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AR 27:32 - Getting "closer to both Indigenous traditions and Jesus"?
In this issue:
WORLDVIEW - where "all of life is spirituality, beliefs are de-emphasized"
Apologia Report 27:32 (1,585)
September 21, 2022
WORLDVIEW
"What's the Truth in the Story?" is an interview with Randy Woodley (distinguished professor of faith and culture, Portland Seminary/George Fox University), by Joel Mayward (The Other Journal, 33 - 2021) is helpful as an introduction to Woodlley's short book, Indigenous Theology and the Western Worldview. This edition of AR concludes with our own brief review.
Mayward opens by saying that Woodley writes to "emphasize reconstruction as much as the deconstruction of long-held ideologies" in his "controversial" publication which "Woodley says will probably get him 'expelled' from evangelicalism."
Woodley sees "the problem with Christianity, especially evangelical Christianity, is that evangelical Christians believe that their faith begins with them. They have no long history, no perspective, no anthropological discernment. Many Christians, particularly evangelical Christians, think that their reading of Scripture forms their theology and worldview. But it is actually their worldview and experience that determines how they read Scripture. ...
"Most American Christians have inherited a Western worldview that, through thousands of years of Roman Catholicism and, less directly, Eastern Orthodoxy, has led them to interpret Scripture with a post-Enlightenment intense individualism. The people who wrote Scripture never wrote from that perspective - they wrote from a communal, even tribal perspective. ...
"Many Christians are bound by this post-Enlightenment binary idea that one thing's right and one thing's wrong, that there can't be any tension, that we have to resolve any difference. ...
"When Americans look at the land, they universalize it, as if to say, 'God has given us all land' rather than considering specific land. And in this way, they have justified the actions against Indigenous people in particular, because land has become abstract rather than particular."
Woodley is speaking of "Western people who hold a theology that is crucicentric or built only upon what Jesus did on the cross. That's a warped theology that doesn't understand what Scripture is actually saying. ... We've got a wack theology because we start from a really bad place. ...
"We read the Scriptures as story. Our first thought is not 'what's true' and 'what's not true.' That doesn't really matter. What matters is the truth of the story, not whether the story is true. ... But both the conservatives and liberals are asking the wrong questions. The right question is, What's true in the story? When the writer wrote the story, what were the truths they were trying to get across?"
Mayward: "But how do we even know that we are seeing with blurred vision? What kick-starts people to start the reimagination process?"
Woodley's response includes: "Some of us have this reaction, like 'No, I have to defend the American myth and my theology and this civil religion,' and all the rest."
Mayward: "... That sounds almost like a death of our old worldview and a resurrection."
Woodley: "Absolutely. ... I need to entangle myself in everything that goes in that opposite direction.
"That is tough for most White Americans because taking such a turn means releasing control, and control is part of that Western worldview - Westerners don't know how to act if they can't be in control."
Mayward: "... And there's the sense with these movements, and with the global pandemic as well, that the system of understanding in which a White person is in control of everything is starting to get dismantled without White people necessarily wanting it to be."
Woodley: "... I think we need something like deprogramming. I have relatives who are under a sort of spell with this stuff, and when a person is under that kind of influence, you don't battle a lie with the truth. You have to tell a better story. ... That story is not the abstract, nonpolitical, milquetoast White version that evangelicalism has embraced; it's a story that must be actively involved in every area of our lives."
Mayward: "... I can recall a short-term mission trip to a Native reservation in Arizona with my predominantly White church in which we had our actions questioned. ... [T]he pastor of the local Native congregation said something like this: ... 'Is anything really going to change? You can leave and pat yourselves on the back. But is this really what the gospel is supposed to be? Is this really what the body of Christ is supposed to look like?'"
Woodley: "... We have a major cultural shift occurring right now. And what I hear from millennials, and Gen Xers to a lesser degree, is that they don't want the paradigm that was handed down to them. ...
"I have a five-month cohort of fifteen colearners right now, and most of them are millennials. They don't want that old paradigm anymore. But they're also looking for a way to stay true to spirituality and Jesus, and they're wondering whether that can even be done. They give me hope." The interview concludes with a brief listing of recommended resources. <www.bit.ly/3DCgj0g>
Indigenous Theology and the Western Worldview: A Decolonized Approach to Christian Doctrine, by Randy S. Woodley <www.bit.ly/3PvUi5H> -- in his preface, Woodley sets the context for the book and rejects the unequal relationship between one teaching and one taught in favor of each being co-learners (ix). In this way, narrative theology "is a primary communications tool among Indigenous peoples from time immemorial" (xi). Storytelling "is the production of narrative theology" (20). ... [S]tory and conversation is Indigenized pedagogy" (21).
Much here begs further description, but is beyond the introductory purpose of the book. Some examples:
Woodley describes meeting a tribal elder who early on in Woodley's life gave the advice: "Respect Jesus. Jesus is a great spirit and I talk to him" (12).
"[W]hoever interprets history also influences theology and gets to name the myths that underlie a mythologized society, creating them into their own worldview" (14).
"The myth of progressive civilization is based on the Western worldview, displaying Greco-Roman and Anglo-Saxon White supremacy" (21). As for this, reparations are expected (42), but Woodley prefers "rehumanizing" (81-83).
"I'm not sure that Christianity is compatible with Indigenous values, but I'm pretty certain that following Jesus seems to be. If you're interested in following Jesus more than following Christianity, I don't think there's a conflict. ... You can be a Christian and follow Jesus, but it is very different." He's a former "flaming evangelist" as well, but now he incorporates "the whole gospel," a term that is more implied than defined (44-45).
In addition, "the modern Western worldview says, narrative is fact, and fact equals truth. Indigenous worldviews might say that we understand narrative has truth, and facts are, well, not so important as truth (47). ...
"Creator holds everything together, and so I understand my role as a human being to be one who keeps harmony.... (48) [and] for me, when I pray to Creator, and how I understand my people have been praying to Creator, ... they have been praying to Jesus. Maybe they don't want to look at it that way, and that's ok." (49).
"I believe the Word of God is not the Bible, but the stories within it [are]...." (51).
North America's "land has not welcomed settlers because the settlers have not asked the land for a welcome." Woodley gives the example of a Cherokee story in which a council of animals and councils among plants discuss the problem of the Cherokee and provide solutions. This is supported biblically with a reference to Job 12:7-10 (54-55). In addition, "the plants talk to us in our dreams (56). ...
"I can pretty much find any belief system or understanding I have and trace it back to the land. ...
"If you don't have land (including the water), you can't talk to Creator (58). ...
"God is more powerful through our faith, which is perhaps the crux of the Christian faith and the point of the gospel story. That is to say, our faith is the protest that Christians are called to live into, and against, the illegitimate powers of this world - that which destroys harmony" (59). ...
"In an Indigenous worldview, all of life is spirituality, beliefs are de-emphasized, spirituality is passed on primarily via observation and participation or practices. Correct practices show beliefs and reaffirm values and worldview. Knowledge is what one has lived and experienced, but for the Euro-American reality, religion is just part of life and beliefs are overly emphasized" (61).
Woodley uses the term "European tribes" without explanation, leaving the reader with the sense that he views all native Europeans as Indigenous. "Euro-American theology and practice ... is about conquest - it seeks to rule over nature, and it's fundamentally fragmentary." In "Christianity and the West [there is] no room for mystery or nuance or even non-certitude or humility" (63).
A concentration of theological comparison follows. Included is the remark that Indigenous American beliefs "are what some would call panentheism" (65).
Walter Brueggemann <www.bit.ly/3Kq1Eqs> is the most sympathetic Christian writer that Woodley cites (66, 91). This is typically in support of Woodley's reference to a "shalom, or harmony" construction with which Woodley develops his "harmony way," a framework that is "held by 45-tribal groups and represented in 10 core values" (92-94) shared by all, constituting, with further description, the key contribution of the book.
The back cover of Indigenous Theology notes that Woodley and his wife are "co-sustainers of the Eloheh Indigenous Center for Earth Justice." <eloheh.org>
Regrettably, Baker Books is Woodley's publisher. Included is this annotation within its promo material: "A Cherokee teacher, missiologist, and historian encourages us to reject the many problematic aspects of the Western worldview and to convert to a worldview that is closer to that of both Indigenous traditions and Jesus." <www.bit.ly/3c93O0T>
POSTSCRIPT, Oct 27 '22: Those core values are:
1. Tangible spirituality
2. Life governed by harmony
3. Community is essential
4. Humor is sacred
5. Feeling of cooperation and community
6. Oral tradition
7. Past and present time orientation
8. Open work ethic
9. Great hospitality and generosity
10. Nature connection
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