Whether we
like it or not, the new spirituality is with us and is sure to impact us. It
will increasingly feature in our television screens, books, schools, public
legislation, and make inroads into our churches. How are we to respond to it?
Robert
Webber identifies three different ways Christians typically engage movements such
as this. The first, characteristic of sections of the church with a focus on
theology and the intellect, is to resist.
“There are many Christians who have been shaped by the modern worldview of
rationalism,” he writes. “In this mindset, ministry has been characterized by a
defence of Christianity against the secularization of culture” (The Divine Embrace, 116). Webber
mentions the late Francis Schaeffer as an example of this approach to the
encroachment of secular philosophies. “He insisted on factual, propositional
truth and the defence of the faith through philosophy, logic and scientific
evidence. Schaeffer’s approach is the modern way of presenting historic
Christianity, and as a result many embrace an intellectual spirituality based
on reason as the way into the future” (Ibid.).
The second
approach to the emergence of the new spirituality is,
Webber notes, to adapt to it. This, he argues, is the typical response of
churches with an emphasis on experience. “Another group of Christians,” he
continues, “are those men and women who have been shaped by the post-sixties
revolution and have ministered in the period of history during which the culture
of the new spirituality has emerged. These folks are the pragmatists, and as
such they are very much in tune with the changes taking place in communication,
business, marketing and advertising and have been influenced strongly by the
therapeutic emphasis of psychology. While they have maintained the basic
doctrines of historic Christianity, they have simplified Christian commitment
to the very basic emphasis of an experience of Christ” (Ibid.). Webber goes on to say how this doctrinal reduction has gone
hand in hand with a focus on self and what will meet personal needs. “It
reduces faith,” he says, “to an existential personalism
that fails to adequately distinguish itself from the narcissism of popular
spirituality. It generates preoccupation with a journey into self, a focus on
personal experience much like that of … medieval mysticism… (Ibid., 117). People with this
outlook instinctively examine any new movement to see what personal benefits it
may offer. Their tendency is to adapt what they can use for their own purposes
without necessarily accepting or rejecting the source from which it comes.
Webber has
problems with both of the above approaches. The first, he argues, is too
dependent upon a rational approach to truth characteristic of the modern or scientific
age of reason. It supposes that the way to meet error is to engage it blow for
blow, idea of idea through reason and fact. The second approach – that of
adapting – he critiques as too concessive, too influenced by the relativism of
our postmodern outlook.
How then
should we respond? Webber argues that we should meet the claims of the new
spirituality with “God’s story as a comprehensive vision of the world, its
history, and the meaning of human existence” (Ibid.). He speaks of this as a return
to truth and passion. It is a return to telling the gospel story as the
early church embraced it – as the action of the Creator embracing rebellious
sinners in redeeming love and pursuing his purposes for the universe. It is the
story of the incarnation, death and resurrection of the Son of God, the story
of his present rule in the heavens and his return to end human history as we
know it now. It is not a story without truth and fact – that is, it is not
opposed to the faith commitments of the apologetic “resistors” – but it doesn’t
rely on evidence and logic and philosophy for its effect. It simply tells God’s
story, unapologetically declaring the revealed truths of creation, fall,