Heresy Roulette

May 19, 2008 by djackson.

Yesterday being Trinity Sunday I thought it might be a good devotional practice to read “Scalene Trinities,” a chapter from Dorothy Sayers’ book The Mind of the Maker. Though Sayers was no mean theologian she’s not really - or at least not primarily - doing theology in this book but literary criticism. She anchors her method, however, in the ancient Trinitarian creeds of Christianity - the Apostles’, Nicene, and Athanasian. (She left out the Baptist Faith & Message but there, she was an Anglican and a Brit so we’ll absolve her.) She posits that the holy trinity of good writing is Idea (corresponding to the Father), Energy (which answers to the Son), and Power (the Spirit, of course).

In this particular chapter she offers to diagnose the failings of various writers based on where their trinities are out of whack, or scalene, a geometrical term that refers to a triangle with unequal sides. For instance, if a writer’s work is “fatherless” we might get any number of beautifully turned phrases but no coherent message. A writer who is short on son might convey a great governing conception in terms so abstract that we get an autopsy instead of a living creation. A spiritless author may clothe a powerful concept in a well-constructed plot but mishandle the actual words and so leave the reader cold - or perhaps injured.

Christology, of course, has always given us the most interesting heresies and Sayers even dabbles with fine-tuning son-starved writing with particular false doctrines. Thus a Gnostic writer, believing his exalted conception too good for sullied flesh, rejects metaphor and simile and fogs out swirling, multi-syllable abstractions. An Arian, on the other hand, is “all technique and no vision,” since mere words can never rise to the divine. A Manichee’s writing is hollow - all external effect with no true content.

Now all of this is good fun and spiritually healthy at the same time but it occurred to me to put Sayers’ system to a different use. Before turning to The Mind of the Maker I had been perusing David Norman’s blog (http://www.davidnormanblog.com/). In one recent posting David reports the results of a series of self-evaluations he’d taken in order to discover his spiritual gifts and determine his Ministry Preference Assignment, Leadership Style, and DISC, whatever that is. Anyway, it seems David was supposed to discover if he is an otter, lion, beaver or golden retriever.

I have several standing views on this kind of thing. First of all, I’ve never liked spiritual gift inventories, a sort of Cosmo Quiz for Christians. Taking a test to identify your gift makes about as much sense to me as reading the Sears catalogue to find out what your aunt got you for Christmas. (Well, bad analogy; your aunt always gave you clothes.) The way to discover a gift is to open it and play with it. If the giver happens to be handy, this works even better because, as someone who loves you and delights to see you enjoy his present, he will join you in the process and bubble along about what he’s given you and how it works.

Second, I’m suspicious of these leadership style things. Trevor Carpenter, a graduate of our Logsdon program here at the School of Christian Studies, briefly attended different seminary located north of us geographically and right of Bob Jones theologically. They subjected him to one of these color-the-bubble gizmos and the results indicated he had the personality of a born church-killer. They encouraged him to consider another line of work such as selling Amway or hosting a game show. Trevor is now pastor of Baptist Temple, a multi-ethnic megachurch down in the valley and one of the most dynamic congregations you’ll ever run across.

Finally, I don’t like the otter/beaver/lion/retriever schematic. All of these gimmicks (and the same four-square form appears under different names in the various half-baked Christian psychology books produced by various half-baked Christian psychologists) come originally from Aristotle who believed that four physical substances (called “humors”) governed the body and that having more of one than another determined your character. Apart from the discredited biology, I object to analyzing Christians based on theories concocted by a pagan, never mind how smart a pagan.

Which brings me back to Sayers. It occurred to me that since pseudo-scientific self-analysis is all the rage among evangelicals I might be able to cash in on the trend and simultaneously introduce at least a measure of theological sanity to the process. Sayers’ schematic is at least based in Christian theology instead of premodern biology. I wonder if I could use her insights into writing to critique preaching styles. I plan to give it a try over the next few days. At the end, if I’m feeling particularly bold, I will offer my view of my personal preaching heresy. In the interval I strongly suggest reading Sayers’ essay which can be found online at http://www.worldinvisible.com/library/dlsayers/mindofmaker/mind.10.htm.

Posted in General | No Comments »