More of Mr. Duncan

This weekend I began a book of essays by David James Duncan (Montana flyfisherman, self-described Christian mystic, and author of two of my favorite works of fiction, The River Why and The Brothers K) entitled God Laughs and Plays. Like his two above-mentioned novels, this collection of "churchless sermons" masterfully combines Duncan's fine writing style with wise reflection, much humor, and an articulate appreciation for the natural world. Here's an extended quote from a chapter somewhat provocatively entitled "What Fundamentalists Need for Their Salvation:"

Most of the famed leaders of the new "Bible-based" American political alliances share a conviction that their causes and agendas are approved of, and directly inspired, by no less a being than God. This enviable conviction is less enviably arrived at by accepting on faith, hence as "higher-than-fact," that the Christian Bible pared down into American TV English is God's "word" to humankind, that this same Bible is His only word to humankind, and that the politicized apocalyptic fundamentalist's unprecedentedly selective slant on this Bible is the one true slant.

This position is remarkably self-insulating. Possessing little knowledge of or regard for the world's wealth of religious, literary, spiritual, and cultural traditions, fundamentalist leaders allow themselves no concept of love or compassion but their own. They can therefore honestly, even cheerfully, say that it is out of "Christian compassion" and a sort of "tough love" for others that they seek to impose on all others their tendentiously literalized God, Bible, and slant. But how tough can love be before it ceases to be love at all? Well-known variations on the theme include the various Inquisitions' murderously tough love for "heritics" who for centuries were defined as merely defiant of the Inquisition itself; . . . the missionaries' and U.S. calvary's genocidally tough love for land-rich indigenous peoples whose crime was merely to exist; and, today, the Bush team's murderously tough love for an oil-rich Muslim world as likely to convert to Texas neocon values as Bush himself is likely to convert to Islam.

Each of these crusader groups has seen itself as fighting to make its own or some other culture "more Christian" even as it tramples the teachings of Christ into a blood-soaked earth. The result, among millions of nonfundamentalists, has been a growing revulsion toward anything that chooses to call itself "Christian." But I see no more crucial tool for defusing fundamentalist aggression than the four books of the gospels, and can think of no more crucial question to keep asking self-righteous crusaders than whether there is anything truly imitative of Jesus--that is, anything compassionate, self-abnegating, emphatic, forgiving, and enemy-loving--in their assaults on religious and cultural diversity, ecosystem health, non-Christian religion, or anything else they have determined to be "evil."

For two thousand years the heart of Christianity has not been a self-pronounced "acceptance of Jesus as my personal lord and savior": the religion's heart has been the words, example, and Person of Jesus, coupled with the believer's unceasing attempt to speak, act, and live in accord with this sublime example. (44-46)