Assumption 3: Baptizing Cognitive Frameworks
Baptizing your computer might kill you. I often hear people say, “culture is not our enemy” (we being the church in this statement) but that we do need to engage, redeem, celebrate, and even baptize culture. This statement is, on the one hand, a refreshing reprieve from a generation or two ago that spent significant energy decrying… dancing for example… So I am on the whole in line with most of the statement. Culture is not our enemy, in fact, we are part of culture. It is a dynamic relationship and at this point in my life I am largely a product of my global, national, regional, and especially local and familial culture(s). As such, I am learning to have gratitude and celebrate aspects of that cultural inheritance, but also to critically interrogate other aspects that 1) do not reflect core Christian commitments and 2) that reduce humanity and the possibility of a flourishing life together.
One of the assumptions isolated in the “baptizing culture” statement is that anything “out there” in the world can be utilized in the church as long as it is “submitted to Christ.” I remember hearing things like this in high school in regards to digital media. So, use the wonders of Hollywood and television to produce explicit Christian content (e.g. those of you who watched the Passion of the Christ in youth group). The difficulty arises when you start thinking of the different levels of what it would mean to baptize a cultural device or practice. It seems to me that the prevailing thoughts, views, and paradigms that vivify those devices or cultural practices and make them attractive to us are just as important to think through. So, one could ask, what does sitting in front of screen for a few hours do to your body? This is not to diminish this as amazing technology or wondrous opportunity for Jesus (I cried for like an hour the first time I watched The Passion during a lock-in…); it is to ask questions deeper than simply adopting cultural practices and assuming they are Christian because “christians” have begun to use them. The assumptions and cognitive frameworks behind the cultural practice or device not only continue to exert formative power through the device’s existence, but also through its continued use. Not to mention that much of our digital technology has its own goals and ends – often distraction or monetization through manipulation. Check out the recent documentary, The Social Dilemma, for more thoughts on this point.
So, easy example, online church. Do we now have the capacity to “meet online and worship online”? Depending on how you define those words, then yes to some extent we can. Most then assume we should. Assuming the use of the tool is for Christian purposes, that is enough to sanctify it. However, and again we come back to means and ends, what if your means is based on ways of thinking and living utterly opposed to your end? Can you really be the church via an online stream? Some argue that because of God’s transcendence he can totally do that. Certainly, God can do what he wants. The question though is more about what is normative for Christians in embodying the Gospel and experiencing God. If we try to baptize the tool we find ourselves caught in a tangle of opposing cognitive frameworks, what I call power cords for this metaphor haha. Digital technology has assumptions about what a human is, what the good life is, and explicit profit ends for what it offers. This is the power that vivifies the various devices we use, which are not bad but can easily and subtly, but nonetheless real, connect us to these views of reality that oppose the vivifying truths of Christianity. The opposition between the two is not the problem. The issue is more around forgetting that there is opposition at some level between various cognitive frameworks. As Paul says, what does light have to do with darkness.
The promise to experience a full human experience via a screen betrays a materialistic view not only of the universe, but of humans. And it maybe isn’t pertinent for the church to baptize a view of the universe as atomistic, void of meaning, simply units available for use with no inherent dignity until I assign them value by using them for my purposes. The materialistic and mechanistic view of the universe is counter to actual ordinary human flourishing. As well as all of the rest of creation. And I am concerned that many churches in trying to baptize the most popular cultural practices (relevance) have in fact adopted accidentally(?) many of the cognitive frameworks behind those cultural practices. Jesus, however, is quite clear about his value of ordinary embodied life – the incarnation. Jesus is clear about how all things came to be because of God and through him – therefore the universe has inherent value. Jesus is incredibly clear on what the good life is and it is at odds with a way of life that consumes manufactured trivialities ad infinitum in devotion to economic idols/ideals. These cultural beliefs don’t need to be baptized – they need to be identified (in much, much, much more clear and intelligent ways than I have done here) challenged, and resisted at every opportunity with deep knowledge of core Christian commitments and the courage and wisdom to see our lives integrated through focal practices along these commitments to embody Jesus for the sake of the world.
To Be Human 