Responsibility vs Independance; A Case Study in Evangelical Culture

http://www.faithit.com/can-you-really-live-life-significance-without-significant-other-um-yes-because-god/?c=tsal

Throughout our culture there is a permeable tension between having duties to others and desiring to be completely autonomous, independent and worry free. We simultaneously encourage the formation of families (understood as a group bonding through blood relation, social roles and mutual obligation) and living an adventurous life, free of responsibilities to others. In Evangelicalism, this tension becomes particularly prevalent. For most of the 20th century, Evangelicals have shared the belief that raising a family is always better than not doing so. Interestingly, in the 21st century this tendency is being reversed. Take the article above where the author tries to argue that both singleness and marriage are good things. But is it really that simple, where the answer is just that both are equally good? I don't think so, it seems instead that there are numerous ethical issues at play. These include; responsibilities to parents and ancestors, spiritual/vocational calling, and the merits of individualism.

Responsibilities to parents and ancestors;

A great sin of western culture is it's whole-sale elimination of familial pride/identity. In other words, we don't think of ourselves as owing our parents anything. We don't gain pride from our families, so much as embarrassment. Think, for instance, about your last name. What does it mean to you? Not much probably, but up until the late 19th century last names meant a great deal to people. Your family name carried with it honor, shame and tradition.

When it comes to marriage, we don't think of ourselves as needing to carry on our family lineage. But don't we have real obligations to do so? Christ, nor Paul, nor any of the apostles gave any command to follow our family traditions, but they did seem to hold the general attitude that we should reform only that which needs to be reformed. Take the book of Philemon, where Paul addresses the issue of slavery. He does not call slaves to rebellion, nor masters to set their slaves free. Paul new that doing so would cause needless death and suffering. Instead, Paul encouraged peace, kindness and gentleness between a slave and his master. The traditions of slavery were not the problem, but the abuse slave owners bestowed on their slaves was.

Should we not act in the same way towards our parents? Is it not an abuse to our parents and family lineage to simply throw out all of their traditions for the sake of individuality? I believe it is, reform should be sought perhaps, but we should try to carry on our family lineages and carry on the traditions we were raised with. This clearly means being married and raising children, so in many cases I would argue that marriage is better than singleness.

Spiritual/vocational calling;

Now the backlash, or the flip-side to the reasoning shown above, is the clear priority of Christ above family. This is taught in Luke 14:26 "If anyone comes to me and does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters--yes, even their own life--such a person cannot be my disciple." How do we reconcile this chain of thinking with Paul's attitudes described above? It seems to me that a bit of context is necessary here. First of all, Jesus is clearly using hyperbole here, otherwise he completely contradicts himself in his statement to Nicodemus in Mark 12:30-31. Second of all, Jesus is speaking to Jews, whose families would never support them following some miracle worker claiming to be the Messiah who would later found a religion bent on radically changing traditional Judaism.

The point then seems to be that there are necessary changes to be made in following Christ. If your family is hostile towards the gospel, you must be able to leave your family in pursuit of the gospel. Now, this clearly does not mean that if our parents are unsupportive of us sharing the gospel, we must completely denounce them. Nor does this mean that we must all become radical evangelists, traveling the world in pursuit of sharing the gospel to foreign nations. On the contrary, we are called by Christ to be sober in our thinking and to realize the gravity of the decisions we make.

17Nevertheless, each person should live as a believer in whatever situation the Lord has assigned to them, just as God has called them. This is the rule I lay down in all the churches. 18Was a man already circumcised when he was called? He should not become uncircumcised. Was a man uncircumcised when he was called? He should not be circumcised. 19Circumcision is nothing and uncircumcision is nothing. Keeping God’s commands is what counts. 20Each person should remain in the situation they were in when God called them (1 Corinthians 7:17-20 NIV).

The Merits of Individualism;

The passage above leaves an eerie stench in the nose of any self-appraised individualist. There is a deep sense in Christianity that our lives do not belong to us, despite what our culture tells us. At the same time, Christianity has traditionally encouraged total submission to God and commitment to Christ as a member of His body; the Church. The great culture war, however, is not between the Church and "secular" culture, but is most prominent within the Church.

On the one hand, individualism seems to fill the Church with a rejuvenated energy unseen for many decades. It allows for a self-empowered framework of preaching where every Christian is crucially important for the spreading of the gospel and every Christian holds the power of the gospel and the life of Christ through the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. Knowing God personally and being known by God under this framework is the core of the Christian life, as well as being empowered by God to make a difference. To our minds these statements just seem basic; they are obviously true, what other way is there to describe the gospel? This narrow mindedness, however, is precisely individualisms downfall. It's too narrow in its scope and too shallow in its interests. As such, individualism brings with it a great deal of blind spots. It allows ideas to seep in without notice, patterns of thought to take hold without much reflection and action to be encouraged without hesitation.

When it comes to marriage, individualism can be incredibly harmful, not only in what marriage means but in deciding whether or not to become married. The focus becomes entirely on how marriage fits in with my personal plan and God's personal schedule for my life. Take the article posted above. The only factor that matters is your personal situation, where God has a specific "season" in mind for both marriage and singleness. I'm afraid this attitude is too simplistic, the question of marriage does depend on the situation a person is in. However, there are also underlying philosophies which help us make sense of our situations in order to decide which "season" we are in.

Deciding to pursue marriage or not is not a purely individual decision. Marriage does not occur in a vacuum. Our decisions on marriage, therefore, must take into account our family status, our calling by God, our family traditions and our standing in the Church. Our responsibility in these matters is not only to our prospective spouse, but also all those with whom we live and love. In some cases this requires us to remain single, in others we are called by God to be married. In both, God has given us the ability to discern His will for our lives.

Misunderstanding honor/shame cultures;

http://thegospelcoalition.org/article/overcoming-the-culture-of-shame/

Sam Louie, a therapist specializing in overcoming addictive behaviors, writes in this article why shame based cultures are actually damaging to Christian communities. He states at one point, 

Because he is elevated above any nation, tribe, or ethnic identity that tries to hold us back spiritually, Christ offers forgiveness and mercy with the power to break the bonds of cultural shame. As Christians, then, we can live in authentic community that gives us the freedom to risk exposing our vulnerabilities to one another. Members of the body of Christ must be free to acknowledge our hurts and struggles so we can be known and healed.

But is this really true? And how could it be true when the first Christian communities abided by an honor-shame system? The answer is simply that Louie doesn’t understand that there are different kinds of honor-shame systems. His main argument against shame based cultures is that they are emotionally stifling, that is they don’t allow us to express normal emotions. He writes,

In psychological circles we call this a "false self," because the reality and vitality of life is cut off from the person who refuses to acknowledge any feelings or thoughts deemed unacceptable to them or their culture. For millions of Asians, this false self is a defense and construct needed to protect the ego as we strive to earn approval and acceptance. Unless it is confronted and torn down, the individual will stay locked in a cycle of cultural shame that can stifle his soul that craves to be released from bondage.

Louie is confusing shame with its particular expression in Asian culture. Even accepting all the psychological claims (which all assume a hyper-individualist culture is best), not all honor-shame cultures see expressing emotional distress or anguish as a shameful act. During the time of Christ, for instance, Jews and many other Mediterranean societies saw nothing wrong with crying in public after being disgraced or tearing your clothes in anguish over a tragedy or wrongdoing (Pilch & Malina, Handbook of Biblical Social Values p 56)

All this being said, of course there are legitimate issues and social problems caused by honor-shame cultures. For instance, group cohesion and solidarity often causes groups to become extremely exclusive and in some cases even violent against other groups. But just because a cultural system has a tendency towards causing these problems doesn’t mean that we should just throw out the entire system! After all, we live in an individualistic society and there are just as many social problems today as there ever was in any collectivist society; depression, suicide, mass shootings, sexual slavery, gang wars, drugs etc.

But it gets worse, because Louie makes a further argument that shame based cultures cannot allow for forgiveness either from others or ourselves;

Guilt can be healthy since it helps us acknowledge mistakes we need to correct and leads us to think of ways to rebuild ourselves and our relationships with others---including with God. Shame, by contrast, is a perverse and distorted belief that we are inherently unworthy of love. Consequently when you feel shame, instead of wanting to be corrected, you feel you deserve to be persecuted, punished, and tormented. A shame-based person doesn't know how to feel healthy guilt.

“Shame is a perverse and distorted belief that we are inherently unworthy of love.” This is where much of psychology and Biblical teaching clash, even though no one seems to want to admit it. Scripture does teach that we are inherently unworthy of love and that we do deserved to be punished eternally. Psychologists are almost universally against this mentality, calling it damaging and dangerous to our mental health. It may be damaging to our mental health if being healthy means being happy. Unfortunately, it’s not that simple. You can believe that you deserve punishment while still desiring to be reconciled to God and the Church. This is the entire point of mercy and grace.

This is what I mean when I say Christianity is being psychologized. We think we somehow have to conform to the pseudo-scientific interpretations of various studies and experiments performed by psychologists. But we cannot simultaneously believe that all feelings of anguish and despair are somehow evil and believe that we are deeply sinful creatures unless we define sin in terms of feeling depressed and self-hatred. This idea is damaging for the Christian community because it prevents us from actually dealing with the fact that we are not usually good people, that we do wrong others and that we do deserve punishment!

Whatever your cultural or social upbringing, Jesus can heal and change you. He can transform your heart and free you from the emotional or spiritual bondage. No matter how weak, defective, or incompetent you may feel, God can transform your shame for his glory. This good news needs to be shared among millions of Asians---some in our own churches---who are still suffering in shameful silence.

The true gospel of psychology; God can make you feel better about yourself. What nonsense.