Creighton Lacy - "A Himalayan View of Christianity" (November 5, 1967)
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Transcript
Transcripts may contain inaccuracies.
- | That's when we pray to say, | 0:03 |
our Father who art in heaven, | 0:06 | |
hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come, | 0:08 | |
thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. | 0:12 | |
Give us this day our daily bread. | 0:16 | |
And forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those | 0:19 | |
who trespass against us. | 0:22 | |
And lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil. | 0:25 | |
For thine is the kingdom, | 0:29 | |
and the power and the glory for ever. | 0:31 | |
Amen. | 0:34 | |
- | He has made known to us in all wisdom and insight | 0:55 |
the mystery of his will according to his purpose | 0:59 | |
which he set forth in Christ as a plan for the fullness | 1:02 | |
of time to unite all things in him, | 1:06 | |
things in heaven and things on earth. | 1:10 | |
This sermon if it is a sermon must begin | 1:15 | |
with an explanation and an apology. | 1:17 | |
It is clearly presumptuous to step into this pulpit | 1:20 | |
and talk about impressions from a sabbatical year in India. | 1:23 | |
Ezekiel was taken to a very high mountain | 1:28 | |
and told to look with your eyes and hear with your ears | 1:30 | |
and set your mind upon all that I shall show you, | 1:35 | |
and declare all that you see to the house of Israel. | 1:38 | |
Chaplin Wilkinson offered me a similar challenge | 1:43 | |
which I could not resist. | 1:45 | |
But let me hasten to add that in choosing this title, | 1:48 | |
A Himalayan View of Christianity, | 1:51 | |
I am not claiming an Olympian view. | 1:54 | |
The buses and motor scooters and third class trains | 1:58 | |
on which I penetrated some remote corners | 2:01 | |
of India are not conducive to a divine perspective, | 2:03 | |
quite the contrary. | 2:07 | |
But to label these individual comments | 2:10 | |
as Indian might've suggested that | 2:12 | |
in some sense they represent a nation | 2:14 | |
or a culture or a church. | 2:17 | |
Himalayan however implies the remote and lofty view. | 2:20 | |
The remoteness of a casual traveler spending less | 2:24 | |
than a year and speaking only English. | 2:27 | |
My contacts included Christian saints and Hindu sadhus, | 2:30 | |
missionary administrators and politicians, | 2:34 | |
social and ecumenical pioneers. | 2:37 | |
Protestants and Roman Catholics and Syrian Orthodox. | 2:39 | |
Yet I cannot pretend to have entered vitally | 2:44 | |
into the life of the Indian church or to have shared | 2:46 | |
in its daily struggle for survival, physical and spiritual. | 2:49 | |
Himalayan may also suggest a far distant perspective. | 2:55 | |
Across the arid plains and the tropical seas perhaps even | 2:59 | |
to the other side of the globe. | 3:03 | |
In a year of absence from familiar surroundings | 3:05 | |
and from routine tasks, | 3:08 | |
one may heed more readily the advice of Isaiah. | 3:10 | |
Hearken to me you who pursue deliverance, | 3:14 | |
you who seek the Lord. | 3:17 | |
Look to the rock from which you were hewn | 3:19 | |
and to the quarry from which you were digged. | 3:22 | |
One small American pebble can easily get lost | 3:25 | |
in a strange culture of 500 million people. | 3:28 | |
Yet such an alien environment often helps one | 3:32 | |
to look up the rock from which you were hewn. | 3:35 | |
There is no time this morning for me to draw comparisons | 3:38 | |
between Indian society and ours to apply impressions | 3:41 | |
of the Indian church to American Christianity. | 3:45 | |
But I do entreat you to use your own binoculars | 3:49 | |
to climb beyond this bullet and look afresh into the quarry | 3:51 | |
from which you were digged, | 3:56 | |
to focus on your own Himalayan view of Christianity. | 3:58 | |
My word of apology concerns the overly personal approach, | 4:03 | |
the reliance on my experiences and my observations. | 4:07 | |
Yet in a deeper sense, our Christian preaching ought | 4:12 | |
to be more personal, more confessional, | 4:15 | |
more witness and testimonial than it usually is. | 4:18 | |
The first confession surprises even me. | 4:23 | |
When I yielded to the temptation offered | 4:26 | |
by the university chaplain, | 4:27 | |
I warned him that my current perspective | 4:29 | |
on Christianity might be largely critical and negative. | 4:31 | |
There are surely enough depressing features | 4:35 | |
about the church in India. | 4:37 | |
Many congregations remain segregated | 4:39 | |
in spite of constitutional laws and the Christian gospel. | 4:42 | |
Or if they are physically open to all, | 4:45 | |
the outcasts nevertheless remain outside | 4:48 | |
the redemptive community. | 4:51 | |
Although the church of South India deserves recognition | 4:53 | |
as the most far reaching experiment in church union, | 4:56 | |
a similar merger in North India has been blocked so far | 5:00 | |
by the fear that any wider commissioning | 5:03 | |
of the clergy implies that one denominational ordination | 5:06 | |
is inferior to another. | 5:09 | |
Or the participation in the United Church | 5:12 | |
will reduce salaries and other benefits | 5:14 | |
from the United States. | 5:16 | |
There is conspicuous opportunism | 5:18 | |
in many segments of the Indian church. | 5:20 | |
Groups which frankly demand continued subsidies | 5:23 | |
from abroad. | 5:26 | |
At least two high government officials, one Christian | 5:28 | |
and one Hindu delivered to me very bitter tirades | 5:31 | |
against the inordinate salaries of some bishops | 5:34 | |
on the ground that they were thus isolated | 5:37 | |
from the regular clergy as well as from the penniless Lama. | 5:39 | |
Among some historic bodies of Indian Christianity | 5:44 | |
and especially among the fundamentalist sects | 5:47 | |
which have flooded the country since independence, | 5:49 | |
there is a streak of pietism, escapism, | 5:52 | |
other worldliness, so-called spirituality | 5:56 | |
which comes nearer to Hindu world denial | 5:59 | |
than Judeo-Christian realism. | 6:02 | |
As a minority of 2% in a hostile environment, | 6:05 | |
religiously tolerant but socially intolerant, | 6:09 | |
Christianity has so long feared syncretism, | 6:12 | |
absorption into the prevailing culture | 6:15 | |
that it has adopted a ghetto mentality of isolation, | 6:18 | |
ignorance and self defensiveness | 6:22 | |
in relation to non-Christian faith. | 6:24 | |
The ancient Mar Thomas Syrian Orthodox churches | 6:28 | |
who date their origin from the 1st century AD have | 6:31 | |
until recently remained ingrown communities without social | 6:35 | |
or evangelistic outreach. | 6:38 | |
The Protestant denominations | 6:41 | |
are still considered foreign importations. | 6:42 | |
Extracting converts from family, home and village | 6:45 | |
to live in alien worlds. | 6:49 | |
In fear that the gospel would be swallowed up | 6:52 | |
by the encroaching sons of Hindu society, | 6:54 | |
many Christians have ignored the wisdom | 6:57 | |
of the Indian poet Tagore. | 6:59 | |
If you close the door to all errors, | 7:02 | |
you also shut out the truth. | 7:05 | |
This is the negative picture which could be painted | 7:09 | |
in much broader, bolder strokes. | 7:12 | |
The parallels within Western Christianity are obvious. | 7:15 | |
These are some of the factors that produce | 7:19 | |
a pessimistic view of the church in India, | 7:20 | |
especially when it is encountered after the vitality | 7:23 | |
and hope and energy of Christians in Eastern | 7:26 | |
and Southeastern Asia. | 7:29 | |
What surprised me however, | 7:31 | |
when I tried to say this to myself and to you, | 7:33 | |
is that far more positive affirmations crowded to the four. | 7:36 | |
These are perhaps minority movements still, | 7:41 | |
trends which might be disclaimed | 7:44 | |
by a majority of Indian Christians today. | 7:46 | |
Yet glimmers of light in the darkness | 7:49 | |
which may presage a coming dawn. | 7:51 | |
First, despite the ecumenical leg already mentioned, | 7:55 | |
Christian unity is manifesting real vitality in service. | 7:59 | |
During these recent critical famine years in India, | 8:05 | |
international and interfaith agencies have pooled | 8:07 | |
their resources in a program known as AFPRO, | 8:11 | |
Action for Food Production. | 8:14 | |
Church World Service from America, (indistinct), | 8:16 | |
the Bishops Appeal in Germany. | 8:20 | |
Oxfam, the Oxford Famine Relief in England. | 8:22 | |
Catholic Relief Services | 8:25 | |
and other groups have joined together not merely | 8:27 | |
to distribute emergency food, | 8:29 | |
but to tackle a long range problem by digging tube wells, | 8:31 | |
supplying fertilizers, | 8:35 | |
building irrigation projects and so on. | 8:37 | |
Or for a very different approach I attended one session | 8:41 | |
of an All India Christian Educators Conference. | 8:44 | |
The first time in history that principals | 8:47 | |
and college presidents and administrators | 8:49 | |
from all kinds of schools, under Protestant, Catholic, | 8:51 | |
Syrian Orthodox and other auspices had convened | 8:55 | |
to discuss their common problems and common goals. | 8:58 | |
Welcomed by the Hindu state governor, | 9:03 | |
addressed by the stately Cardinal, | 9:05 | |
this meeting was both a witness and the working session. | 9:08 | |
Many Indian leaders including | 9:12 | |
the recently retired President Radhakrishnan owe something | 9:14 | |
of their dedication and vision to education | 9:17 | |
in Christian mission schools. | 9:20 | |
But the contribution was acknowledged | 9:22 | |
if at all in isolated individual terms. | 9:24 | |
Last January, the entire country could see that Christians | 9:28 | |
of many varied creeds have a constructive role | 9:32 | |
to fill in nation building, and are determined to fill it. | 9:35 | |
This ecumenical unity and service suggests | 9:41 | |
the second positive emphasis. | 9:43 | |
A few people here and there are committed | 9:46 | |
to the church's participation in the world. | 9:48 | |
The ghetto mentality, | 9:52 | |
the pietistic spirituality still prevail. | 9:53 | |
But some Christians are convinced that the church must deal | 9:57 | |
with social evils and injustice at the source instead | 10:00 | |
of the symptoms as citizens of the nation | 10:03 | |
and as followers of Jesus Christ. | 10:06 | |
Near the Western shore of India, I tramped an entire day | 10:09 | |
across dusty fields with an agricultural missionary | 10:12 | |
who was paying a courtesy call | 10:16 | |
on the village welfare officer, | 10:17 | |
repairing an irrigation pump, | 10:19 | |
advising farmers about fertilizers and pesticides, | 10:22 | |
and topography and seed. | 10:25 | |
The following month a thousand miles away | 10:28 | |
in the industrial east, I accompanied another missionary | 10:30 | |
as he discussed urban development problems | 10:34 | |
with a young city planner, | 10:36 | |
one of the new breed of dynamic enthusiastic, | 10:38 | |
technically trained engineers | 10:41 | |
who are remolding the Indian society. | 10:43 | |
In the capital, a research officer in the Ministry | 10:47 | |
of Community Development was making a survey | 10:49 | |
into motivations for service. | 10:52 | |
He was a burly seek with no previous Christian context | 10:55 | |
that I could discern. | 10:58 | |
The other four agencies he chose to study my new play, | 10:59 | |
a hospital, a children's home, a literacy center, | 11:03 | |
and an extensive ministry to destitute people. | 11:06 | |
Three of them just happen to be Christian institutions. | 11:10 | |
It is no mere coincidence that the motivation, | 11:14 | |
the commitment which this man seeks to instill | 11:17 | |
into government personnel are most clearly manifest | 11:20 | |
in the Christian community. | 11:24 | |
I would go further and brand this unrepresentative, | 11:27 | |
irresponsible slander the frequent charge | 11:29 | |
that Indian Christians are more corrupt | 11:32 | |
and less trustworthy than their Hindu neighbors. | 11:35 | |
There are undoubtedly crooks within the church, | 11:38 | |
not to mention all kinds of hypocrites | 11:41 | |
and one does not need to go to India to find them. | 11:43 | |
But I would confidently assert that there are more cases | 11:47 | |
in which Christians are sought after and appreciated | 11:50 | |
because of their superior integrity, unselfishness, | 11:53 | |
sacrifice and dependability. | 11:57 | |
Shortly before going to India, | 12:01 | |
I met an attractive young American Jesuit | 12:03 | |
who teaches on the faculty of a labor relations institute. | 12:05 | |
It was exciting to hear him talk | 12:09 | |
like some protestant liberals | 12:10 | |
about the Christian presence in India, | 12:12 | |
the responsibility of the church in the world, | 12:15 | |
the conviction that we missionaries do not take Christ | 12:18 | |
to India, he is already there at work. | 12:21 | |
We merely serve in his name and spirit. | 12:24 | |
But when he discussed not only service | 12:28 | |
but salvation outside the church, | 12:30 | |
the redemptive activity of Christ within Hinduism, | 12:33 | |
I asked why the superiors thought of such heretical views. | 12:36 | |
I don't give a damn what they think he said, | 12:40 | |
and when a year later I visited his school almost | 12:43 | |
in the shadow of the oldest and largest steel mill in India. | 12:46 | |
He informed me lethally that the new director general | 12:49 | |
of the society of Jesus had been there on tour | 12:52 | |
and had given his task that endorsement | 12:55 | |
to this non evangelistic ministry. | 12:57 | |
This program for training efficient, | 13:00 | |
socially responsible labor and management leaders | 13:03 | |
without regard to religious affiliation. | 13:06 | |
As elsewhere in the world, | 13:10 | |
the church in India appears still largely bound | 13:11 | |
to institutions and traditional structures. | 13:15 | |
But here and there, it is seeking new forms of ministry, | 13:18 | |
new expressions of witness and service, | 13:22 | |
new ways of integrating the sacred and the secular. | 13:25 | |
This in turn points to a third embryonic movement evident | 13:29 | |
in Indian Christianity. | 13:32 | |
The development of a more inclusive theology. | 13:35 | |
And this ray of light has two parallel beams. | 13:38 | |
One is the concept of salvation in Christ | 13:42 | |
without conscious acknowledgement of him. | 13:45 | |
The other is the discovery of common ground | 13:49 | |
for dialogue with other faiths. | 13:51 | |
The concept of salvation in Christ apart from baptism | 13:54 | |
and confirmation sounds like a contradiction | 13:58 | |
to many people, both Orthodox Christians | 14:01 | |
and critics outside the church. | 14:03 | |
Yet most modern theologies are reluctant | 14:05 | |
to say even on scriptural authority that human beings | 14:08 | |
who have never heard of Christ are eternally damned. | 14:12 | |
Even conservative literalists are eager | 14:16 | |
to extend the redemptive power of Christ to all of life, | 14:18 | |
including possible creatures in outer space | 14:22 | |
who obviously have never heard of Jesus of Nazareth. | 14:24 | |
Many of us have tried to escape this dilemma | 14:28 | |
with a dualistic approach that God may certainly | 14:30 | |
in his wisdom and mercy use unknown methods | 14:34 | |
and include unrecognized persons in his scheme of salvation. | 14:37 | |
But according to human perspective, | 14:42 | |
we must continue to affirm biblically | 14:44 | |
that there is no salvation outside the Christian community. | 14:47 | |
This is no longer adequate. | 14:52 | |
We have seen too many persons who bear the marks | 14:54 | |
of Jesus Christ yet remain outside the church. | 14:57 | |
If our rational minds are in any sense made in the image | 15:01 | |
of God, we rebel at the injustice of unmerited punishment, | 15:04 | |
and any doctrine of forgiveness | 15:09 | |
or grace begs for the inclusion | 15:11 | |
of people beyond the visible body of believers. | 15:14 | |
One contemporary answer is that men may be saved | 15:18 | |
not inevitably are but maybe saved by Christ | 15:22 | |
or in Christ without knowing or accepting him. | 15:26 | |
The redemptive work of Christ | 15:30 | |
in other words may take place apart | 15:32 | |
from conscious allegiance to the Christian faith | 15:34 | |
and thus may apply to the Hindu or the Buddhist | 15:37 | |
or the humanist or the atheist. | 15:40 | |
My Jesuit friends and a number of protestants would adopt | 15:44 | |
some such approach stressing the opening text from Ephesians | 15:47 | |
or the promise in Romans 8:21, | 15:51 | |
that creation itself will be set free from its bondage | 15:53 | |
to decay and obtain the glorious liberty | 15:57 | |
of the children of God. | 16:00 | |
All creation, all man, | 16:03 | |
all life some theologians would say. | 16:06 | |
Let me add that this attempt | 16:10 | |
at the solution does not fully satisfy me | 16:12 | |
but not because it is radical or unscriptural. | 16:14 | |
If the work of Christ is to be so divorced | 16:18 | |
from the historic person of Jesus | 16:21 | |
or at least from recognition of him, | 16:23 | |
then it seems to me we might as well acknowledge frankly | 16:25 | |
that we are talking about God's activity | 16:28 | |
whether we call him father, son or holy spirit. | 16:31 | |
But Jesus of Nazareth is simply our Western Christian way | 16:35 | |
of understanding God and the others may come to him | 16:39 | |
through Buddha, Krishna or Christ. | 16:43 | |
In other words, | 16:48 | |
I believe in the universality of Christ as revealing | 16:49 | |
and implementing God's love for all mankind. | 16:53 | |
But if that activity, that revelation can take place apart | 16:57 | |
from knowledge of Jesus, | 17:02 | |
apart from the Christian community which he founded, | 17:03 | |
apart from theological creeds and traditions, | 17:07 | |
then we must face realistically the practical consequences | 17:10 | |
of this more inclusive theology. | 17:14 | |
First, God may reveal himself in other cultures | 17:17 | |
through other events even in other incarnations | 17:21 | |
and who are we to deny God that authority? | 17:25 | |
Second, if Christ is at work in Hindu society | 17:29 | |
and an individual on aware of the historical Jesus, | 17:33 | |
then the necessity for baptism and church membership | 17:37 | |
is called into question. | 17:40 | |
Some of the most dedicated younger missionaries | 17:43 | |
in India today are asking if conversion means not just | 17:45 | |
a new life, a commitment to God's purpose, | 17:50 | |
but a deliberate rejection of a person's own culture, | 17:53 | |
does the church have any right to demand such conversion? | 17:57 | |
Joining the church in this country is a respectable act | 18:01 | |
though protestant traditions are somewhat embarrassed | 18:04 | |
by adult baptisms. | 18:07 | |
But where becoming a Christian often means separation | 18:09 | |
from family, job, community, even national heritage. | 18:12 | |
Do we have the right to insist on a public procedure | 18:17 | |
which many of us would be unwilling to accept? | 18:21 | |
Just last week I read a vivid Japanese characterization | 18:25 | |
of this outmoded view, | 18:28 | |
removing fish from a dirty river called the world | 18:30 | |
and placing them in a clean pool called the church. | 18:34 | |
Is such conversion even consistent with a new theology | 18:39 | |
which stresses the gospel in the world, the sacred | 18:43 | |
in the secular, the assurance of Christ's presence | 18:46 | |
in non-Christian situations. | 18:50 | |
In a recent address in this country M.A. Thomas, | 18:53 | |
director of an exciting new ecumenical center | 18:55 | |
in South India describe the mission of a Christian thus, | 18:59 | |
to heal not convert, to enter a life of service seeking | 19:03 | |
to meet human need wherever it may be found taking the form | 19:08 | |
of a suffering servant. | 19:12 | |
I do not know the answer to these problems. | 19:15 | |
I dare even to raise the issues from this pulpit | 19:18 | |
with real soul searching agony. | 19:21 | |
To universalize or abstract the work of Christ | 19:24 | |
from the formal acceptance of Jesus and the church | 19:28 | |
is merely one effort of some thoughtful Christians | 19:31 | |
to combine his unique function, | 19:34 | |
no man cometh unto the father but by me. | 19:37 | |
With an inclusive opportunity for salvation, | 19:40 | |
for the millions who do not acknowledge him. | 19:43 | |
I do know that in this modern secular age | 19:47 | |
which embraces the east as well as the west, | 19:50 | |
Christian theology must find some formulation | 19:53 | |
which does not give the impression of dogmatic, exclusive, | 19:56 | |
arrogant finality if it is to get even the hearing. | 20:00 | |
Jesus Christ is not the problem. | 20:06 | |
Millions of non-Christians admire even revere him | 20:08 | |
as a supreme teacher, a perfect example, | 20:12 | |
an object of genuine devotion. | 20:16 | |
Yes even as a savior if by that we mean one uniquely sent | 20:19 | |
by God for a specific task. | 20:24 | |
Two barriers stand in the way of full acceptance. | 20:27 | |
One is the claim that Christianity | 20:31 | |
is the only path to salvation. | 20:33 | |
That Christ is the only revelation of God, | 20:35 | |
that all other religious experience is there by thoughts. | 20:39 | |
The second barrier, Mahatma Gandhi put blankly | 20:44 | |
when someone asked him what was the greatest handicap | 20:46 | |
that Christ faced in India. | 20:49 | |
His answer, Christians. | 20:51 | |
These comments lead to the other facet | 20:55 | |
of a more inclusive theology. | 20:57 | |
The need to find common ground for dialogue | 21:00 | |
with man of other faiths. | 21:02 | |
The dream of a universal syncretistic world religion | 21:04 | |
has long since faded from all but a few exotic cults. | 21:08 | |
Religious leaders generally agree | 21:12 | |
that the major faiths will continue to co-exist | 21:14 | |
for centuries to come. | 21:17 | |
But peaceful coexistence requires mutual understanding, | 21:19 | |
recognition of some common goals, | 21:23 | |
and a willingness to give and receive insights. | 21:26 | |
My Himalayan view has led me to reject two popular notions | 21:30 | |
in regard to world religions. | 21:34 | |
One is the denial that we worship the same God. | 21:36 | |
That we hold widely divergent concepts | 21:41 | |
and practice widely divergent rituals does not justify | 21:43 | |
the categorical assertion that we seek | 21:47 | |
or follow different gods. | 21:49 | |
Such an assertion seems to me either a regression | 21:52 | |
to polytheism or an assumption about the nature of God | 21:55 | |
as presumptuous and absurd as the ontological declaration | 21:59 | |
that God is dead. | 22:02 | |
The second notion I've come to abandon is the belief | 22:05 | |
that we cannot and should not compare our religions. | 22:08 | |
Of course we must avoid the common temptation | 22:12 | |
to contrast their worst with our best | 22:15 | |
or their practice with our theory. | 22:18 | |
Karl Barth has branded all religions including Christianity | 22:22 | |
as man's search for God in contradistinction | 22:25 | |
to the revelation in Jesus Christ | 22:29 | |
which is God's action toward man. | 22:31 | |
I have long felt that man's search for ultimate reality | 22:34 | |
is part of God's creativity, his activity and his plan. | 22:37 | |
But the revelation of law, love and sacrifice, | 22:43 | |
a victory over alienation and death which we Christians see | 22:47 | |
in Jesus Christ will remain only an arrogant | 22:51 | |
and hypocritical claim to others, | 22:55 | |
unless in some way, our conviction results | 22:58 | |
in greater reconciliation and service, | 23:02 | |
a more consistent cosmic view, | 23:06 | |
better psychological adjustment to a revolutionary world, | 23:08 | |
clear purpose for living beyond ourselves. | 23:13 | |
The Muslim may know more | 23:17 | |
about God's transcendence than we do. | 23:19 | |
The Buddhist may practice deeper communion | 23:22 | |
with the absolute. | 23:24 | |
The Hindu may have a more consistent theory of evil. | 23:26 | |
But unless by this frankly pragmatic standard, | 23:29 | |
Christianity can be seen in some overall sense superior | 23:32 | |
to these other religions. | 23:37 | |
Then we deny by our lives what we affirm | 23:40 | |
in theological creeds about Jesus Christ | 23:43 | |
as the incarnation of God. | 23:46 | |
May I illustrate this with one final personal incident, | 23:51 | |
almost literally the high point of my year in India. | 23:54 | |
My last foray into the actual Himalayas. | 23:57 | |
I had written on the back of a friend's motor scooter, | 24:01 | |
50 miles from the nearest rail head to visit the Dalai Lama, | 24:04 | |
spiritual and political ruler of Tibetan Buddhism | 24:08 | |
in exile since 1960. | 24:11 | |
For over two hours we discussed politics and theology, | 24:14 | |
mostly theology by his preference. | 24:18 | |
And I shall not recapitulate that conversation now. | 24:21 | |
But two or three quotations I do want to share with you. | 24:25 | |
After his holiness had asked us Christians | 24:28 | |
what we consider the nature of God, I returned the question. | 24:31 | |
Immediately the Dalai Lama broke in ahead of his interpreter | 24:35 | |
to answer in excellent English, | 24:38 | |
the ultimate truth not as being everything based on it. | 24:40 | |
He went on to explain in almost tilikian terms this concept | 24:47 | |
of the highest quality of natural existence, | 24:51 | |
the principle on which everything is dependent, | 24:54 | |
the roseness of a rose that gives meaning and purpose | 24:57 | |
to the seed, the plant, the blossom, and death. | 25:01 | |
This is not self existence but dependence. | 25:05 | |
A Buddhist detain salvation | 25:08 | |
when he understands this ultimate truth. | 25:10 | |
Or as his holiness put it for our benefit, | 25:13 | |
you can say that you've come into direct contact with God. | 25:16 | |
A few minutes later, the Dalai Lama, largely self-taught, | 25:21 | |
spiritual and intellectual leader of one | 25:25 | |
of the more primitive superstitious forms | 25:27 | |
of Buddhism acknowledged that quote, | 25:29 | |
"Jesus was not an ordinary man. | 25:33 | |
After he has passed away, he still exists. | 25:36 | |
Yes, you can also meet him." | 25:40 | |
If you are groping for the conclusion | 25:46 | |
of this sermon so am I. | 25:47 | |
The implications of what I've tried | 25:50 | |
to say obviously involve not only our attitudes toward | 25:52 | |
other faiths and other cultures, | 25:55 | |
but also our Christian program of mission | 25:57 | |
as dialogue and service, | 25:59 | |
and some of our traditional theological constructs. | 26:02 | |
From my Himalayan view, I am distressed by the complacency, | 26:06 | |
the denominational jealousies, the frequent irrelevance, | 26:11 | |
the insensitive arrogance of much contemporary Christianity | 26:15 | |
in India or the United States. | 26:19 | |
But I come down into the valleys with at least a measure | 26:22 | |
of eagerness and hope based on the conviction | 26:25 | |
that a few Christians here and there are determined | 26:28 | |
to break out of restrictive moles and divisive barriers. | 26:31 | |
It is not my province to judge whether Pandit Nehru | 26:36 | |
or Swami Ranganathananda for example are saved according | 26:39 | |
to any Orthodox Christian theology. | 26:44 | |
I'm sure that they are in any concept of salvation | 26:47 | |
that would be meaningful or welcome to them, | 26:50 | |
or to the God of love whom I see revealed in Jesus Christ. | 26:54 | |
His holiness the Dalai Lama, a Buddhist acknowledges | 26:59 | |
that one can still meet Jesus. | 27:03 | |
Mahatma Gandhi, a Hindu lived | 27:06 | |
in constant fellowship devotionally and ethically | 27:09 | |
with Christ though he never became converted or baptized. | 27:12 | |
If men like these are part of God's family, | 27:17 | |
then the important question for us as Christians | 27:20 | |
who do acknowledge the Lordship of Jesus Christ | 27:23 | |
is not how we meet him in what creeds or sacred buildings, | 27:27 | |
but that we meet him and how we follow him. | 27:33 | |
Let us pray. | 27:40 | |
Open our hearts oh God, both to thy word and to thy world. | 27:44 | |
Help us by our lives to witness to thy love revealed | 27:50 | |
to us in Jesus Christ our Lord. | 27:55 | |
Amen. | 27:58 | |
(upbeat music) | 28:19 |