Former Mars Hill Mega-Pastor Rob Bell has a new book coming out. In a video promoting his book, he once again starts off making our arguments for us. I’m not sure if this is a good thing or a bad thing.
For his last book, “Love Wins,” he did a video talking about the evils of the concept of Hell. Bell rejects the concept of Hell. In one sense, that is great because Hell is obviously ridiculous. But in another sense, Hell is a good tool for exposing the evils of Christianity and any theistic belief that employs such a concept.
Bell’s latest book is called “What We Talk About When We Talk About God.” The video promoting the book describes God as an Oldsmobile in the sense that God is outdated and obsolete. On that Bell and I are in agreement. The problem is that Bell can’t let go of his cherished Oldsmobile and so he wants to remodel it into a different model car:
This is where things get interesting. Bell wants the concept of God to evolve so that Christianity can stay relevant. I’m conflicted as to whether this will be a good thing for humanity or a bad thing.
I guess it is sort of like the win/win that Roy Speckhardt talked about in his last Huffington Post article, “A New Pope Is Good for Humanism.” On the one hand, if Bell succeeds in making Christianity more relevant, he would have moved Christianity closer to Humanism and that would be better for society than how Christianity operates today. On the other hand, if Bell fails and Christianity remains as dogmatic and obsolete as an Oldsmobile, people will continue to leave religion at a rapid rate and move more toward atheism. My problem is that if Bell does succeed in making Christianity more relevant, it might stick around longer that it should.
I have to confess that I have a secret fantasy that Bell will continue to move a significant number of more liberal Christians away from Christianity entirely. Perhaps Bell will reject so much of the dogma of Christianity that he will eventually de-convert. I hope that he will wake up one morning, pick up his Bible, and realize that his beliefs are so foreign to that book that he can no longer accept it or the principle character in it as believable.
What do you think; is it a good thing for Christianity to evolve in a more progressive way in order to survive or will that just needlessly prolong humanities attachment to ancient superstitions?
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