MISSION TO THE CHURCHES The Council of Churches for Britain and Ireland's "Commission on Mission" held a one-day consultation at Inter-Church House, London, on November 19 1992, on "Contemporary Western Cultures and the Gospel". SoF was invited to send a representative and, after discussing the pros and cons of participation, the SoF Steering Committee appointed the editor of SEA OF FAITH magazine to attend. The Commission subsequently asked him, with representatives of other invited organisations, to make a short presentation.
This is the text of the presentation by David Boulton: "Sea of Faith" is described in your Conference papers as "pursuing the line of Don Cupitt". This is commendably brief, but misleading. Don Cupitt's 1984 television series "The Sea of Faith" was indeed our inspiration, but we are a network without a Leader to follow, a dogma to pursue, or certainties to promulgate. I do not know whether Don Cupitt - who is currently recuperating after a major operation - would endorse every word of what I have to say, and I am sure other members of our network would say it differently. I can only represent them in the broadest sense.
In the Sea of Faith Network we do not mourn the decline and fall of traditional beliefs, including traditional beliefs in Christianity and God himself.
Instead we offer a vision of a new, dynamic, entirely human faith. Together, in the words of our Statement of Intent, we "explore and promote religious faith as a human creation". We affirm the continuing importance of religious thought and practice as a vehicle for awe and wonder, and for the celebration of social and spiritual values. And we explore the implications of accepting religion, in its multitude of different forms, as a human creation. We draw our membership from men and women with and without church affiliations. Anglican, Quaker, Humanist and many other streams run into the Sea of Faith.
So what have we to say about culture, and about mission? I cannot promise that what we have to say will necessarily be welcome or helpful to the Churches Commission on Mission. But we were invited to today's deliberations, and I presume we are expected to make our own distinctive contribution. So here goes.
We see no divide between Christian religion and contemporary culture. No divide, because Christian religion, all religion, is itself a cultural product.
Religious faith, like pop videos, "Blind Date", Harrison Birtwistle, Madonna and Wensleydale cheese, is part of our culture. It is not something outside and above culture. It is not, in our view, the reality of which human culture is but a shadow. It is not the Truth against which human culture should be tested. It is not a set of revealed absolutes, the same yesterday, today and for ever, free from and apart from the flux and fashion of human culture. It is not the Holy Secret possessed by a Church empowered to redeem a hopelessly relativistic humanity. Not in our view.
None of us here will have any difficulty in recognising, say, witchcraft or Hinduism or Japanese Buddhism as human constructs: attempts, vast and often inspiring, by particular human communities in particular circumstances, to make sense of the world and life on earth. But we balk, many of us, at accepting that our own Christian faith is equally the product of human genius, human imagination, human creativity and human culture.
Still more do we tend to resist the idea that God himself is a changing product of our culture and language. The gods of ancient Greece and Rome, the fertility gods of our ancestors, the Nordic gods after whom we still name our days of the week - yes, these are cultural products. Perhaps also the tribal God of ancient Israel. But not, we say, not the all-loving God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit, our Christian God. He, surely, is beyond culture? And that being so, surely we who know him can also step out of culture? We can see the human condition with God's eyes, and help him put it right? Can't we?
In Sea of Faith we would say "No, we don't think it works like that". Our God too is the God we have made. We may define him as the ground of our being, or as the ultimate symbol of all the values we choose to affirm. But he and we, his church, are culturally produced. If you see contemporary culture as a problem, a headache, we Christians or post-Christians are part of the problem, not the cure; part of the pain, not the aspirin.
When the churches look at contemporary culture, one part of contemporary culture looks at another part of contemporary culture - that's all. There is no bespoke salvation on offer. The best we can do is invite others to join us in collectively seeking our own salvation, in fear and trembling if you like, but also in the exhilarating joy of unbounded exploration. We do it with God's help - but we know we are talking in metaphors when we say that.
And Mission? Well, we are very dubious about mission, at least as generally understood. It seems to us somewhat arrogant for the churches to assume that they are the recipients of a mission to teach the world how to live. It is arrogant to assume such a mission, and yet more arrogant to claim that we are the mouthpieces and messengers of Almighty God in such a mission. Yes, our traditions and our scriptures say so, but our traditions and our scriptures are products of flawed humanity. We owe it to ourselves and to God - that inescapable metaphor again - to question the assumption that the Church or the Christian tradition or the born-again believer knows the Way, the Truth and the Life and is commissioned to spread the word to a mass of humanity which for one reason or another hasn't had the privilege, our privilege, of knowing the Truth with a capital T.
Look at the churches. Look at us! In a world of violence, we condone violence, blessing our armies as they go to war, at the Somme, at Dunkirk, in the Falklands, against Saddam's Iraq. Look at us! We say "Blessed are the poor", but prefer not to be blessed ourselves. We preach humility but claim a special relationship with the one true God. We preach equality but practise hierarchy, preach brotherhood, and after two thousand years are still debating sisterhood. Champions of the underprivileged, we nevertheless demand a privileged place for the churches in education, in the tax system, in broadcasting, in the law, in the composition of Parliament itself. By what moral right do we, so inconsistent, so confused, so flawed, often so plain ridiculous, assume a mission to teach others how to live?
I do not for a moment take it upon myself to suggest that the churches have nothing useful to say, no valuable experience to share. But I do say that, in all humility, they have at least as much to learn as they have to teach. And perhaps that is what mission could, should be about: a two-way process of sharing experiences and insights. If mission begins with repentance, with putting our own house in order, and proceeds to selfless action on behalf of the weak, the oppressed, the downtrodden, the hungry, the helpless, then let's get missioning. Go ye into all the world and practise the best Gospel humanity can put together - but preaching to a contemporary culture apart? Who are we kidding?
On behalf of the Sea of Faith Network, thank you for inviting us, and for listening.