Universal Life Church

Anne Rice now officially believes in Jesus Christ, and not the institution named after him. The bestselling author of the popular Vampire Chronicles series of novels formally announced 28 July that she was leaving the Roman Catholic Church. Rice, who left the faith at age 18, reverted back in 1998 and started writing novels such as Christ the Lord: Out of Egypt. However, her decision to embrace Christ while rejecting Christianity fails to satisfy either religious conservatives or atheists, leaving the author in a catch-22. But Rice’s new spirituality is not necessarily contradictory; it is merely a nuanced composite of beliefs which marry her social conscience with her spiritual predilections.

Rice struggled for years to reconcile the tenets of her Church with her personal scruples, but finally gave up when she decided the Church endorsed too many beliefs she found repugnant. (One might say that, for Rice, there was no longer any baby to throw out with the bathwater—only dirty bathwater.) Her objections to the Church’s policies run the gamut and mirror those of most liberals. On her official Facebook page, she declared,

Today I quit being a Christian. I’m out. I remain committed to Christ as always but not to being “Christian” or to being part of Christianity. It’s simply impossible for me to “belong” to this quarrelsome, hostile, disputatious, and deservedly infamous group. For ten …years, I’ve tried. I’ve failed. I’m an outsider. My conscience will allow nothing else.

As I said…, I quit being a Christian. I’m out. In the name of Christ, I refuse to be anti-gay. I refuse to be anti-feminist. I refuse to be anti-artificial birth control. I refuse to be anti-Democrat. I refuse to be anti-secular humanism. I refuse to be anti-science. I refuse to be anti-life. In the name of …Christ, I quit Christianity and being Christian. Amen.

Of course, such a compromise between religious faith and social conscience has its opponents on both sides, religious and non-religious. For the pious, Rice has obviously strayed away from the flock since she believes she can explore and understand the teachings of Jesus Christ on her own terms, while for the non-religious, she is not straying far enough and is failing to sever her ties completely with what they regard as superstition.

The reproof on the religious side came from a Catholic archbishop himself. In a recent Washington Post editorial, former Archbishop of Canterbury George Carey criticized Rice’s decision as contradictory, claiming that her belief in Christ was impossible without fealty to the church named after him. In the article, Carey argued,

What Anne Rice said saddens me. I hope she might reconsider her unwise and contradictory statement. If she had said the ‘church’ instead of ‘Christianity’ it would have made more sense, but of course I would have still disagreed! You see, Christ is synonymous with Christianity. We only know Christ through his people, through the saints, through the scriptures, through the church. Christ without Christianity is D-I-Y religion—Sinatra’s ‘I did it my way’.

It is unwise, because the example of such a lifestyle leads nowhere. These 40 plus American teenagers are keen, practicing Christians who are wonderful examples of Christianity at its best. They know they cannot follow Christ without the church—fallible though it is. They also know that you cannot transform the world without one another. That is why Christ called disciples to follow him. If Anne wants to follow Christ she can’t do it on her own.

But Rice’s simultaneous devotion to Christ and rejection of Christianity is not necessarily contradictory, because the terms Christ and Christianity are not necessarily synonymous. Christ can refer to the life and morals of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, and Christianity, to a cult set up in his name after his death. Just because an institution is named after a religious figure does not mean that the institution reflects the teachings of that religious figure. Therefore it is perfectly reasonable for Rice to make a distinction between the two terms, and to reject one while embracing the other. In addition, Carey faults her for exploring Christ outside the official sanction of the Church. So what if she did? Why should a person go through a priest or a church to understand the teachings of Christ? Where did Christ say we should? It is reason, conscience, intuition, and reflection which are required for spiritual exploration, not blind faith in the word of a self-styled authority. Therefore, if Anne wants to follow Christ, she most certainly can do so on her own.

Then there are the atheists who rebuke Rice for failing to adopt the extreme opposite view and abandon entirely the esoteric and mystical beliefs which she treats as valuable insight on how to live a good life. (The poor girl can’t win.) At the blog Godless Girl, the author bemoans the fact that Rice acknowledges the possibility that there is more to the natural world than meets the eye:

…that’s not good enough!

Rice is clearly not abandoning her mythology and superstitious delusions. She’s leaving conservative, fundamentalist Christianity behind and making a political stand out of it. But what about liberal Christianity that is still based on the same myths, but is dressed up in hipster clothing and a laissez faire [sic] attitude? When Rice realizes the whole shit n’ caboodle is based on a false premise, then perhaps she might leave for good. Perhaps.

Indeed, Rice is clearly not abandoning what the author labels mythology, and, as one commenter points out, it is beside the point to take issue with Rice’s belief in a spiritual dimension to reality when she already so vehemently defends social justice causes:

I think it’s no ones business to say “not good enough”. It’s her spirituality, her views, her beliefs and her life. Who are you to demand “better” of her in her own belief system. She already rejects human rights injustice, bigotry and ignorance, etc – the important parts… so she holds onto a belief in the super natural – that’s her right and prerogative. [sic]

So what if Anne Rice believes that the soul survives physical death, that spirits exist, or that there might be a higher consciousness pervading the universe? She defends civil rights, women’s rights, gay rights, science, and secular humanist thought, so it is hard to imagine her burning anybody at the stake for heresy any time soon. But the blog’s author fixates relentlessly on what she deems “a false premise” and “superstitious delusions” (as if these ambitious and questionable claims aren’t enough), even dismissing the very “laissez-faire” attitude that so many secularists themselves cherish, as though the most important thing in life is to prove somebody right or wrong, and not to get along with them. It is a petty and truculent position to take.

Of course it is impossible to please everybody all of the time, and there will always be evangelicals on both side of the egoistic and divisive “I’m right, and you’re wrong” playing field. The important thing is that Rice thinks critically and refuses to cow-tow to convention for its own sake. What do you think? Is Christ without Christianity a change for the better?

Sources:

Washington Post

GodlessGirl

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Recently at the Universal Life Church Monastery blog, we posted a story on the dismissal of a professor of Catholicism, Dr. Kenneth J. Howell, from the University of Illinois over controversial remarks he made about homosexuality in an email to students. The post made the argument that Howell was merely reflecting the views of Catholics. However, as it turns out, the claim that Howell was reporting on what Catholics believe, and not insinuating his own, personal views, is at best unclear and suspicious. In addition, it is undecided whether Howell’s words should be protected as a form of academic freedom. (You can read Howell’s full email in the link below.)

The original post argued that Howell was merely doing his job as an instructor of Catholicism by explaining to students how Catholics invoke a theory called Natural Moral Law to justify their position on same-sex marriage and relationships. The basis for this argument reflected that of the source article, from World Magazine, which also defended Howell for “just doing his job”. However, as it happens, World is an evangelical Christian publication, and certain passages from Howell’s letter were taken out of context, failing to provide a comprehensive overview. Such a source of information is, at best, biased.

On closer inspection, Howell’s use of voice shows little objectivity and professionalism. He does use the third person several times, deferring to what other people believe and what certain theories purport in relation to religious belief and sexual morality, stating, “Natural Moral Law says…”, “the utilitarian says…”, and “NML says…”, so it is easy at first to view his wording as impartial speech reported from a detached perspective. However, this sort of phrasing breaks down frequently when Howell assumes the first person, proclaiming with almost personal zeal, “Human sexuality is inherently unitive and procreative” and “If we encourage sexual relations that violate this basic meaning, we will end up denying something essential about our humanity, about our feminine and masculine nature”, all without specifying that this is what other people (such as ministers, priests, and other members of the clergy) believe. In other words, he seems to have lost his vigilance in explaining the views of others in spite of his own. The overall tone begins to suggest, “this is what they believe—and I now take up the baton.”

Aside from Howell’s apparent failure at maintaining an objective, professional tone, there is the problematic little caveat he provides in the last paragraph which raises questions about whether he ever intended an objective explanation in the first place. Immediately before closing his email, he reminds his students,

As a final note, a perceptive reader will have noticed that none of what I have said here or in class depends upon religion. Catholics don’t arrive at their moral conclusions based on their religion. They do so based on a thorough understanding of natural reality.

This statement can be interpreted in at least two ways: Howell could be reporting objectively that such a moral theory is a doctrine of the Roman Catholic Church, but he could also be saying that religious belief is not the basis for his assertions. Well, if he is not explaining religious belief to begin with, then it is quite impossible that he is explaining the religious beliefs of others. The only other option, then, is that he is proposing a moral system he believes to be universally self-evident and all-compelling.

Finally, Howell unwittingly betrays his own hypocrisy when he haughtily defies his students to prove their knowledge of moral truth, only to reveal his own ignorance in the matter. “Unless you have done extensive research into homosexuality and are cognizant of the history of moral thought”, he argues, “you are not ready to make judgments about moral truth in this matter”. But at the same time, he makes an embarrassingly asinine display of his paltry, second-hand familiarity with same-sex affection: “To the best of my knowledge,” he speculates, “in a sexual relationship between two men, one of them tends to act as the ‘woman’ while the other acts as the ‘man’” (which manipulation of gender—if that is what it is—would be a bad, bad thing, of course), adding anecdotally that “a physician has told me that these acts are deleterious to the health of one or possibly both of the men”. In other words, the entire body of research into the moral truth about homosexuality with which Howell seems to champion his theory is just some camp, exotic rumor he heard through the grapevine from some doctor or other.

If Howell wrote his e-mail as a Catholic, and not as a professor of Catholicism, what is his view on sexuality? It would be a rather perfunctory model in which the sole purpose of sex, according to Natural Moral Law, is procreation. From this viewpoint, human beings participate automaton-like in a breeding program to produce young, not to give pleasure or to bond. The reason? In NML, men and women are complimentary and “fit” together anatomically; no sex act which does not involve the functional binary opposites of male and female in the context of procreation is valid, according to this model. Taking control of one’s sexuality and re-creating sexual possibilities for oneself is a perversion, states the theory, not an enriching and empowering opportunity for self-creation. For the NML dogmatist, we should remain as unthinking slaves subservient to a biological imperative to breed—which, of course, would cut sterile couples out of the picture, as well as post-menopausal women, couples who use birth control techniques, and even men and women who practice oral sex—after all, none of these scenarios are any more conducive than homosexuality to the generation of young. For Howell’s NML, what is essential about our humanity is our capacity to make babies, not our capacity to love.

Needless to say, it is the view of Universal Life Church Monastery that romantic love is not limited to couples who exhibit the necessary anatomy for procreation, but is open to any consenting adult who possesses a willingness to love. What are your thoughts? Was Dr. Howell merely explaining to his students the theoretical views of people of the Roman Catholic faith, or was he inserting his own biased perspective into the picture? Should his letter be protected as a form of academic freedom? For if it was not objectively academic in the first place, it follows that it cannot be defended as academic freedom. What about academic integrity, moreover? Let us know your thoughts.

Update: According to the Champaign News-Gazette, The University of Illinois has offered Kenneth Howell his job back, although the school will be dissolving its relationship with the Catholic center that pays the school’s Catholicism instructors.

Source:

Champaign News-Gazette

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The relationship between slavery and religion is a well-attested one, with Christianity playing a prominent role both in the continuation of slavery and in the abolitionist movement. Every year, the British West Indies celebrate the abolition of slavery in the British Empire, which took place 1 August 1834 (approximately thirty years before all blacks became free in the “Land of the Free”). In remembrance of the suppression of indigenous African beliefs by Christian slave-owners, the people of Trinidad and Tobago mark the occasion with a Blessing of the Ground ceremony, celebrating the survival of native spiritual traditions as a symbol of black freedom from white religious orthodoxy.

The imposition of Christian dogma on slaves forced native beliefs underground, but slaves continued to show a faith in primal religion despite the risk of discovery by their owners. In an attempt at wholesale subjugation, the white man enslaved his fellow man not only physically, but also mentally, using religion as the tool. As Dara E. Healey of Trinidad and Tobago’s Guardian explains,

The process of mental enslavement—religion is a spiritual weapon, witchcraft, superstition, heathenism, loathsome pagan idolatry[—]these are just a few of the degrading descriptions of traditional African religion used during the centuries of   enslavement.

By preaching with absolute, adamant certainty that the sole path to salvation lay in Jesus Christ (a kindly white man with a chestnut beard, white robe, and red sash), and that eternal torment awaited those who could not believe in the need for a blood sacrifice, white clergy employed spiritual guilt and shame to chip away at the slave’s psyche and eventually break her down into a compliant, malleable laborer. But the white, evangelical Christian god was not to be too accommodating—only enough to show slaves their sin. “Paradoxically”, Healey continues, “while Christianity was introduced both on the African continent and in the diaspora to show the heathens the error of their ways, there were just as many vigorous attempts to prevent them from being able to read the Bible”, explaining that,

Learning about a better, whiter god was one thing, but there was real fear that if the enslaved actually began to read the Bible and learnt of the teachings of Jesus, that they would have begun to entertain notions of equality.

Essentially, then, slave-owners would lull their slaves into a stupor with the hope of salvation offered by the white man’s god-figure while concealing from them the ideas of equality present in the sacred and religious literature of that very same religion. The message was loud and clear, “While we will show you spiritual salvation, we will deny you earthly freedom.”

This clever tactic of intimidation and indoctrination still exists today, with the same goal of wheedling stray sheep back into the flock by preaching that the one and only ticket to heaven is belief in atonement through the crucifixion of Jesus Christ, and that any other path to spiritual salvation is a wicked detour, an insolent and premeditated slap in God’s face. Most of these “wayward paths”, as Healey notes, are outside the monotheistic ecclesiastical spectrum. In a truly inspiring passage from the evangelical Inspire magazine, dogmatist Dr Don Carson warned Christians at a recent Keswick convention about following a spiritual path not centered on the Christ avatar:

I don’t want you to think that Christians today should be robustly doctrinal and not emotional, or without any sense of the mystical experience of God. I’m merely saying that the pursuit of the mystical experience of God, abstracted from the gospel,   abstracted from the mediation of Christ, abstracted from the way we are reconciled to God, can actually become a kind of idolatry, a kind of paganism that sidesteps the cross.

In other words, don’t be just robustly doctrinal—be robustly doctrinal and emotional. And, on top of that, it is dangerous to pursue spirituality (such as African shamanism) for its own sake. The spokesperson for spirituality (e.g. Jesus Christ) is more important than spirituality itself; the man who says “do good to your neighbor” is more venerable than the actual deed of doing good to your neighbor. But good deeds are beside the point in a religion preoccupied with the doctrines of grace and atonement. The basic message is, “God became a human and committed suicide so that he would not have to torture you for eternity due to the imperfection that he created in you (and blood must be drawn, no matter what), and, folks, the good news is that he won’t torture you for eternity if you believe he killed himself for you.” Moreover, what is truly ironic about Carson’s accusation of idolatry among primal religions is the fact that the fixation on the Christ figure itself constitutes the supreme idolatry—an excessive devotion to and adoration of a supernatural figure, all in spite of good deeds.

At the same convention, speaker Jonathan Stephens heightened the irony when he said on the same theme, “It is hugely important that we open our minds to see the Christ-centredness of the whole Bible—it is all about Him. How do we improve our holiness? By fixing our eyes on Jesus. If Christ is the centre of your life and your thinking, then your life will be transformed by His grace.” In other words, we should open our minds to the idea of closing our minds to every other conduit to spirituality than the holy teacher Jesus Christ of Nazareth. Jesus. Jesus, Jesus, Jesus. Not feeding the hungry, not giving to the poor, not living in harmony with nature. Jesus. Makes one want to break out in song: “Jesus, Jesus, Jesus—sweetest name I know. / Fills my every longing, keeps me singing as I go.” Following this logic, the man who speaks the message is more important than the message itself, despite the fact that the man was extolling the actual words he spoke, and not himself.

But what does all this have to do with celebrating traditional African religion on Emancipation Day, with the Blessing of the Ground ceremony which marks a primal return to a more holistic spirituality? Perhaps the black community of Trinidad and Tobago, and the other former West Indian slave colonies, seek to liberate their spiritual conscience from a self-styled authority. Like other pagans and heathens burdened with the guilt that they have been winnowed out of paradise, they proudly refute the unreasonable doctrine that an earth-centered polytheistic religion which nurtures social stability, coping mechanisms, and a respect for nature, should constitute a malicious threat to some distant, jealous god—especially when their god is not so distinct from nature in the first place.

Learn more about paganism, pantheism, primal religion, and traditional African religion by visiting the Universal Life Church Monastery’s Guide to Divinity.

Sources:

Guardian

Inspire Magazine

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