That has whetted the interest of
conservatives, who are gloating in the expectation that they, in concert
with these newer Christians, will squeeze the progressives out of power and
influence. That hope became even more explicit with the protests mounted by
Anglicans elsewhere in the world, especially in Nigeria, over the
consecration of an openly gay bishop, Gene Robinson of New Hampshire. While
a large majority of the Episcopal bishops in the U.S. voted to approve
Robinson, conservatives made the most of these objections in the Third
World. It was this, of course, that got most of the play in the media.
A varied panel of academics raised a number
of questions and got answers that seemed to satisfy their concerns.
Perhaps the point made most frequently is
that this is one more example of the North "using the South to think with."
Practically, it means that the South is used largely as ammunition in
debates inside the U.S.; theoretically, it means that the debate is carried
out using received concepts, not asking whether they ought to be redefined
and reshaped or new ones should be invented. Jenkins himself often made the
point that he was thinking in terms of "Christianities" in the plural and
was not making any single form normative.
Another issue, mentioned several times, was
his use of statistics about membership, which are especially misleading in a
situation of frequent conversion and serial baptism; he pointed out that he
had referred to such statistics only in a second-hand way, always
conditioned with a "Some say . . . " In the end, all agreed that over-use of
statistics can create a misleading impression of inevitability.
Several panelists noted that the term
"Christendom," which was coined in Anglo-Saxon England, has at least two
different connotations: sometimes it means Christianization by force, which
happened, of course, not only in Europe but in the colonial world; but it
also can connote a close connection with popular culture, which, as we well
know, is tremendously variable. Either way the term suggests increased
power, political or cultural, and when the adjective "new" is added it can
easily look like a kind of eschatological completion that is to be sought at
all costs. Instead of this, suggested Cynthia Hoehler-Fatton of the
University of Virginia, what we need more is "a new humandom."
The panelists were aware of immigration
patterns. Most immigrants to the U.S. are Christians, but immigrants to
Europe are Muslims. Europe is becoming more secular, the South is becoming
more religious, and the U.S. is between them, tempted by both trends.
First-generation immigrants may think like fundamentalists, but the second
generation, which grows up in different circumstances, are quite different.
Jenkins himself made two final points.
First, he emphasized that he does not
believe that we are fated to a "clash of civilizations." Islam has had
varying modes of relationship with culture and politics, but what is most
salient at the present time is that one well-financed form of Islam was able
to appeal to many disaffected people in the Muslim world. Their influence,
while it is a fact, is not inevitable, he said. (Lamin Sanneh, an African
convert to Christianity from Islam, pointed out that non-Western Christians
in much of the Middle East have more in common, culturally speaking, with
Muslims than with Europeans.)
Second, Jenkins noted that Christians in
the world's South, while they may be biblical and doctrinal conservatives,
are not conservatives on social and economic issues. He reminded
the audience that he had said in his book, over and over, that the
conservatives in the U.S. who are trying to make common cause with Third
World Christians are "in for a nasty shock" when it comes to important
issues like these. As someone else pointed out, the Anglican bishops in
Africa asked that the issue of same-sex relationships not be forced on the
church, because they had other more important issues, including poverty and
their relationship with Islam. It is on that very different terrain that
alliances will finally be made.
Pres. Bush and religious rhetoric
A panel of reporters and pundits
discussed the theme "Bush, the War, and Religious Rhetoric." This, for
understandable reasons, drew a large and motivated crowd. Following their
job assignment, they focused mainly on rhetoric surrounding the war, and
only under questioning directed their attention to the religiosity of the
Bush administration more generally.
David Brooks of the
Weekly Standard started out by noting that, when one reads the
President's speeches, there is no more religious language than is typical of
the civil religion of past presidents. He also emphasized what to some
observers has been obvious, that almost no theology is reflected in the
speeches. His rhetoric about the Iraq war has focused upon (1) evil,
which seems quite tangible but for undefined reasons; (2) certitude about
providence, but with the characteristic political proviso that it
remains mysterious, evoked primarily for rhetorical effect; and (3) a sense
of national calling, a conviction that the U.S. is the "last best
hope" of human kind -- that it has, as Bush said in a recent speech,
"wonder-working power" to spread freedom and democracy throughout the world.
Peter Steinfels of the New York Times
cautioned us to differentiate between Bush's rhetoric, its context and
function, and its reception in various segments of the public. He called
attention to the forceful rhetoric about evil as a tangible fact and the
intention to hunt down and punish evil-doers, one by one. But he also noted
that Bush had not only called Islam "a religion of peace" but, in a recent
press conference, affirmed that Muslims, Jews, and Christians worship "the
same God" -- to the discomfiture of many evangelical spokesmen.
Mark Silk picked up on the theme of Bush's
rhetoric, after 9/ll, promoting freedom and democracy everywhere in the
world, noting that such rhetoric is "Wilsonian" (and Clintonian), quite
unlike what Bush had championed in the 2000 campaign. He went on to point
out that the Muslim world sees the U.S. as not living up to these
commitments, since it is their co-religionists who are on the receiving end
of the Patriot Act, and their entire religious community, not simply a few
terrorists, is regarded as the enemy.
Steven Waldman
of Beliefnet.com emphasized that Bush, in characterizing Islam as "a
religion of peace," helped de-fuse public anger in the wake of 9/11. Already
in the 2000 campaign he had used, for the first time in political history,
the vocabulary of "church, synagogue, and mosque"; while this was part of
his promotion of the "faith-based initiative" in the attempt to woo more
voters, it did represent something new. And his recent affirmation that
Muslims worship "the same God" was a courageous act, in Waldman's view.
Conservative religious leaders took a
rather different view of Islam, describing both the religion and its founder
in negative terms. George Will went so far as to suggest that Bush, in at
least this respect, is liberal or latitudinarian in his religious attitudes.
In the minds of many people, Waldman commented, Islam has replaced Communism
as the world enemy.
Bush, he noted, did not respond to this
anti-Islamic rhetoric until shortly after the November 2002 elections, and
then in only a moderated way. The reason, he suggested, is that the
electorate is now closely divided (about 45% Democratic, 45% Republican, and
10% independent), and Bush could not afford to alienate any part of his
constituency. In these contrasting actions, he declared, we see "the best
and worst acts of the Bush presidency."
In the subsequent discussion, Silk noted
both the decrease in hate crimes against Muslims and the increase in
anti-Islamic feeling in the public, analogous to the public approval of the
internment camps after Pearl Harbor. Steinfels reminded the audience of the
complexity of the situation inside the U.S.: although the press never
mentions it, 70 percent of the Arabs in the U.S. are Christians, while many
of the Muslims in the U.S. are African Americans.)
It was only in response to questions from
the audience that the panel members addressed the broader religiosity of the
Bush administration. They agreed that this administration has projected the
image of personal piety and virtue. What it wants to do, Waldman suggested,
is to depict Clinton and the Democrats as spoiled children of the Sixties,
in stark contrast to the personal responsibility of the Republicans and
their program. Brooks picked up on this, commenting that both parties are
engaging in what he called "a continuation of culture wars by other means,"
refusing to take statements and decisions at face value but seeing them as
symptoms of deeper differences. Steinfels, in response, did not see these
partisan reactions as unrealistic, for there are serious differences between
the two parties, especially on domestic issues, and the President has often
acted in an unnuanced "Texas sheriff" mode. Some of the panelists, it seems,
want to pay attention to what is actually done; others take rhetoric and
style seriously. And that, of course, is the classic problem of interpreting
political behavior, both past and present.
