My maternal grandmother — we called her “Nan” — died in the late 20th century. Born in the late 19th century, she lived 96 years.

I was given the privilege and humbling task of conducting her memorial service. A reference book I used listed significant inventions and historical events the year she was born and every year from the mid-1800s up to the late 20th century.

It was hard to imagine what Nan saw happen around her in her 96 years. The same will be said at my death, I’m sure. After all, I was born when radio was the newest thing and milk was delivered in bottles to our home.

MAKING THINGS MESH

In the course of Nan’s days and mine, we tried to make sense of our lives within the world in which we found ourselves.

During her days, Nan knew little or nothing of the big bang and the expanding universe, billions of galaxies, black holes or supernovas. I know about them but fall short of getting my mind around the dimensions and their implications.

For example, as best astronomers can measure it, the big bang happened 13.7 billion years ago. Our sun and its planets came out of the ongoing creation 5 billion years ago. Life began on Earth 4 billion years ago and will end in 5 billion years when the sun goes out.

Nan held her world together with love, creativity and kindness, underpinned by her Christian Science faith.

Mary Baker Eddy, the founder of Christian Science, was inspired to write her book, “Science and Health with Interpretation of the Scriptures,” in order to make sense of her faith and the modern world in which she found herself. It worked for Eddy, for Nan and for the many followers of Christian Science.

Eddy used — as do we all — the puzzle pieces of her faith and the science of the day to construct the picture of faith and practice she preached and practiced.

We all are challenged by the constantly expanding worldviews of our eras to discern the essence of our spiritual truth and its relation to revelations about our lives and universe.

For Christians today, a major question shaping discernment has to do with Scripture. Is it literal or metaphorical, objective or subjective, ancient generations’ spiritual truth represented in the worldviews of their times or literal and final definitions of the physical and spiritual world for all time?

EMBEDDED WORLDVIEWS

As a student of the Christian Scriptures, I understand them to be spiritual truth told using the scientific and religious worldviews of the eras in which the authors lived.

Genesis’ creation stories, for example, take place in a cosmos where the Earth is flat and the heavens contained within a dome placed on the Earth like a cake cover. The stories aren’t first about geology or astronomy. They’re about God and humanity and proper relationship.

Today, we’d write the story using different models of the cosmos, which will, in their turn, be outdated by future discoveries.

The cosmic worldview and cultural forms of an era provide the metaphors that that era uses to tell the story of its vulnerability and the strength it longs for and finds in its object of faith.

Depicting God as king or god above all gods, omnipotent, omniscient, male or female, judge, stern or compassionate, are all descriptions of the holy one as best it is understood. But the holy one (another metaphor) is always beyond final description.

So, how do we or can we speak of the divine in our age? Metaphors serve their time, but they can obstruct the journey of faith if the generations that follow believe them to be truth’s final and ultimate expression.

CHANGING MINDS

As the Gospel of John (4:24) says, “God is spirit, and those who worship God must worship in spirit and truth.” The “truth” John speaks of is not fact but authenticity, integrity and sincerity. And, I would add, because the spirit in which we worship is inspired by and reflects love, this truth is also joy.

Scripture, through story, prose and poetry, tells the “truth” of God the faithful of our traditions have found. It is spiritual truth, not stone. It is always more than even Scripture can tell, yet in some measure it is known.

Theologian Douglas John Hall, writing in the Sept. 7 issue of Christian Century magazine in a series called “How My Mind Has Changed,” ends his engaging essay with these sentences, which reflect intellectual integrity and spiritual wisdom:

“Probably, if I am granted more years beyond my present 82, my mind will change again. But I hope that it will always be change for the sake of distinguishing a living and therefore modest faith from the great temptation of all religion, which is to imagine itself true.”

My grandmother told the truth of life and love she believed in by the way she lived in the days in which she lived her life. The same is asked of us: not final answers but humble, open, love-inspired faith.

 

Bill Gregory, an author and retired minister, can be contacted at: wgregor1@maine.rr.com.

 

Copy the Story Link