When we have an experience, that experience consists of two parts. The actual experience of which we are the object. A good example for the evangelicals is the born-again experience, but we could use any transformative or horizon shifting experience here. On the left is the person who has the experience, on the right is a box which represents the context and langauge in which the experience happened. When we have an experience we often don't think about the context in which that experience occured.
The reality is that both the subject and the object are intimately entwined in the experience. You have an experience in the midst of a context, complete with a language to wrap around that experience. The experience becomes indistinguishable from the language and context in which it occurs. So when you talk to a born-again Christian about their conversion they use a context specific language to talk about it. What is also interesting is that often they refuse to equate similar experiences in other traditions simply on the basis of dissimilar language.
What we need to do is learn how to separate the experience from the context without invalidating the experience. This is hard for people who have invested a lot into their contextual language. That is quite understandable, anyone who has had a life transforming experience knows the joy of wanting others to have the same experience. But we can easily do violence to other valid experiences simply because the language is different. It is important to understand that the language of the context is the problem here, not the experience itself. So by pulling the two apart we even get a clearer understanding of what that experience really did shift within us. And when we put them back together we gain a new ability, that of being able to speak carefully about our experiences. What I mean by carefully is not hiding the experience, rather not feeling that we need to define our experience in narrow and often exclusive language.
When I first encountered this, about six years ago, I described it as surgically removing my faith, examining it and then re-inserting it into my being. At first this can be very painful, we become afraid that if we lose the langauge of an experience we might lose the experience. But having engaged in this for a number of years now I can see that it is really essential. In fact it realizing this is almost like another conversion experience. It makes us what Professor Eaton calls "ecumenically elastic". We are profoundly rooted in our real experiences, but we develop a fluidity to which we can begin to speak of them and even affirm them when we see religious experience in a completely different context.
4 comments:
At the risk of only making book recommendations, you should read J. L. Austin's classic, How to do things with words. I gaurentee the library has this one!
Kenny, your book recommendations are always welcome. Another to add to my list. {sigh} I wish I had free cycles to read these right away.
Not sure HOW to do this. You are giving me images, how about a concrete example?
Let's use the example of the born-again experience. In the churches that use that langauge your conversion experience, which often involves a change of your worldview, is initimately tied to being born-again. So you ask people if they have been saved, born-again, redeemed, etc. Never really unpacking what these terms actually mean, they have an assumed meaning. When people talk of their conversion in such a paradigm it is usually in the context of a single moment where they have an epiphany.
Because the language helps name the experience, it becomes quickly adopted to the experience. There is an assumption that the experience is common with others using the same language, but listen to the stories that go beyond the language and you will hear subtle differences. At this point in history we really like to have a language around our experiences, so the fact that we adopt this language is not a surprise.
Now the hard part is separating the langauge, in this case the evangelical jargon of being saved or born-again, from the experience. That the experience happened and changed your worldview is completely valid. Hopefully in life we all will have many worldview shifts (aka conversion experiences). Some more significant than others. But the issue is how we attach a lanaguage and assumed meaning to these experiences.
To get at the meaning of these terms one needs to separate them. (I am sometimes more interested in unpacking the worldview behind words than the experience, I think Prof. Eaton is more interested in the experience divorced from the specific langauge). So that means critically approaching the terms we use to describe the experience. What does it mean to be saved? Saved from what? Why did that make sense in naming my experience? Are there other formulations that would also name my experience?
The issue is that in say a Roman Catholic paradigm, the term born-again and saved are not common. Because of this evangelicals assume that most RCs aren't saved at all. But the reality is that this is a too narrow perspective on what it means to be saved? If you had the same experience in an RC environment you would most likely name it differently. The experience would be no less valid, but it might launch you into a different framework of interpretation.
Is that any clearer?
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