Robin R. Meyers: "UNDONE: Faith as Resistance to Empire" - Beecher Lecture III

The third of three lectures by Robin R. Meyers: "UNDONE: Faith as Resistance to Empire." Harvey Cox, among others, has put the dilemma of the anti-imperial faith of Jesus in the modern age succinctly: We not only live in the Empire, the Empire lives in us. One of the prevalent myths of the early church is that the first followers of Jesus did not engage the Roman Empire, but quietly ignored it in pursuit of a spiritual life that flew under the radar of the Principalities and Powers. New scholarship has revealed the extent to which the first Jesus People represented a direct challenge to the ways of Rome, the economy of Rome, and the oppressive hierarchy of Roman Family Values. Once the church was a clear threat to the status quo, now the church is largely a defender of the status quo, blessing both a warrior worshiping militarism and a death-dealing and predatory capitalism. Thus the illusion from which we must be "undone" is the hypocrisy of accepting the protection and affluence made possible by the Pax America while calling for its demise. We pray the prayer of Jesus, "Your kingdom come, your will be done . . . while under our breath we mumble the dissent of our daily practice: my kingdom stay, and my will be done. There will be no renewal of the church until we embrace and practice a countercultural pacifism, redefine the place of money in human relationships, and engage in meaningful and sacrificial non-compliance with the imperial forces that deal death and indignity. Church will prosper again when it gets smaller and considerably more dangerous.
The three 2013 Lyman Beecher Lectures, given by Meyers, are entitled "UNDONE: Faith as Resistance to Ego, Orthodoxy, and Empire." Instead of conceiving of the church as an institution that promotes faith as a belief system, defending doctrinal claims as essential to salvation and good works, UCC pastor and author Robin Meyers will make the case that the Jesus Movement was in the beginning, and must be again, a Beloved Community of Resistance. Confronting our illusions with help from Kierkegaard, and drawing the poetry of Anna Kamienska, each lectures will focus on three areas that demand resistance: ministry as performance (ego), ministry as right belief and worship (orthodoxy), and ministry as sentimental surrender to the status quo (Empire).
For more information on Meyers, visit robinmeyers.com.