Going to Hell

What a catchy title, huh?

So, I'm plugging a book for a friend of mine, Fr. Rick Morley, an Episcopal priest who used to live right here in my little town of Lonaconing, MD. Rick's book discusses the difference between what people/churches/etc. say we need to be "saved," and what Jesus says about how to be "saved" throughout the gospels. Is salvation based on faith alone? Works-based faith? Something more than that?

Who's "right" when it comes to issues of salvation?

from page 70: "The Good News here is that there is no checklist of good deeds to fill out. Jesus is talking about a manner of living here, and it’s one that isn’t motivated out of the fear of Hell or the hope of heaven, but a life that’s driven by an authentic love."

Specific parables and dialogues from the gospels are presented, which offer different perspectives on this question, which Rick then asks, "Right here, what exactly does Jesus say that salvation depends on?"

My prediction is that this book will be a bit offensive to fundamentalists, challenging to radical liberals, and, hopefully, somewhat uncomfortable to us all, because Jesus came to call us out of our comfort zones and truly examine our lives lived in relationship with Him.

Rick approached me with this book, still only in digital format and not yet published, and asked me what I thought. Very humbled, but also very excited to be a part of his editing process, I did as he asked, read it, and responded to the questions that he asks. When the book was published, and I received a print edition, I was once again humbled to see that some the comments I offered him became small changes in the book's content.

So, yes, there is a little bit of me in there too.

Read the book, it's a dialogue, and is written in such a way as to spark further dialogue, not only with others, but with yourself, and with Jesus Christ. Jesus, what exactly are you saying that salvation depends on?

God and Tao

I read an article today, by a fellow named Michael Gleghorn, called Philosophical Taosim: A Christian Appraisal. Gleghorn briefly introduces Taoism and Lao Tzu, who wrote the Tao Te Ching, which is foundational to Taoism. Quoting an outside source, Gleghorn says that the whole point of Taoism is "to live in a way that conserves life's vitality by not expending it in useless, draining ways, the chief of which are friction and conflict."

He goes on to discuss, what he believes, to be the principle difference between Taoism and Christianity: that Tao is unavoidably impersonal, whereas the Christian God is fundamentally personal.

However, he later quotes Chapter 67 of the Tao Te Ching, which seems to indicate that Tao is not the same as God(heaven):

Everyone under heaven calls my Tao great, and unlike anything else.

It is great only because it is unlike anything else. If it were like anything else it would stretch and become thin.

I have three treasures to maintain and conserve: The first is compassion. The second is frugality. The third is not presuming to be first under heaven.

Compassion leads to courage. Frugality allows generosity. Not presuming to be first creates a lasting instrument.

Nowadays, people reject compassion, but want to be brave. Reject frugality, but want to be generous. Reject humilty, and want to come first.

This is death.

Compassion: attack with it and win. Defend with it and stand firm.

Heaven aids and protects through compassion.

-translation by Stephen Addiss and Stanley Lombardo, Copyright 1993, Hackett Publishing Co.

Gleghorn also quotes Chapter 62 of the Tao Te Ching which, reading through fully (his article does not present the reader with the entire text of this chapter), does not seem to support his argument:

Tao is the mysterious center of all things, a treasure for those who are good, a refuge for those who are not.

Beautiful words can be traded, noble deeds can enhance reputations, but if people lack them, why should they be rejected?

When the Son of Heaven is enthroned and the Three Ministers installed, presenting jade discs and four-horse chariots cannot compare to sitting still and offering the Tao.

The ancients honored this Tao. Didn't they say: through it seekers find, through it the guilty escape? This is why Tao is honored under Heaven.

-This text comes from the same source as the above translation.

Gleghorn keeps returning to his argument that Tao cannot be God, because Tao is impersonal, and God is personal. But is he not missing the point? Perhaps that is not what the Tao Te Ching says at all, perhaps Lao Tzu was not trying to assert that Tao is God, or Heaven, but rather, Tao is the Way of Heaven, as Tao means Way?

Look at the very last section of Chapter 62, which was all that Gleghorn quoted in his article. The idea of Tao, as presented here, does not seem mutually exclusive to theism at all, or Christianity, as Gleghorn asserts.

My, albeit, limited knowledge of the Tao Te Ching leads me to see it this way. Tao is not meant to replace God; at least Tao does not necessarily have to replace God, because Tao is, as Gleghorn himself describes, "the way of all things: the way of nature, of society, and of oneself." Therefore, Tao is a concept, not a being, as God is a being.

So how is this exclusive to the Christian God?