Discussion Questions: Chapter 7 – Paying Homage
Chapter 8 – Radical Inclusion
1. In this refreshingly concise and clear essay, Bruce Sanguin offers a thesis supported by tolerance and open-mindedness toward the larger faith community of the world. He begins with a not-so-tolerant lampooning of the Southern Baptists for their hell-bent agenda and tactics of peddling conversion at all costs to Muslims. Sanguin’s message: this is bad…very bad. Have you encountered such efforts with other Southern Baptists or with Evangelical Christians bearing a fundamentalist agenda? What attitudes/theology inform such exclusion and claiming of truth?
2. From here, Sanguin introduces a different model, as presented in Matthew’s depiction of the Magi…noting that “the basis of the unity of all peoples of faith is biospiritual. We have all come from the same place and are made of the same stuff. We are stardust, reconfigured in human form, inspired by the Creator.” The Magi travel to Israel for a single purpose…to pay homage to the Christ child. No Southern Baptist agenda here. This, Sanguin suggests, is our healthy alternative…the way of the Magi.
Let’s discuss his follow-up questions: What would ecumenical relations with other faiths look like if they were homage-based? What would it mean for Christians to make the long journey across strange cultural and religious landscapes bearing only gifts of respect for all that is sacred in other traditions?
3. Finally, Sanguin contends that “the deeper we go into our own faith system, the closer we get to God…[and thus] the more we are informed by values of diversity, inclusivity, and respect for the inherent dignity of other people and faiths.” Only by adopting the wisdom of the Magi will we, too, be equipped to “return home by another road,” transformed by our experience. So where in your life have you returned home by “another road?”
4. Anne Squire writes with a similar passion/goal, embracing the language of inclusion in understanding “the kingdom of God.” I chuckled at her opening quote from Don Cupitt, “What Jesus preached was ‘the kingdom’; what he got was the church!” What does this statement imply about the historical and current affairs of the church?
5. Squire says that “radical inclusion demands that membership in the community in question be open to all.” Let’s address her initial question: What did Jesus mean when he talked of the kingdom of God?
6. Squire then quotes John Dominic Crossan, who says, “Jesus robs humankind of all protective privileges, entitlements, and ethnicities that segregate people into categories.” Thus, she writes, “The kingdom of God, as defined by Jesus, is a realm of radical inclusion, a society of radical equality.” Therefore, “no one has the right to speak for God in the choice of who is in and who is out.” Sounds eloquent and simple…yet the world struggles to adopt such attitudes of mutual tolerance. As we look around us, what are the greatest barriers/hurdles toward this path of grace?
7. Squire notes many of the individuals and groups most directly affected by current restrictions and exclusions (pages 147-151). The key to addressing these, she suggests, is “education about the early days of Christianity…[as well as] the new formulations of theology, which allow the church to re-create itself.” She invites us to think and live in “the kingdom way”…motivated and informed by Jesus’ own vision of God’s kingdom.
What does thinking and living in “the kingdom way” mean for you? How does it promote inclusivity in your life journey?
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