CHRIST AND CHRISTIANS

Every portrait of Christ is the product of the interaction between the authoritative materials from the past and and an interpreter. They all say as much about the interpreter as they do the object of inquiry.  All are relative to the cultural context of the theologians who paint them.  Each one reflects a view of reality as a whole along with an understanding of what humans beings need to achieve the ideal life. The Jesus depicted in these multitudinous Christologies undoubtedly has some connection with the facts of history, including the message, ministry, and intentions of the man himself. The connection, however, cannot be precisely known with certainty. The problem is that we cannot compare our Christologies with the real Christ to discern where they do and do not accurately portray the past in adequate language. We cannot make that comparison because every Christ available to us is already an interpretation of the reality we wish to encounter and not merely the reality itself.

We are the ultimate and final authors of what we believe. As an exponent of a form of modernistic liberalism, I urge (1) that we give up the notion of an abiding, universal essence of Christianity, since I think we create it with the authoritative materials rather than discover it embedded in them and (2) that we acknowledge that we are the author of our beliefs and values in the final analysis.

For something on the light side: