Losing my religion

When I was a frosh as college the band REM released a song titled "Losing my Religion." At a Christian Liberal Arts College it spurred a bit of conversation, mostly trying to decide if losing religion was a good or bad thing. In the end, most of us agreed that it depended on your definition of religion. In general, "religion" is a rather vague term and can refer to many good things, and many horrible things.

Fast forward to Monday night- I had the opportunity to hear and talk with Bruxy Cavey, teaching pastor of the Meeting House
who was speaking on the release of his newly expanded book, "The End of Religion." I never asked a question, as I haven't read th book yet, but if I did, I would have wanted to ask Bruxy to give me his definition of religion.
I'm not going to pass any critique until I've read the book, but here are my initial thoughts.
First, the idea of ending religion as we know it must be tempered with another seminal work from 1991 titled "The Myth of religious Neutrality" by Roy Clouser. This book stirred up heated feelings in favor and against, as I'm sure Bruxy's book will.
I agree with premise of the myth of religious neutrality- which is, that we really are not neutral. We have a "religion," a set of deeply felt beliefs, examined or unexamined, that influence and drive what we do, think and understand (I'm avoiding words like epistemology and the like, which is helpful, but can be confusing if you haven't had the blessing/curse of going to seminary). The idea that we can somehow escape or get past our religious bias is itself a bias/belief. Thus the circular reasoning begins.

I also agree with Bruxy, if I grasp his argument correctly, that Jesus essentially ushers in the end of religion. But I will add this- the end of religion in all the ways that it has basically gone wrong, which is most of religion as we know it. Because, and this is the crucial thing, Jesus doesn't so much end religious Judaism as he fulfills it. In his own words, he fulfills the law, he doesn't abolish it. The law was given because we missed the heart of religion, the heart of a relationship with Jesus. So while I could be said that Jesus takes us back to the start, because he is that start, it's better understood that he takes us through the mistakes. The brings the full circle to the relationship with God as we were designed for.

I believe we are religious creatures by nature- designed to worship. It's inherently part of our "creatureliness" and our creators glory. So if you attach the word "religion" to this created norm of worship, well then, religion is a good thing again. Now we don't try to end religion all together, we just take it back to it intended design and place in creation.

Instead of rambling on for ever, I'll just add that throughout Jesus' ministry and the New Testament letters I think a strong case can be made for the right place of the right kind of religion. And perhaps that can be seen nowhere better than in Revelation 22 and the glorification of Jesus and consummation of redemptive history- an image of all of creation worshiping God. I suppose I'm just fixated on seeing that as a "religious" action.

So, I'm grateful to both books as ponder these matters- we are creatures made to glorify the Creator, but we've certainly messed it up. Let us boldly slaughter all the sacred cows of false religion that keep us from the relationship with God offered through Jesus and His Holy Spirit, and the kind of religion that our own Lord Jesus finds pleasing (James 1:27).