August 2014 – Thinking Pacifism

Ted Grimsrud—August 25, 2014

I first learned about anarchism back in the 1970s. My wife Kathleen and I got involved with an activist group opposed to Jimmy Carter’s decision to reinstate registration for the draft in order to “show resolve” to the Soviet Union (this is one of the darker aspects of Carter’s presidential legacy—a cynical but failed attempt to hold off the political threat from the right that remains thirty-some years later an important element in the socialization of young people into our national security state). We met a young couple, Karl and Linda, who had just moved to our hometown, Eugene, Oregon, to be part of the rising anarchist movement there.

I had typical superficial stereotypes of anarchists as mindless terrorists (it was an “anarchist,” after all, who had shot President McKinley). I was disabused of that superficial antipathy in conversations with Karl and Linda and also in seeing their lives. They were compassionate, committed to social justice, and (Linda, at least) thoroughly nonviolent. They were pretty negative about Christianity, but were interested to learn to know about our Anabaptist convictions.

About the same time, I took a class on the history of political theory at the University of Oregon—and the professor treated anarchism as a serious political philosophy that needed to be considered alongside the other more mainstream approaches. It might have been as part of that class the I read George Woodcock’s fascinating book, Anarchism: A History of Libertarian Ideas and Movements.

I have not traveled very far down the anarchist path in these past decades, but I have remained interested in and sympathetic toward this political orientation. Writers such as James C. Scott, Noam Chomsky, and Rebecca Solnit, whose anarchistically-inclined books I have read for reasons other than direct articulation of anarchism, have kept my interest alive. And then, when I learned about the Jesus Radicals website and movement, I started to realize that there was some genuine compatibility between the evolving political perspective I have been constructing and at some articulations of anarchism.

Anarchism and the Bible

One of the new ideas for me has been to think that perhaps we could say that anarchistic sensibilities (in our present day sense of what those involve) are embedded in the biblical story from start to finish. I want in this post to begin to sketch an argument to support this idea. Continue reading “Does the Bible teach anarchism?” →

Ted Grimsrud—August 4, 2014

There seems to be something inherently attractive in the midst of intense controversies about the hope to find ways for people to “just get along.” So when we have all the stresses that we have had concerning Christianity and the inclusion (or not) of those in intimate same-sex relationships, it’s not surprising that the idea of a “third way” that could lead to resolution and keep as many people as possible in fellowship would be pretty attractive.

However, as a person who is not always uncomfortable with taking a partisan position (including on this issue) and who has become used to being the recipient of others’ anger due to that position, I have not found the notion of a “third way” particularly attractive. I often think of the statement from Texan humorist and political activist Jim Hightower: “The only things in the middle of the road in Texas are yellow lines and dead armadillos.”

What does “third way” refer to?

Based on my experience over the past thirty years, I find it difficult to envision a genuine “third way” that would result in Christians all getting along with each other concerning inclusion. The issues at stake simply have not lent themselves to compromise, “agreeing to disagree,” or “agreeing and disagreeing in love.” This is too bad, of course, even scandalous. It’s certainly a black mark on Christianity. But, still, it does seem that in practice we do have mostly an either/or issue—especially when we focus on the marriage question.

In the past several years in the United States, probably just about everyone has been shocked with the sea change that has occurred regarding the legalization of same-sex marriage and the broader acceptance of sexual diversity. The momentum is such that it is hard to imagine that the movement toward inclusion will ever be reversed. It does seem possible that the U.S. Supreme Court could issue a ruling that would slow the momentum some, at least for awhile. However, such a slowing most likely would only be temporary. Continue reading “Is there a “third way” regarding same-sex marriage and the churches?” →