Religionless Christianity - Father Dave's Blog

“Religion that is pure and undefiled before God the Father is this: to care for orphans and widows in their distress, and to keep oneself unstained by the world.” (James 1:27).

This week we begin a series of readings from the letter of James – the Apostle traditionally referred to as ‘James, the Just’, though I think he’d be better named, ‘James, the Controversial’.

The controversy begins with the question of whether James was Jesus’ actual blood-brother. Various New Testament texts refer to Jesus as having brothers and sisters (Matthew 12:46-50, 13:55-56; Mark 3:31, 6:3; Luke 8:19; John 2:12, 7:3; Acts 1:14; 1 Cor. 9:5), and Paul speaks of as James “the Lord’s brother” (Galatians 1:19). Even so, both Catholic and Orthodox traditions hold that Mary had no other children and so assume James was a cousin. Either way, it may have been James’ earthly proximity to Jesus that influenced the believers in Jerusalem to elect him as their first leader (Acts 15).

Controversy about James hasn’t been restricted to Catholic and Orthodox circles. Martin Luther – the spearhead of the Protestant Reformation – called the Letter of James a ‘strawy’ epistle and wanted it removed from the New Testament altogether! For Luther, James’ emphasis on living out your faith seemed to run contrary to his insistence that we are saved by faith alone and not by our good works. Luther may, of course, have been reading James through 15^th century eyes. The first century church was not exploiting its members through the sale of indulgences.

I think our verse today – James 1:27 – is itself controversial. It says that the essence of religion is looking after vulnerable people and maintaining your integrity! A statement like that must have seemed outrageous in the first century!

Religion at that time was almost entirely a matter of ritual. If you were Roman, you showed yourself to be religious by attending the set feasts and performing the obligatory sacrifices. If you were Jewish, you showed yourself to be faithful by sacrificing at the Temple, having your male children circumcised, and by keeping to the food laws. It was ritual practices like these that kept you “pure and undefiled”.

I think this makes intuitive sense. Religious purity is achieved through performing religious ritual. James secularises the process. What keeps you “pure and undefiled before God the Father is this: to care for orphans and widows in their distress” (James 1:27).

Twenty centuries later, Dietrich Bonhoeffer spoke of the need for ‘religionless Christianity’ – a faith stripped of all its non-essential elements that would better communicate to a humanity that had ‘come of age’. He was thinking along similar lines. I think James, the Controversial, though would have said that we don’t need to get rid of religion. We just need to redefine it.

The word ‘religion’ comes from the Latin verb, ‘religio’, meaning ‘to bind back’. Religion is the process whereby we bind ourselves back to our Creator and to back to who we are. From a Christian perspective, this binding back is a process of love.

Our Sunday Eucharist

We celebrated another wonderful Eucharist last Sunday. A big thank you to Doug Pyeatt and Andrew Logan for joining me on the panel. Once again, I’ve extracted some ‘shorts’ from our Bible Banter that are featured below. To see more, head over to the Sunday Eucharist Instagram page.

This coming Sunday, being the first Sunday of the month, I would normally enjoy having both David Baldwin and Tom Toby with me on the panel. I received an email from Tom’s wife, Ruba, though this morning, saying that Tom is still in Iraq and can’t join us. At time of writing, I’m looking for someone to take Tom’s place. Let me know if you think that person could be you. 😊

Come what may, we will go live this Sunday from noon at TheSundayEucharist.com or via Facebook , YouTube, Twitter, LinkedIn or Streamyard.Please join us.

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What’s On?

Friday to Sunday, August 30 to September 1^st – @Binacrombi. Join me
Sunday, Sept 1^st – Our Eucharist from midday via thesundayeucharist.com (or through Facebook , YouTube, Twitter, LinkedIn or Streamyard).
Tuesday, Sept 3^rd – Boxing at The Mundine Gym in Redfern from 7 pm

You’ll notice that the calendar above is looking pretty thin. That’s because I’m taking a week off between September 4 and 11. I’ll be spending some time with Joy, and also heading down to Melbourne for a few days to spend time with my darling daughter, Imogen, who will celebrate her birthday on September 10.

In truth, I need a break. If you didn’t hear what happened with the fight last weekend, it was the most spectacular and exhausting boxing experience I have ever had.

I travelled to the Gold Coast to fight Brad Glenn. I had no idea who I was dealing with. I couldn’t discover anything about him, except that he was 20 years younger and slightly heavier than me. I wondered if I was being set up again. I wondered indeed if this might be my last fight.

Brad Glenn turned out to be a lovely man but an inexperienced fighter. I stopped him (TKO) in the second round. I was then offered another fight against Steven Estaban – the same fighter who won a split-decision over me last December.

Estaban is a seasoned fighter with more than seventy pro fights behind him. He had never been beaten in Australia. He got ahead of me early in the fight. Before the last round, Grant, my cornerman, told me that if I could walk down the steps when I finished the fight, he would throw me down! In other words, I had to give it everything I had in those closing minutes. I did, and I knocked my opponent down in the last few seconds of the fight. That was enough to give me the win.

According to Grant, I’m now in the WBF World rankings! He says I’m rated #2 in Australia and Oceania as a Masters Middleweight. I don’t know what to think about that as I have never competed at middleweight (72.5 kg). What I am clear about though is that I’ve been offered for two more fights in November, and possibly three! Hopefully, by the Grace of God, they will come off and, hopefully, by the Grace of God, I will get paid for both bouts and, hopefully, this will make a big difference to the financial situation of both Binacrombi and me personally.

I did a more lengthy write-up of my fight experience on my article site (click here). I’m also including the short that I put together below. Please enjoy it and help it go viral by sharing it. If you want to watch the full fight, it’s at the bottom of the page.

Forgive me if I’ve raved on about my boxing too much today. I know full well that the real fight is the one that’s happening outside of the ring.

My passion and prayer for Palestine is undiminished, of course. Indeed, I’m hoping that if the boxing goes well, it may give me a stronger platform from which to speak about these greater issues. Even so, I am thankful for boxing, as I am thankful for all of you who support me financially and with your prayers.

May the Lord bless and strengthen you for the work to which you have been called.

Your brother in the Good Fight,