The Future of Faith by Harvey Cox: A Book Review

There's something happening here. The words of that old song reverberate within me when I think of the events happening in our world and in the Church. Harvey Cox, recently retired from the faculty at Harvard, has delivered a seminal work on his take on where Faith Is, Has Been, and Is Going. The Future of Faith is incredibly approachable by the lay reader, yet Cox's theory on the future of faith is hard-hitting, hopeful, and ground-shaking. I highly recommend this book for the individual reader as well as a group study. Pastors, church leaders, academics, and interested non-Christians will all find places to engage Cox's discussion.

I appreciated this book because of Cox's grasp on history combined with his widespread travels and involvement in inter-faith dialogues across the spectrum. This guy has truly seen it all and his sharp mind and grasp of current events has helped him place this book not within the ivory tower but in the reality of everyday existence.

Something is changing in the sphere of faith. Cox rightly places our current location in between a second and third age of faith. The first age was the Age of the Spirit beginning with Jesus all the way through the persecutions and explosive growth of this underground movement.

The second age was the Age of Belief. This was the period following the Constantinian conversion and the melding of Church and Empire. Catechisms began to appear outlining specific "beliefs" one must hold to be considered a Christian and, upon Constantine's converting the Empire to Christianity, these beliefs also carried with them power and, soon, an elite class of leadership. The clerical class. Now, instead of living in the Faith, one must hold to teachings *about* that faith. Differing theologies were mashed together into one orthodox view and those who missed the cut were labeled heretics... some at the pain of death.

The coming age is Cox's hope and read on the future. This he is calling the Age of the Spirit. He points to many things, to numerous to lay out here, but essentially the role of women in the church has moved away from the male-centered images of Christ and even God to explore further the ways of the Spirit. Also the large numbers of people who have started to identify themselves as spiritual but not religious signals a lack of trust or concern for the institution of the Church. People are realizing that they can have fellowship with each other and God without a mediating influence such as clergy or rote belief systems.

But by and far the most interesting part of Cox's thesis for this reader was his harkening us back to a time when faith did not require one set of beliefs over another. Creeds, statements of beliefs, etc. etc. serve only to divide Christians one from the other he believes. They serve to build walls within the house and each denomination or church or community sits walled off from their brothers and sisters not because they lack a faith in Christ but because they hold different *beliefs about* that faith. Cox sees these belief systems, and their current use in hot button topics in culture, as the rear guard in a system that is fading away.

Just the other night, at a Bible study we hold in a bar in downtown Minneapolis, a young woman told me that she doesn't like going to church because she gets tired of people telling her what to *believe*. Having just read this book I was primed for the ensuing conversation. I think it was mutually edifying and it gives hope to those who are tired of the intra-mural fighting that church can be about more than fighting about whatever the moral issue of the day might be.

I cannot speak more highly of this book. Cox has placed it right in the milieu of contemporary faith issues with a simple, yet shattering, idea. What if we could set aside the arguments over *beliefs* and walk with each other in the *faith*? This is a question that invites a journey. It requires a suspension of what those of us inside the church believe are the *requirements* for membership. Above all, it calls us to be curious about what God is up to in God's world. Can we do it? In the end, it doesn't matter, these changes are coming. My prayer is that we can do this journey with grace and without inflicting more wounds on the other.

Technorati Tags: Book review, emerging church, Harvey Cox, Future of Faith, religion, theology

Comments

[brad evans]

What a hypocrite! Lutherans are still "tied to empire", still state churches, still getting people's tax money and government support all over Europe. The only thing that's changed is that you've stopped preaching in support of the Kaiser and become something like pseudo-revolutionaries in drag, half Che Guevara, half social worker. Meanwhile, by 2050, the ELCA will have exactly ONE member, Wisconsin and Missouri will have become overdressed Baptists and most of the lutheran churches in Europe will be either museums or mosques. The fastest growing segment of American religion is "none of the above"; the only thing "emergent" about Mainline Protestantism's latest attempt to re-brand itself and so stave off further irrelevance is its ghost from its shrunken body.

[Chris Enstad]

Brad,
I'm unclear as to how this review is hypocritical. Did you read Cox's book and find my sense of it wrong? I nowhere defended the status of the mainline denominations nor did I explicitly put a plug in for the "emerging church" at least as it is branded in the U.S. Cox's point is precisely about the "none of the above" folks.

By the way, the broad strokes you use to paint all of the people you slander in your post is way off the mark. Read the book and let me know if you think I missed something. "Lutherans" doesn't mean *this* Lutheran. The ELCA doesn't need to survive for their to be a spiritual faith at existence in the world. I am not defending nor attacking the mainline church but I think Cox's point should at least be debated rather than attacks like yours being made.

[Greg Gorham]

I very much enjoyed Cox's book as well! I definitely agreed with his thesis and the overall thrust of the book, although I had two big issues with the way he got there.

It seemed like he put a lot of weight on a fairly controversial dating of the Gospel of Thomas. And he didn't really interact with people like NT Wright, who would disagree with his early dating, just kept saying that the majority of scholars date it mid-first century. He also seemed to take a low opinion of folks like Ireneaus, who heavily disputed the integrity of the gnostic gospels, basically casting him as a power-hungry man trying to solidify his control over the church. Which for all I know could be true, but it seems like any charitable analysis should really require more evidence to support a broad character judgment like that. I think his larger point was valid, but it seems like he could have gotten there with the Didache, or other non-gnostic sources like I Clement, or historical analysis of how rapidly Christianity seemed to change and evolve in those early years. I don't understand why he basically staked his whole argument on a disputed dating of the Gospel of Thomas and attacks on early saints like Ireneaus.

I also wish he would have interacted more with those who insist that liberation theology tends to be an ivory tower, academic discipline in 3rd world countries, rather than something with broad traction across the whole population. I give him the benefit of the doubt on this, but I've heard so many people dismiss the liberation theology movement in those countries as something for the academics and not for the general populace, it would have been nice to get his thoughts on that critique.