These are just a few thoughts from some thinking I’ve been doing…

Marcus Borg: ‘Taking religious pluralism seriosuly calls Christian exclusivism radically into question, and in my judgement, negates it…Does it make sense that ‘the More’ whom we speak of as creator of the whole universe has chosen to be known in only one religious tradition, which just fortunately happens to be our own?’

Is there only one true religion (or faith)? I guess I’ve always grown up with the idea that yes there is, and it’s the Christian faith. Jesus is the only way to salvation, and theoretically people can’t be ‘saved’ unless they’ve said some kind of arbitrary prayer accepting Jesus as their ‘saviour’. This is what’s known as an ‘Exclusivist’ view. Two things have started to challenge me on this thought.

Firstly, it’s a little convenient that the one true faith is most prevalent in the world’s two superpower nations (UK and the US). This makes the idea of salvation into something of a postcode lottery, with God only accessible to those who were lucky enough to be born in the cultural context in which Christianity is a known and acceptable religion.

A lot of this idea has perhaps arisen through the melding of culture and religion in perhaps inevitable but unhelpful ways. Before the mass-migration and multiculturalism experienced worldwide in the last century, divides between cultures and religions were far sharper. Not only were people from other countries racially and culturally ‘Other’, so were their religions. Religious difference was far from celebrated, or even accepted, but feared as satanically inspired. This is reflected in traditional approaches to Christian mission overseas. The idea of ‘coverting the natives’ meant not only the imposition of our religion, but also our language, our culture and our values. Now, in our multicultural world, especially living in a multicultural city like London, it is easy to see such actions as absurd and highly misjudged. With mass influxes of those of both other cultures and religions, we can learn to live alongside, respect and also be inspired by those of other faiths who live out their lives with real integrity. We can see the benefits and neccessity of celebrating difference. The reality is that there is truth in many places, and ouside of as well as inside the Christain faith. Psalm 24 – ‘The Earth is the Lords, and everything in it’. Borg suggests we should celebrate this kind of diversity and pluralism – ‘The world is richer because of its distinctive cultural-linguistic traditions’.

Secondly, contemporary theology presents the possibility that bringing God’s kindgom on earth and living well in the here and now could be more important than the neccessity of future salvation. Borg affirms this similarity in lots of religions. Though they do speak of an afterlife, ‘the religions are not primarily about the next life, not about paths to an afterlife, but to life centred in the sacred in the here and now’.

It’s interesting to note how closely related the world’s major religions are (take Christianity, Islam and Judaism), and even beyond this, deep intrinsic similarities with less mainstream faiths as well. All this seems to point to a kind of spirituality operating in humans at a much deeper and intrinsic level than can be expressed in any one ‘religion’. People across time and space have sought out a God, a ‘more’, the sacred; how can we be so sure we have a monopoly on what that is? For Borg, these similarities add to, rather than detract from the credibility of Christianity.

A pluralistic view isn’t without its problems – many would argue it doesn’t work logically, as two different things cannot be simulatenously ‘true’. I don’t know what the answer is, but if we take seriously the issues raised above, I believe it’s important to be open to the idea that it is possible to experience God outside of the Christian faith.