9-7-03

I know from my own encounters with people in that church, both upstairs and down, believers, agnostics, and seekers - as well as people who don't belong to any church - that what matters in religious experience involves much more that what we believe (or what we do not believe). What is Christianity, and what is religion, I wondered, and why do so many of us still find it compelling, whether or not we belong to a church, and despite difficulties we may have with particular beliefs and practices? What is about Christian tradition that we love - and what is it that we cannot love? . . . The drama being played out there [at the Church of the Heavenly Rest] "spoke to my condition," as it has to that of millions of people throughout the ages, because it simultaneously acknowledges the reality of fear, grief, and death while - paradoxically - nurturing hope. Four years later, when our son, then six years old, suddenly died, the Church of the Heavenly Rest offered some shelter, along with words and music, when family and friends gathered to bridge an abyss that had seemed impassable.

As Elaine Pagels asks at the beginning of her latest book, Beyond Belief, "What is about Christian tradition that we love - and what is it that we cannot love?[1] This is a pressing question for Unitarian Universalists. Many of us gathered here today were raised as Christians. I'm curious to see a show of hands . . . Well, if you are sitting here this morning, chances are you left the Christian church of your upbringing - so there was something there you could not love. You came to Unitarian Universalism, where we do not have a creed. But then ironically, here you are, in another congregation, another church, one historically and culturally steeped in the Protestant tradition. How can that be? What is it about Christianity that we love?

Pagel addresses this dilemma in her book. She maintains that many people, herself included, love the community of Christianity, but cannot accept the creeds. She describes the creeds of her congregation as the "traditional statements that sounded strange to me, like barely intelligible signals from the surface, heard at the bottom of the sea."[2] Yet, this Harrington Spear Paine Professor of Religion at Princeton University goes to church.

On the first page she explains how she came back to church as an adult. It was the unexpected, crushing diagnosis that her toddler son was terminally ill. She wrote of her return "Here is a family that knows how to face death." She came back to face the ultimate death of her son. Only in a congregation was she going to find the full expression of fear and hope necessary to sustain her in a time of terrible, human loss.

But as a historian of religion she still has the questions, and the desire to find out whether the Christian creeds we know today, existed in the time of Jesus. Are these creeds the word of God? If so, is there room in "God's kingdom" for those who treasure the faith, but not the faith statements, who find themselves living beyond belief?

- refer to Jesus as "son of God" or "messiah", human roles in the ancient world, titles not capitalized in the original Greek versions of Matthew, Mark, and Luke,[3] but John calls him the "word of God", the same as God, which would be the orthodox version codified several hundred years later in the Nicene Creed. Pagels maintains that John placed after the other 3 gospels is the exclamation point, that theologically shapes the first 3.

-John is also the only gospel to belittle the apostle Thomas, the one we remember as "Doubting Thomas - In John, again the only NT (New Testament) gospel to make this claim, Thomas is not present when Jesus returns, and therefore misses the meeting when the apostles receive the holy spirit (BIG DEAL - Though, as if God is only at the meetings God: "I'm sorry Thomas you missed the meeting when we voted to . . . ). We remember "Doubting Thomas" because in John he does not believe the Jesus is resurrected. As Pagels explains Thomas wants to see, he seeks to "verify truth from his own experiences." (Jesus tells him "Do not be faithless, but believe"). If this story only appears in one gospel, why do we remember it? and why does it appear at all?

-Pagels notes that "Origen writes that John's author had constructed a deceptively simple narrative, which, like fine architecture, bears enormous weight."[4] Poetic, spiritual, metaphors, powerful gospel

-Pagels thesis that Gospel of John, with its insistence on the divinity of Jesus, unity of God and Jesus, and the faithless ignorance of Thomas, was written to negate another gospel most of us have not heard of, The Gospel of Thomas.

What is The Gospel of Thomas? And what about it was so controversial to the author of John?

GT is one of several gospels discovered at Nag Hammadi Egypt in 1945. In 367 C. E., Athanasius, the bishop of Alexandria ordered that all "heretical" gospels not included in the recently codified New Testament, be destroyed. Scholars theorize that monks in a nearby Egyptian monastery secretly refused to follow orders - instead of destroying "heretical" gospels and books, they sealed them in a six foot jar, and buried them on a hillside near Nag Hammadi Egypt, where they remained for 1600 years until discovered by a local villager. Among these books were The Gospel of Thomas, the Gospel of Truth, the Secret Book of John, and the Gospel of Phillip (go to your library and find them).

must have valued or treasured, probably didn't dare keep private copies, just hid these with hope and faith that others would find them. 4th century book burnings.

Gnostic = one who knows or seeks experiential insight or mutual recognition, like the character of Thomas we see in John (to church fathers who struggled to create a unified church based of one interpretation of specific works, gnostics were heretics, innovators, frauds.)

Gospel of Thomas is a UU's dream gospel (almost like it was written by liberal Christian today?)

Contains: wisdom sayings, parables, community rules, and eschatological sayings. Refers to secrets, mysteries, signs. Seekers are applauded, innovation is preferred, questions are encouraged, revelation is continuous. There is no birth narrative, no story about crucifixion - only sayings (like Qur'an).

Jesus said "the Kingdom is inside you, and outside you. When you come to know yourselves, then you will be known, and you will see that it is you who are the children of the living Father. But if you will not know yourselves, you dwell in poverty, and it is you who are that poverty." (Nag Hammadi Library, The Gospel of Thomas, 3)**

Jesus said "Let the one who seeks not stop seeking until he finds. When he finds, he will become troubled; when he becomes troubled, he will be astonished and will rule over all things." (NHL, GT, 2)

"Within a person of light there is light" (Compared to Gospel of John "I am the light of the world" and "Whoever does not come to me walks in darkness."") (BB 68)

"the kingdom of the Father is spread out upon the earth, and men do not see it." (NHL, GT, 113) The beloved community here and now.

-Community under distress and persecution, fighting with over theology, and without for safety.

-Christians seen as atheists by Romans (don't believe in pantheon of gods), considered violent, promiscuous, politically extreme .[5] (IRONY OF HOW non-Christians perceived today) In various cities they were banned from baths, markets, and public places. They were attacked on the street, murdered in the arena.

-2nd century bishop (today Lyon, France), Irenaeus, concerned by violence, distressed when his mentor burned at the stake, wants to stop the fighting inside and out, gain credibility for universal "catholic" church. Concerned that "Thomas like" seeker groups are fragmenting Christianity - of course he is correct. They were. This fragmentation could have caused the disintegration of Christianity. Questions of unity and diversity.

-As Pagels explains, "[Irenaeus] declares that whenever possible, one must discern the obvious meaning; and whenever a certain passage seems ambiguous or difficult, one's understanding should be guided by those passages whose meaning seems clear."[6] HOW BIBLE READ TODAY BY MOST PEOPLE - when in doubt go to John 3:16 "For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son . . ."

3) Either you are a straight "orthodox" believer or are a damned heretic, no matter

Gnostic followers took NT as first step to search, wanted more questions and existential dialogue.

"While Irenaeus sought to clarify basic convictions about God and Jesus Christ in theological statements that would become the framework of the fourth-century creeds, Valentinian Christians accorded such theological propositions a much less important role. Instead of regarding these as the essential and certain basis for spiritual understanding - and instead of rejecting them - they treated them as elementary teachings and emphasized instead what Irenaeus mentions only in passing - how far God surpasses human comprehension."[7]

1) How much Irenaeus idea of NT interpretation wins, and is our understanding 2000 years later - he created the successful mission statement for Christianity

2) How many different Christians existed in the first three hundred years of the movement, and how the educated, questioning, seeking, spiritual Christians lost the battle for theological interpretation because they didn't care to fight it - eventually their practice and outlook was lost to us (but to continually return)

1) Pagels never directly comes out and says creeds silence faith even today. Speaks of the necessity for but limitations of creed, enumerates the number of early Christian groups and gospels "shut out" after the creation of the Nicene Creed, but, in a personal book, never specifies how creeds limit or change her faith today. She describes creeds as "traditional statements that sounded strange to me, like barely intelligible signals from the surface, heard at the bottom of the sea." (5) Now she has my attention. I wish she would go a little further and explain, why as an award winning, modern historian of religion, why does she go to church?

"We even raise the dead, many of whom are still alive among us, and completely healthy." (7)

Christianity has the power of healing because it has the power of community (story of Beloved by Toni Morrison). Pagels words at the start when she speaks of the death and illness of her own son "Here is a family that knows how to face death." "The Church of the Heavenly Rest offered some shelter . . . when family and friends gathered to bridge an abyss that had seemed impassable." This is one purpose of her title, "Beyond Belief", along with the continuous gnostic search, beyond certainty but with faith and hope

Community always has been and continues to be the center of Christianity, whether in the form of baptism, communion, or pot luck supper "I was hungry and you fed me, I was thirsty and you gave me drink". These are the words of Jesus. This is the spirit of Christianity. For some the fear of damnation, gets or keeps people in the door, but the practice of kindness, the courage to have fear and hope, this is what motivates religious groups to gather. This is why we are gathered here this morning. This is what keeps a historian of religion, and Unitarian Universalists coming to church.

I want to close with a word of caution and significance. While reading this book I continually wondered if the early gnostic, "Valentinian" Christians appeal to Pagels, and myself, and I suspect most of you, because they are the educated, poetic seekers, less interested in theology and more interested in reflected personal experience. Although Beyond Belief is a breakthrough book, it too is limited by the author's experience and perspective. It is still hubris to believe that our educated, experiential vision is the true vision of Jesus or Christianity or the word and spirit of God. If anything, Pagels book counsels us towards a diversity of thought and interpretation, one that includes both the Gospel of Thomas and the gospels of the New Testament.

So why is all of this important now? In a world of increasing closeness, stress between modernity and tradition, and in a time of global religious fundamentalism, an exploration of religious diversity, at the earliest time of religious revelation, is a great thing. This year our first through sixth graders will study the Judeo-Christian tradition, to learn about religious history and diversity. We are now and have always been one people with many thoughts and experiences. May we tread gently and lovingly upon this earth and in respectful communion with all. Amen

* This summer I began experimenting with something I have always wanted to do, but had not (until now), dared try, preaching without text. This sermon was a compromise, some text and some notes. You may hear and see more like this in the future. Please let me know what you think of the "live" sermon and notes in this form.

[1] Elaine Pagels, Beyond Belief (2003), 6.

[2] Ibid., 5.

[3] Pagels, 37-38.

[4] Pagels, 37.

** My copy of The Gospel of Thomas comes from the Nag Hammadi Library Collection. This sentence is verse 3 in The Gospel of Thomas.

[5] Pagels, 79.

[6] Pagels, 117.

[7] Pagels, 163.