Calvin Synod Herald, 2016 (117. évfolyam, 1-12. szám)

2016-09-01 / 9-10. szám

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CALVIN SYNOD HERALD

focus on social issues, like social discrimination, human rights, ecological crises, etc. I agree with them that these issues are important for every Christian. Moreover, I believe that these are important parts of God’s work on earth. But is this the only agenda left for the church? Is this why we must exist for? Is this where we must focus our energy? I do not think so. One does not need to be a Christian to hold these issues important. Or, to put it another way, just to be involved in these issues does not make me a Christian. Not even if I do it in Jesus’s name, waving my Bible. As we saw above, what makes me a Christian is that I want to be in the closeness of God. To be Christian means that I am identified by my relationship with Christ. It seems that our problem is, that, in today’s America, if I locate my identity in Christ my relevance called into question. But if I need to choose between relevance and Christ, I chose my Savior. Now,

I also believe that the church can play a relevant role in society without losing its identity in Christ. I actually believe that this is the only way to be a Christian today. I must come back to this issue later, but before I do so, I want to point out another reason why churches still exist today.

Another reason for churches to still exist today is their close ties to nationalistic and cultural-historical values. They are the so-called “folk churches.”4 They are more typical in Europe than in the US. The question of identity and relevance are interwoven here. From the identity point of view “Christian” identity is part of the family identity, which, respectively, depends on social identity. One born to be a Christian because she or he is born in a Christian family. With the words of John Butosi, one “born, reared and educated in the best tradition of folk-religion.”5 From the relevance point of view, one’s folk-faith is relevant to society by being a relevant part of the given society’s historic and cultural values. But this is not only a Hungarian (or European) phenomenon. State and church are supposedly separated in the US. However, in reality the state as a sociopolitical entity, and the churches are related to each other much more than it is assumed. Instead of “folk church” it is called “civil religion” in the US. Yet, in many way, it has the same devastating consequences for the churches. The most important one for our investigation is that national and religious identity blurred.

The revered New Testament scholar, Michael J. Gorman, outlines “American Civil Religion” as follows.6 One fundamental assumption is that the US is, in some sense, a chosen nation and has a unique place in God’s plan. It generates extreme patriotism, and even nationalism sometimes. American civil religion values human liberty and rights as divine gifts. A“corollary myth is a form of secularized Calvinism, the notion that hard work mixed with a degree of generosity toward others will inevitably result in greater and greater freedom and prosperity, often understood as God’s blessing.”7 In such setting one puts one’s trust not in God alone, but also in the system which represents God’s rule on earth. Thus, one serves not God alone, but the system too. In political circles it is mingled with the idea of militarism and sacred violence which gives America permission to

use violence when “peaceful means are undesirable or unsuccessful.”8 The theological outcome of such “religion” is to put emphases on these national-civic-religiousvalues, even if it compromises our relationship with Christ. It might work, but is it what we want? Do we want to be defined our religious identity alongside the values of such “civil religion”?

In the beginning of this article the question was raised: “Aren’t we already Christians?” In light of the above we must alter the question to something like, “What makes us Christian?” Am I a Christian because it is part of my inheritance as my family/cultural identity (belonging to a “folk church”)? Am I a Christian because I regard certain values as important part of my identity as a citizen of this state (hold to a “civil religion”)? I think that the biggest mistake which we made in the past that we answered this question in the affirmative. Or, at least, we have not raised concerns about these questions. I do not want to repeat myself, but only point out that we circled back to the questions of the second paragraph above. To be a Christian means that I am a Christian first, and only after that something else (let it be Hungarian, American, or Hungarian-American). I am not talking about cutting the titles with our national roots. It is impossible anyway. It remains part of our individual identity. It might be an important decision-making factor in certain areas of church life (e.g., to which part of the world we send our support, etc.). But it needs to cease to be our spiritual qualifier.

I would like to finish this article by pointing out that there is another reason that churches still exist today. It is much more important than the aforementioned two, yet much more neglected. It is the historical fact that the church was always able to rejuvenate. There were many renewals of faith in the past two thousand years. The first few hundred years of church life was marked by the first great outpouring of the Spirit. When the Roman Empire felt, and Western civilization almost disappeared with it, there were the Monastic and Gregorian renewals. In the Middle Ages there were the Mendicant, Waldensian, and Hussite movements. Five hundred years ago came the “big” renewal (or, as we call it, reform). And since then history witnessed many more such renewals. Today we often use the term “revival” for faith renewals. However, I want to be cautious here, because I think that this term is enormously misused in particular religious circles. It has become a kind of brand name (i.e., “revivalism”). Something which can be produced, or even commercialized. But we cannot make or cause church revivals. It is not for humans to make such move, but interlay in the hand of God: “The Spirit blows wherever it wishes” (John 3:8—my translation).9 But when the Spirit does blow somewhere, renewal happens. But even if we cannot “make” a revival, is it appropriate to pray for one? In the early years of my theological studies, I was fascinated by church revivals. I read many books about it. I even had the privilege to witness one with my own eyes. My conclusion is that we cannot “make” revivals, but when