Why do you think so many people often "turn to God" for help when they are suffering? This is not always the case, but stay with me here: Many people I have talked to about faith say, "Well, I don't really go to church/believe in God/like to talk about religion" etc. But I've also witnessed so many of these same people suddenly calling upon God to help in their time of need and distress. I think it is no accident that there is a longing to salve our human suffering. Hence, this is why the idea of God as Jesus of Nazareth makes sense to me. If God really understood that we, as humans, are so hesitant to worship God because of our suffering, then God suffered on a cross. The resurrection is not really revolutionary. If God were really all powerful, of course the Spirit could revive itself again. But the idea that the Creator or Infinite Energy of everything that exists would willingly experience human rejection, suffering and humiliation. That is what makes the story powerful. Hence, in an American context, I think that many people (particularly white middleclass Americans) have trouble conceiving of this suffering because they are wellfed, clothed and satiated. Why would we even need a suffering God? Unfortunately, that is when Christianity just becomes a cloak for some kind of moral altruism of which we see much evidence for on television: lone preachers who speak to large crowds, on a very individual basis, about how they can improve themselves, but nothing is said of community or loving one's neighbor.
I like what you said here Molly. It reminds me greatly of the sermon at the Christmas Mass I attended this past year, only subsitute "suffering" for "humbling" (and then more about us humbling ourselves as God did). But I found much of it to be quite similar. I also agree with what it seems like you are getting at about the social gospel, although I will admit that I have not yet begun to take part in those sorts of activites that are normally associated with the social gospel (ex. helping at a soup kitchen, volunteering at a school to read to kids etc)
When Jesus was on the cross, couldn't he have simply levitated so that he wouldn't be completely hanging there? If so it must have been extremely difficult to do nothing...a pretty nauseating thought, actually. I do question what God can really know of human suffering. What human being knows for certain that God exists? Would it increase or lessen the pain of crucifixion to know that God exists? In any case it wouldn't be the same as the pain coupled with uncertainty. I do think it's a powerful story, but I think it goes for all suffering. God must know what it's like to be everyone. Maybe that's why the story rings so true, because it represents that God suffers along with us.
And also, I'm not saying Christians are the first people to talk about humans and suffering. Buddhists talk about suffering, and Muslims too. Not to mention the Jews, and their entire history of being persecuted.
But Jesus is not God. Jesus is just one of God's many babies. When Jesus suffered, he prayed to God, talked to God about it (if you take the biblical accounts seriously). The incorrect interpretation of the bible is enticing to those who want God to suffer alongside them. The truth is God causes suffering (out of necessity). People don't want to confront the truth though. They heap up teachers to tell them what they want to hear. In doing so, they grant these teachers power over their minds- for they seek to be fooled.
May I just say, FedUp, that as the obvious contrast to us mentalistic, delusional, irrational, ignorant, and close minded folk, you are the perfect example of clarity, objectivity, love, kindness, patience and openness. Inspiring stuff. Nathan
FedUp, you know that's not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about human suffering: humans suffering betrayal, insults, physical, mental and emotional violence, etc.
I've been reading a lot of Dietrich Bonhoeffer lately who was a Lutheran pastor, professor and pacifist who was involved in a plot to take down the Nazi regime. He is much more eloquent than I in explaining this:: Jesus' "being there for others" is the experience of transcendence...Faith is participation in this being of Jesus...our relation to God is a new life in "existence for others"...The transcendental is not infinite and unattainable tasks, but the neighbor who is within reach in any given situation.
Molly, I think you have good intuition! It seems to me that so many people treat God as an "aspirine": he should help them when they have some ache. Of course, I am not saying that God is not present in our suffering: but to think of God in such a way means to deny his transcendece. For me, a genious saying of Karl Barth: "God is not sum of 'worldly' strenghts nor is he above them. God is 'beyond' strenghts, the crisis of all our strenghts...". By being transcendent, he can be in our very heart struck by suffering, abandonment... It is a mistery above all. We cannot comprehense it in all of its consequences, but we can participate in it.
Molly, I think you have good intuition! It seems to me that so many people treat God as an "aspirine": he should help them when they have some ache. Of course, I am not saying that God is not present in our suffering: but to think of God in such a way means to deny his transcendece. For me, a genious saying of Karl Barth: "God is not sum of 'worldly' strenghts nor is he above them. God is 'beyond' strenghts, the crisis of all our strenghts...". By being transcendent, he can be in our very heart struck by suffering, abandonment... It is a mistery above all. We cannot comprehense it in all of its consequences, but we can participate in it.
And, of course, we can be close to each other. Maybe we do not take away suffering of our fellow human being, but being close to him is maybe even greater gift.
