LT on DB and RC
“Religion-less Christianity”
[Note: I write a weekly e-letter called "Life Together" and the below references to that come from this blog being initially sent in Life Together. If you have any interest in receiving Life Together drop me a response post here and I'll get you set up]
When Dietrich Bonhoeffer, German Lutheran Pastor and
Teaching Theologian, was imprisoned in 1943 by the Nazi Regime for
anti-government (Nazi) activity and before he was executed in April 1945 under
personal order of Hitler himself after never being released from prison, he
wrote letters, essays, poems, and narratives both fiction and non-fiction.
Toward the end of his imprisonment he wrote an outline to a book he never got
to write. And in the last year of his imprisonment, and thus too his life, and
what looked like to be what would be the focus of this unpublished book, he was
writing of this thing called a “religion-less Christianity.” We never got the
book. We never got the complete thinking of Bonhoeffer on the subject, but we
got a bunch good thinking, writing, and ruminations to capture our imagination
and call us to engage the faith in what Bonhoeffer called “a world come of
age.” Since years ago being introduced to Bonhoeffer’s “religion-less Christianity”
through the posthumously published Letters
and Papers from Prison I have continuously been tracking this idea and
dabbling as much as I could in learning more. For my sabbatical now in 2018
(roughly June 1 to Sept. 1, 3 months, dates still to be specified) I choose Bonhoeffer’s “religion-less
Christianity” as the focus for the “reflection” portion of my sabbatical. From
what I know now I believe there is great stuff here for helping the church
today be an engaging force of God’s unconditional love in a world that is less
and less interested in religion but more and more interested in God.
Life Together (LT), the weekly e-letter I have been posting
now for a number of years, takes its name from another work of Bonhoeffer, Life Together. Now, in 2018, this
sabbatical year, in the e-letter I will be musing and writing specifically on
the ins and outs of a religion-less Christianity and engaging Bonhoeffer’s
work. It should be fun. I hope you enjoy it. It will be a time of growth and
development for me and I hope will be helpful in your faith and life in Christ
in the world.
Let’s get started.
How can I describe for you Dietrich Bonhoeffer (DB)’s
“religion-less” Christianity?
“It is saying that God, in Jesus, and therefore always even
without Jesus, is not the “God of the gaps,” here to fill our need where we
need or our lack of information when we are lacking. God is not a power or
being that stands ready at our beckon call to help us achieve and perfect the
power and position to which we aspire. God does not stand at the periphery of
our center in order to expand or enhance our place or influence. God, rather,
is the center of all existence and we live within this being. Our humanity is
not aided by divinity, but rather is divinity, but not as an elevation of
humanity to divinity, and (perhaps) not as a deflation of divinity (c.f. the
New Testament, e.g. Philippians 2 describing the decent of God to earth in
Jesus), but rather by a revelation that humanity in all of its dearth and dust,
is where the divine always has dwelt and will only dwell for the sake of or as
the expression of the only thing that God (divinity) is: self-giving love. I am
thinking right now of a couple of related descriptions of all of this: 1)
Martin Luther’s statement that God is only found in suffering and death (note
the word “only”) 2) an illustration of salvation I have conjured up and used
many times that positions a drowning person being met by an arriving “life
guard” who only saves by promising to die along with the drowning person and
then does just that.”
Okay, here’s an interesting thing that as I think of it
sheds some light not only on how I will be sharing my thoughts in 2018 on
religion-less Christianity in Life Together but also expresses how we actually
received DB’s direct address on this subject: the section above in quotes is
something I wrote in my daily journal on December 22 and as I went back to it
to share here I was typing along and realized when I got to the end it was really
an incomplete essay, not a full or well-rounded exposition, and that more
needed to be said and that the thoughts needed to be organized (not to say also
vetted!). DB’s Letters and Papers in
Prison, where we get his direct address on religion-less Christianity
(let’s call it RC), were just that: letters and papers. My thoughts in Life
Together on RC will be that too. Not fully thought out, not fully organized,
not fully edited, just shared. And to give you an idea of how unvarnished what that
sharing will be, here’s what I wrote in my journal on Dec. 22 just after I
finished the above and as I was typing the above out now found abruptly
disturbing because what I wrote begged for more description/explanation:
“cleaned house, did laundry, got haircut, did some home finance.”
I went from noting DB’s RC to chronicling my chores. Ah,
yes. And such is the way we live our life.
So, there you have it for now. Some initial ramblings on DB’s RC and my
engagement of it and sharing with you. Again, now in 2018, I’ll be using Life
Together to just keep opening up this RC as much as possible. At least that’s
the way if feels right now.
