Old Stanley does it again
Stanley Hauerwas gives us a provacative and thoughtful quote:The title of your lecture is intriguing: "Why No One Wants to Die in America." What does that mean?
It means that we live in a society that's in deep death denial. Assuming that most Christians live like other people, thinking they can get out of life alive. It's not going to happen. People care more about who their doctor is today than who their priest or minister is. Most Christians live lives of practical atheism. ... Atheism isn't explicitly a denial of God, it's to live in a way that God does not matter.
(from a 2007 interview)
How do the Christians you know face death? And does it strengthen our witness to the world?
Labels: Christ and Culture
posted by Rev. Daniel McLain Hixon at 4/14/2010
2 Comments:
That is a very provocative quote, one that I agree with. If you are interested, Fr. Stephen Freeman wrote on Christian Atheism, http://fatherstephen.wordpress.com/2007/08/20/christian-atheism/. It is a continuation of his thoughts on living in a one-storey versus a two-storey universe. Interestingly enough, I believe Fr. Stephen studied under "Old Stanley" years ago when he was at Duke.
In answer to your question, a good death is perhaps the best witness that anyone can have in the world. The blood of the martyrs was the fertilizer for the early Church. But, today, I have seen it myself. I have seen a man in a terrible accident who could not move keep saying, "I love God." He lived for a few months, but in that time his manner of death altered the lives of the nurses, doctors, etc. that cared for him. There are many other examples of this as well. Our manner of death will speak volumes of our life.
Thanks for posting this, Daniel.
Craig Groeschel (of lifechurch.tv) wrote a provocative book recently called "The Christian Atheist:Believing in God, but Living as if He Doesn't Exist".
Same line of thinking. He seems to think it is a problem in all churches/denominations and I would probably agree with him,
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