to Christian social ethics, suggested that suffering and peace were normative practices. This was not to say, Yoder was quick to point out in Politics of Jesus, that the Church had no social or political responsibilities. Rather Christians, in forming countercultural communities that fed the hungry, cared for the sick, and spoke prophetically to positions of power on behalf of the oppressed, could serve as a social model to the world. Servanthood, grassroots action, and persuasion, rather than coercion, ought to characterize Christian politics."

David R. Swartz

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"Yoder’s communitarian ethic of peace failed spectacularly in real life." My latest at The Anxious Bench.

PATHEOS.COM|BY THE ANXIOUS BENCH

A Tragic Anniversary: The Politics of Jesus Turns Fifty

Reflections on a book of peace written by a violent man

4Rebekah Mui, Marcia Zimmerman and 2 others

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  Miriam Iwashige

  I'm not sure what readers of this post will be able to see, so I'll also copy one of my favorite comments on this OP, by Gerald J. Mast:

  "Thanks for taking this on so forthrightly. It speaks well to the quandary that many of us who were inspired by POJ are now left with. While I’m also tempted to yield to the Calvinist argument for irreversible depravity, I’ve also been rereading Menno and rediscovering the persistent thread of penitence that shapes his “true evangelical faith.” Maybe that’s a place to go."

  

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  • Gerald J. Mast

    Miriam Iwashige working on an essay and possibly a book about this!

    

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  • Gerald J. Mast

    Miriam Iwashige Menno is the only early Anabaptist leader/writer I know who directly challenged the culture of sexual abuse in the established church of his time. I don't know why we don't talk about this.

    

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    Miriam Iwashige

    Gerald J. Mast Very interesting! I didn't know that. It adds to my sense that we do well to think about being "more like us" before rushing off to be more like other Christian groups around us. I had a similar sense recently when I read an essay by David French on the need for confession when virtue does not follow faith, especially in the political realm. I'm eager to read your essay. https://frenchpress.thedispatch.com/.../getting-more...

    

    FRENCHPRESS.THEDISPATCH.COM

    Getting ‘More Christians Into Politics’ Is the Wrong Christian Goal

    Getting ‘More Christians Into Politics’ Is the Wrong Christian Goal

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  • Rebekah Mui

    Gerald J. Mast Wow in which part of his writings??? And what kind of sexual abuse? I found Stayer's descriptions of clergy discipline by Anabaptist congregations really interesting and encouraging.

    

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  • Gerald J. Mast

    Rebekah Mui He addresses abuse in the "True Christian Faith" in his critique of the priests and monks that is part of a long list of corrupted authorities in Christendom: the judges, the priests, the preachers, etc. (page 401 in CWMS, Herald edition); also in "Reply to False Accusations" (552 and 562, CWMS). He's outraged at the practices of "good-for-nothing men whom they call pastors, ministers, masters, and teachers, some of whom wrong one woman or girl after the other..." What is striking is that he is identifying what we would call grooming and serial abuse in passages like this and connecting these practices with the abuse of power more generally in institutions of Christendom.

    

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• Rebekah Mui

  Love your thoughts, we should be having more conversations about this

 Swartz' original essay can be read here.  Incidentally, both Swartz and Mast are/were teachers at the post-high-school level.  Mast is our daughter-in-law's first cousin.  I'm sorry that the material at the beginning of the Swartz link image is messed up.  He says "Yoder's communitarian ethic of peace failed spectacularly in real life."  He posts under the "The Anxious Bench" title at Patheos.