“One Little Hour”

Richard Niebuhr gets less attention in evangelical circles than his older brother Reinhold. The two were born to a modernistic Lutheran pastor in Missouri, earned degrees from Yale, and became noted neo-orthodox thinkers.

In Social Sources Richard argued that sectarianism within Christianity is caused by social, economic, and political pressures. For example, he pointed to Weber’s thesis about the Protestant work ethic in order to argue that the capitalist spirit aided the advance of Calvinism. Niebuhr also believed that socio-economic tensions contributed to a class division between “respectable” middle class churches, like the Lutherans and Calvinists, and lower class Anabaptists and Methodists.

Niebuhr applied his thesis to the fundamentalism of his generation. He proposed that Fundamentalism was principally a rural phenomenon that was reacting against “modern science and industrial civilization” and found its root in the agrarian populism of William Jennings Bryan. Modernists, centered among the urban bourgeois, embraced progress and enlightenment.

Niebuhr’s argument has a fatal flaw. He leaves no room for doctrine. According to his model, sectarianism is always socially explicable, a view that should have been alien to a lineal descendant of Martin Luther. Unsurprisingly Niebuhr called for a reunification of all Christian churches.

Also, Niebuhr’s acceptance of Beardian determinism is dated. Economic forces are insufficient by themselves to explain sectarianism. He thought that Fundamentalism arose as a result of depressed crop prices post-World War I, a view that completely ignores Fundamentalism’s ideological origins in the 19th century.

Of course, Richard saw Fundamentalism as a backward reaction to modern civilization. By 1937 it appeared reasonable to assume that Fundamentalism was a dying movement. Ironically a recent study by Pew shows that mainline Protestantism, which largely endorses the modernism espoused by Niebuhr, now has fewer adherents than modern Evangelicalism, Fundamentalism’s child.

Niebuhr’s choice of Bryan as the archetypal Fundamentalist proved inaccurate. In many ways Bryan was the exception rather than the rule. While Bryan was an agrarian populist, Fundamentalist leaders like Clarence Macartney, Gresham Machen, and J.R. Straton were urbanites.

Yet although Niebuhr’s central thesis and his definition of Fundamentalism are inadequate, some of his arguments are valid. I agree with him that much of what we do, and even some of what we believe, is a function of the culture in which we were raised. Let me define a peron’s culture as the sum of all their experiences and influences. My current beliefs and attitudes were shaped not only by the Bible, but by the middle class family I grew up in, the Fundamentalist school I attended, and the popular media I consumed. That holds true for the Church as a whole.

We like to think that everything we do has a Biblical basis and in spirit I agree. Yet the way in which Christians apply Biblical principles has changed drastically over time and between cultures. A few examples are pertinent: Why do some churches pass offering plates while others pass a bag or have a collection box? Why do some churches have choirs while others use worship leaders or stick to congregational singing only? Why are some pastors elected while others are appointed? Why do we baptize the way we do?

I am convinced that these differences, with the partial exception of baptism, are driven more by culture than by the Bible.

Before anybody starts chucking stones at me, let me hasten to affirm that the Bible is the source of all absolute truth. Yet often the way that Scriptural truth is expressed is influenced by the culture in which it acts. The interaction between absolute Biblical principle and contemporary culture is not inherently harmful, a position sometimes expressed by extreme separatists.

To illustrate this idea I would put forward the example of women wearing skirts or pants, an often tense debate within my Fundamentalist subculture. The Biblical principal of modesty is absolute. Women must glorify God with their dress and in doing so should dress in such a way that they are beyond reproach. The principle is of course sound, but who defines how modesty looks at any given point in time? Culture does, and as culture changes its definition the expression of that Biblical absolute changes with it. Thus my grandmother would not be caught dead in pants in public while my sister frequently indulges.

This argument is equally valid on both the individual micro- level as well as on the macro- Christianity level. For example, American churches tend to have a stronger executive role for pastors than do many Australian churches. That tendency is the result of cultural, not Biblical, differences.

I do not believe that the interaction between Biblical truth and culture is a debility. Rather I would argue that the flexibility of the Bible is one of Christianity’s greatest strengths. Other religions become dated because they have very specific guidelines (think Islam and burkhas or Mormonism and racism). These religions are often forced to drastically reinterpret their scriptures in order to change with the times. Yet Christianity maintains the essential message of the Gospel in a culturally transcendent way by relying on Spirit-guided principled living.