Charting A New Reformation, Part XVII – The Fifth Thesis

Column by Bishop John Shelby Spong on 14 April 2016 30 Comments
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Question

I am a Lutheran pastor in the Church of Sweden, Diocese of Stockholm. I first started to read your work around the turn of the century. I was first very encouraged by the postings entitled “The Bishop’s Voice.” Next I received and read your exciting autobiography, Here I Stand: My Struggle for a Christianity of Integrity, Love and Equality and reviewed it for a church periodical. When you first visited Stockholm, I listened to your extraordinary presentation at Sofia Church. Since then many things have happened in my life. At various points, I have thought I would have to leave the ministry and the church in order to be intellectually honest. I couldn’t stand or handle the claims of theism anymore — I was fed up with religion, to put it bluntly. Rediscovering your work and reading Why Christianity Must Change or Die and A New Christianity for a New World meant that a road was opened to me, which made it possible to continue my ministry and stay in the church. I’m not sure what label to put on myself right now; definitely non-theist, perhaps atheist, perhaps natural pantheist, but certainly I still struggle on almost a daily basis with the religious language of my tradition. Even in a liberal church like the Church of Sweden, theistic language and presuppositions are all but omnipresent. I just want to say a warm and heartfelt THANK YOU for your untiring work! Just recently I read your letter to the moderator of the United Church of Canada in defense of Gretta Vosper – and I was once again encouraged and felt hope for the church. I wish you joy and continued strength in days to come.

Answer

Dear Christer,

Thanks so much for your letter. It is pastors like you and Gretta Vosper in Canada, to whom you refer, that keep the church alive and struggling to walk forward. It is also pastors like you who are constantly marginalized by institutional Christians. You should not be alone in Sweden. You had great predecessors in such people as the Rev. Marianne Blom, who pioneered progressive thinking in Sweden prior to her death; Krister Stendahl, who taught at Harvard for most of his career, but who also served as the Bishop of Stockholm near the end of his life; K. G. Hammar, who was the primate of your church, when he and I did a dialogue in the Uppsala University auditorium before a capacity audience, and Hans Ulfvebrand, who was the pastor of the Sofia Church when I gave lectures there, just to mention a few. All of these people were great, open, progressive leaders. You walk in a noble tradition. You also speak for numbers of Swedish Lutherans, who no longer attend church. They need to hear that what they experience in church is in so many instances not what Christianity is. So I hope you recognize that your life, your role in the Lutheran Church and your ministry are of the utmost importance.

Leaders like you must be public and visible. I know that is not an easy role to play for when you disturb the security systems of the majority of religious people, their anger can be overwhelming. I have received sixteen death threats in my life. None came from an atheist or a Buddhist; they all came from “Bible-quoting, true-believing Christians.” Perhaps they never read the sixth commandment, “Thou shalt not kill.” Your public voice will give confidence to the voices of those who find no meaning in the words the Christian Church continues to use. God is so much greater than our human perception of God.

Stay in touch with me. You are not alone.

John Shelby Spong

 

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