8/13/2019 Immortality Ideology

1/2

fully prejudiced. Maybe I should invitehim over to watch Mary Hartman, Mary

Hartman. That'll teach him somethingabout TV's potential.

Marlin ]. VanElderen

Our immortality ideologyIn his book Escape from Evil Ernest Beckermakes some caustic observations aboutChristianity which Christians do well toponder. His own purpose is to explainevil in man; and he concludes by groping for a science of society, a curious synthesis of Marx and Freud.

It is Becker's broad sweep of human

history, and the role of Christianity in it,that concerns us here. On Becker's viewman, in his awesome fear of death, seeksto transcend death as a part of some"immortality ideology," a larger group inwhich he can find some meaning in life.History is the record of a succession ofthese immortality ideologies, or a mixtureof them, and their conflicts. Men willinglylend themselves to these, slavishly so, inan attempt to make their lives count. Theresult has been tragedy for the world andits people, for each system demandsscapegoats and victims to perpetuate itself.

In this survey historic Christianitycomes off badly. Promising a newspiritual integrity and a truly democraticequality, Christendom instead becomesharnessed by the prevailing power structures and is used to perpetuate them. Itfails to reinstitute a sacred community ofrough equality; and it fails in its promiseof "a valuation of the individual personthat had not existed before." So, accord

ing to Becker, Christianity failed to effect"any fundamental change in the massivestructure of domination and exploitationrepresented by the state after the declineof primitive society." Christianity becameeffectively subdued and culturized.

Nor has time altered the situation.Having noted how easily "organized religious heroism has given way to the herosystems of modern societies," Beckergoes on to observe that "today Chris

tianity is in trouble not because its mythsare dead, but because it does not offer itsideal of heroic sainthood as an immediate

personal one to be lived by all believers"(italics mine). The message is plain: Becker believes Christians do not live theirChristianity. He asserts further that "the

churches have turned their backs both onthe miraculousness of creation and on theneed to do something heroic in theworld." They have, instead, pretty much

joined the world.Early Christianity held out the prom

ise of social justice in a world that wascrying for it, but "Christianity never fulfilled that promise, and is as far axoay fromit as ever" (italics mine). And still worse,Becker notes, churches have throughouthistory blessed unheroic wars and

sanctified group hatred. One has only toreflect uncomfortably on the recentVietnamese struggle to recognize truth inBecker's charge.

For these reasons, the church is in astate of decline; it is too much a part of thesystem. In Becker's words again: "Organized religion openly subscribes to acommercial-industrial hero system that isalmost openly defunct; it so obviouslydenies reality, builds war machinesagainst death, and banishes sacrednesswith bureaucratic dedication. Men aretreated as things and the world is pulleddown to their size. The churches subscribe to this empty heroics of possession,display, manipulation "

And we have reached the stage atwhich genuine religious heroism, when itdoes appear to threaten organized society,is repressed and crushed. There is noroom for the Daniel Berrigans or the sincere conscientious objector.

These are serious, but I believe accurate, charges leveled against Christianity.

Christians, no less than non-Christians,are immersed in their culture; and few ofthem perceive any real problem in this.Our own immortality ideology "theAmerican Way"has enmeshed all of us.Extricating ourselves from it, even whenwe want to, is extremely difficult. Fromthe side of civil government, we havesucceeded rather well in separatingchurch and state; but the church itself hasdone less well in separating itself from

the state. One religious group recently offered a special bicentennial edition of theBible which presented the special figuresand events of American history alongwith the Holy Writ between the samecovers.

Evangelicals who have been sensitiveto deficiencies in real Christian living anda lack of social action to accompany orthodoxy will find themselves in agreement with Becker's assessment of Christianity. Whatever endorsement they findfor their own insights, however, will betempered by the sadness they feel at theaccuracy of his observations. What suchreally tells us is that we must renew ourefforts and rededicate ourselves to thetask of being used by the Spirit to makeChristianity count in the world!

George De Vries, Jr.

Gears, bearings,and the likeI took a brief tour the other week throughthe buildings of a company that designsand makes machines that make gears,bearings, and the like. I was shown theblueprint and temporal sequence plan forthe control system of a machine that wasabout to be built. I was taken to the areawhere machines costing as much as aquarter of a million dollars and weighingas much as ten tons are put together. Thecomplexity and size of what I saw was sodifferent from what I see in daily life that Icould not help being awed.

Yet there was a question thatgnawed, and occasionally jabbed, myconsciousnessa question that I darednot ask my friend who was guiding meon my too-brief tour: Why should anyone

make gears and bearings?"They help us do things more effi

ciently." I know they do. But why shouldanyone make things that help us dothings more efficiently?

"Doing things efficiently savestime." I know that, too. Why should anyone make things that help us save time?

"Saving time is a basic value." But isit really?

Suppose the quest for saving time re-

February 1977 5

8/13/2019 Immortality Ideology

2/2

^ s

Copyright and Use:

As an ATLAS user, you may print, download, or send articles for individual useaccording to fair use as defined by U.S. and international copyright law and asotherwise authorized under your respective ATLAS subscriber agreement.

No content may be copied or emailed to multiple sites or publicly posted without thecopyright holder(s)' express written permission. Any use, decompiling,reproduction, or distribution of this journal in excess of fair use provisions may be aviolation of copyright law.

This journal is made available to you through the ATLAS collection with permissionfrom the copyright holder(s). The copyright holder for an entire issue of a journaltypically is the journal owner, who also may own the copyright in each article. However,for certain articles, the author of the article may maintain the copyright in the article.Please contact the copyright holder(s) to request permission to use an article or specificwork for any use not covered by the fair use provisions of the copyright laws or coveredby your respective ATLAS subscriber agreement. For information regarding thecopyright holder(s), please refer to the copyright information in the journal, if available,or contact ATLA to request contact information for the copyright holder(s).

About ATLAS:

The ATLA Serials (ATLAS) collection contains electronic versions of previouslypublished religion and theology journals reproduced with permission. The ATLAScollection is owned and managed by the American Theological Library Association(ATLA) and received initial funding from Lilly Endowment Inc.

The design and final form of this electronic document is the property of the AmericanTheological Library Association.