Perception, Know What I Mean? :-)

I recently finished an excellent book, Philip Gulley's 'If the Church Were Christian'.

Although I would like to review the whole book, (here are some good reviews from others: What Canst Thou Say, Evolving Beings) I feel it is more important to communicate a topic that is practically burning me up with it's importance-- perception.

Gulley recalls in his first chapter (ITCWC...Jesus Would Be A Model For Living Rather Than An Object Of Worship) a scene from his childhood:

"...behind the altar hung a magnificent figure of Jesus nailed to a cross.

The statue was so realistic as to be frightening. Nails protruded from Jesus' wrists and ankles, blood mingled down in a grisly red, his body striped with angry lashes. The figure loomed above the priest, inescapable. It had to be gazed upon. Without my mother telling me so, I deduced this Jesus was to be revered. Had the statue been placed anywhere else, had it been avoidable, I do not think it would have captured my attention to the extent it did. But its being placed behind the altar, squarely in the center of the worshippers' attentions, forced me to gaze upon it, brought it sharply into focus, and required a response. It was clear from the priest's words and from the hymns we sang and prayers we offered that the hoped-for response was veneration. This Jesus was to be worshiped. Further, the quality and sincerity of my worship would determine my future, whether I would enjoy an eternal life of joy and bliss with Jesus, or an eternity of suffering and sorrow without him."

There is a huge problem here, just under the surface. I too have felt as Gulley expresses, that people substitute the following of Jesus with the worship of Jesus. And as I've expressed before in this blog (on objectifying, on intellectualizing,) merely worshiping Jesus is objectifying him, and only acknowledging Jesus as God's son is intellectualizing him.

But here's the problem-- As Gulley sat there in church, looking up at the graphic rendition of Jesus on the cross, he made his own conclusions about what everyone else was thinking and about what they wanted him to think, specifically that they wanted him to exclusively worship Jesus. But how was he to know what the person next to him really thought? Perhaps the person next to him was taking in the visual example of how to live a Christian life? Seeing Jesus on the cross is like a visual aid, or a visual parable, to teach and guide us in some way. What way is that? To live like that. So for some, to look up at that crucifix meant one thing (worship), and to others it meant something else (following)!

As I mentioned in a previous post (here), in this life we are living in something like a "duality bubble, or cloud." We cannot see everything.

Daniel C. Dennett brings this up (Breaking the Spell: Religion as a Natural Phenomenon, p. 235) when he refers us to the example of Wittgenstein's 'Beetle in the Box':

Suppose everyone had a box with something in it: we call it a "beetle." No one can look into anyone else's box, and everyone says he knows what a beetle is only by looking at his beetle.-- Here it would be quite possible for everyone to have something different..." (Wittgenstein, Philosophical Investigations, 1953)

Dennett on p. 239 quotes anthropologists Palmer and Steadman (regarding their frustrations with natives of Borneo):

While religious beliefs are not identifiable, religious behavior is, and this aspect of the human experience can be comprehended. What is needed is an explanation of this observable religious behavior that is restricted to what can be observed.

Dennett adds (italics are his):

When it comes to interpreting religious avowals of others, everybody is an outsider. Why? Because religious avowals concern matters that are beyond observation, beyond meaningful test, so the only thing anybody can go on is religious behavior, and, more specifically, the behavior of professing.

What does the Bible have to say? Let's look at Matthew 7:

Judge not, that ye be not judged... And why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother's eye, but considerest not the beam that is in thine own eye? Or how wilt thou say to thy brother, Let me pull out the mote out of thine eye; and, behold, a beam [is] in thine own eye? Thou hypocrite, first cast out the beam out of thine own eye; and then shalt thou see clearly to cast out the mote out of thy brother's eye... Beware of false prophets, which come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ravening wolves. Ye shall know them by their fruits. ... every good tree bringeth forth good fruit; but a corrupt tree bringeth forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither [can] a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit.

So in summing this up, I would say that we are to judge religious behavior, but NOT religious beliefs. The 'Fruit of the Spirit' is behavior, the spirit itself is belief.