I have a lot of other posts in the pipeline, and I have only recently been reconsidering this topic, so forgive the brevity of this post. It’s been how many years since ‘Christian Deconstruction’ became a trend? If you’re unaware of the concept, it is the path or method taken by Protestant/Evangelicals who are ‘deconstructing’ the principles of their faith. While an intellectual endeavor such as re-consideration isn’t dumb, I want to propose that 1. The term deconstruction is dumb and 2. The motive behind deconstruction is typically dumb.
First, the term ‘deconstruction’ is dumb. It actually makes me angry how stupid it is. When I was a Freshman undergraduate in 2008 I was introduced to the work of French postmodernist intellectuals such as Derrida. Derrida, in part, focused on linguistics/semantics and termed his concept for semantics ‘deconstruction’. It was also during this time that the “Emergent Church” movement began. Influential pastors like John Caputo started using Derrida’s term to refer to a process of “pulling apart” the dogmas of the Christian faith. While I have my own reservations about and qualms with Derrida’s philosophy of language [see for example below, my early work on Reconstruction], it’s bizarre and frustrating to see this term co-opted. To me, it appears to be used to lend an air of gravitas to a process that has been done in every generation of the Christian faith, a process called thinking, re-evaluation, pondering, re-consideration, etc. We all love catchy terms and titles, and it’s just plain dumb to nab this one to elevate such a process.
NFS. In the collection of Bryan & Rachel Fulton.
One of my earliest exhibited pieces. Composed of acrylic, pen & ink, gesso, and spray paint on wood platform.
While ‘deconstruction’ is now a popular and frankly sub-intellectual trend among evangelicals, it was initially a philosophical system advanced by French philosophers such as Derrida. This work stands as a critique of the philosophy of deconstruction, taking an entire short story by Flannery O’Connor, scripting it in ‘automatic writing’ style font, and composing a new image out of the whole.
My later work, “Reformation” is a development off of this idea as well.
Second, the motive behind deconstruction is typically dumb. I say typically because there are occasions when people engage in this process of re-evaluation with good reason. In my own time as a teenager and young adult I wrestled with whether the Christian faith was actually something I believed in, or something merely given to me. I think any philosophically-minded person will likely go through such a process at some point in their life, probably multiple points in their life.
But, when along come some people saying we need to do something radical called ‘deconstruction’, it appears to bear a certain kind of motive. What is the purpose behind such a method? I think there are several. 1. The motive is to elevate the pastor or leader or friend who proposes it. It makes them look smart. They want to appear to have done more ‘work’ than you, thought harder than you, come to smarter conclusions than you. If you had really wrestled with issues of faith like them, you would believe things more like they do. 2. The motive is to align your position with a ‘progressive’ or non-Christian conclusion. Of those professing Christians who personally went down the path of ‘deconstruction’ I’ve seen very few retain Christianity. Why is that? Is it because they’re smarter, wiser, and better studied than others? Usually this is not the case.
Instead, there is a external and internal motive to leave historic, genuine Christianity. Externally, others want you to leave. Internally, you want to leave. 3. Very specifically, this is because of sin. We want sin. We want to embrace the cultural sins of our time. In particular, we do not want to be told we are wrong for our beliefs about sexual morality. We want to practice sexual immorality and/or tell others who practice it that it’s okay. These are pressing reasons for a person to decide they should re-consider the faith and come up with a rationalized explanation for why they leave. Additionally, there are also pressing reasons for why a person would not want to leave the idea of Christianity, while yet departing from its basic tenants. It is much easier to stay within a community, stay within a basic ideology, than it is to leave. If one can keep some of the same terms, and convince others to do the same, it is a lot easier than to entirely reject the terms. This is essentially what ‘progressive’ Christianity does. And I think that’s dumb. It is better to be sincere about your reasons, clear in what you are doing, than lie to others and yourself. Just say you like this or that but Christianity rejects it, and call it a day.
There is a better way to address the intellectual challenges of the Christian faith. I remember an old theologian once argued that once a person has concluded in a certain position after a time of intense study and thought, it is wise to retain that belief unless proven otherwise. I think that that is a wise idea because otherwise, any new ‘challenge’ to your position (wether you are a Christian, Muslim, Jew, agnostic, atheist, Buddhist, or Hindu, etc.) will put you into an epistemic crisis that is entirely unnecessary.