A few thoughts on the book so far:
- The first essay makes a convincing point. I’m one of those who believes that Christianity will never be able to dominate a culture. I also believe that nations can’t be Christian. I have little quarrel with anything Hunter says in this first essay.
- What Hunter says about ressentiment in the second essay really rings true with me. I can see it in myself. I am so sick of the Christian Right and their unChristian tactics that I find myself naturally gravitating to the other views as a reaction. I’m not around a lot of people who push the views of the Christian Left, so that may be part of it. But even as I try to escape from politics, I find myself continually correcting mistruths and misconstructions, while trying to find the right attitudes that we all should have in such discussions.
- As I’ve said before, I think Hunter works too hard at including the neo-Anabaptists in his critiques. Since his final views would be described as neo-Anabaptist by many, Hunter has a hard time separating his arguments from their views. Much of it ends up being semantic, like his discussion of power.
The third essay is excellent, and we’ll begin analyzing it tomorrow.
Three months later I finally was able to get it from the library. I have only gotten to the end of the second essay, and I agree that his analysis is fantastic.
Re: the neo-Anabaptists. I can understand your concern, but what I got from it was that he was not critiquing the substance of the argument as much as the obsessive focus on power. My wife described it in terms of the people who are so antagonistic toward the observance of Christmas that they are essentially observing Christmas as a “non-holiday” holiday.
I can appreciate Hunter’s sentiment– if you’re against a system, but seem to be consumed in your antagonism toward the system, it shows as much a focus on the system as those who are part of the system. A better middle ground would be to sustain a skepticism toward power and its structures while not obsessing over it.