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Can
any centre hold?
In
his early twentieth century post war poem, “The Second Coming,”
W.B. Yeats articulates a mood of uncertainty about the future
of humanity: Turning and turning in the widening
gyre Forty years later, especially in
response to the violent oppressions of totalitarian regimes, many
people in a variety of disciplines proposed the end of any “centre”
that expressed an over-arching ideal or story. The end of meta-narratives
is now deemed necessary for human dignity, freedom and imagination.
No single narrative can articulate the “centre” of human existence
and dignity. The assumption of being able to locate a centre was
pursued by modernity in various guises, deploying potent tools
of technological progress to secure a centred focus for human
society. Once such a focus is identified by a particular regime,
it is seemingly necessary to bend all attitudes and resources
toward that “centre.” This also introduces the possibly of suppressing,
either tacitly or violently, any dissenting perspective. Christian faith is committed to a narrative
that is otherwise than any political, religious or cultural meta-narrative
in assertion of a “centre” that can hold but which invariably
does not. v Without
a centre, there can be no privileged position in relation to a
centre; otherness is as privileged as any presumed centre and
our proximity to it. This may seem plausible, but can any such
thesis be sustained? In neutralizing every centre, no brick is
left standing above another; if every narrative can be levelled
to rubble, theoretically, no one can dominate anyone else. Yet
if all otherness is to be tolerated as equally legitimate, every
other becomes no other; “otherness” is scuttled by an implicit
meta-narrative of selected political foci and legislation toward
a surreptitious end. Within contemporary assertions of neutrality
and tolerance, the resurgence of interest in religion—expressed
by a flush of diverse spiritualities—seems natural after concerted
rational attempts to suppress superstitious anomalies of self-projection
within modern life. Various approaches to neutralizing any centre
are apparently, running to script: all narratives are to be tolerated,
even mythical ones; no narrative can be elevated above another;
religious truth claims cancel each other anyway. Yet neutralizing
scenarios are not running to script: perennial anxieties feed
meta-narratives, while presumed tolerance of any narrative devolves
into ethical nonsense. First, meta-narratives refuse to disappear
as mortal anxiety is offset by tribal or partisan strategies in
assertion of a centre in consolidation of “a place under the sun.”
Contrary to intention, the neutralization of any centre has a
bias toward intensely contractual society in seeking to prevent
the potential eruption of conflict between relative but intensely
partisan values. An assertion of tolerance for all narratives
can only be sustained within highly legislated conditions, ultimately
locating any promise of human dignity within law and the threat
of its enforcement! New Testament testimony has already exposed
the fallacies of seeking to underpin righteousness and human dignity
through law. Second, if people yearn for some form of meta-narrative,
then any religion offers a comprehensive narrative with clear
values and focused identity. The intention to neutralize every
centre is at odds with its primary virtue of tolerance when confronted
with the dilemma of repressive or violent expressions of religion.
Not every expression of “otherness” can be tolerated, as is presumed
in the theoretical idealism of tolerance, which self-righteously
asserts that “otherness” trumps any meta-narrative. Neutralizing agendas might promise to eliminate oppression and violence by establishing
mutual tolerance, yet such agendas are unable to provide the leverage
to do this without also legislating contractual sociality and
invariably, exhibiting snide imperiousness toward any choice—even
an honourable one—in which one possibility is distinguished from
all others. Within any society, collective choices need to be made and inevitably,
these will be prejudiced in sentiment and resources against other
choices. Democracy facilitates our preference for select values
along with their motivating narratives and not others. This is
an affirmation of human dignity in the equality of all—which has
Christian roots, even if this dignity now receives largely secular
endorsement. Democracy contests any assumption that a particular
“knowledge” of society or ideal about humanity is more significant
than recognising the equal dignity of all persons, ignorant and
intellectual. Even so, democracy can be held to ransom by sectional
interests that scuttle the majority will of equals. v A
perennial dilemma exists within the quest for some form of centre
that represents common if not universal ideals, so as to adjudicate
on crucial choices amid diverse but often unruly natural vitalities
of life. In resistance to the centring effect of social structures,
assertions of relativity threaten to slide into nihilism. Racial,
religious, political and cultural tribal foci are asserted in
the face of nihilism. (Niebuhr) Here, Niebuhr identifies two enduring
realities of human life—transcending nature and being immersed
in nature. How is the human need for a centre that transcends
the diffuse vitality of nature finally to be met? How is human
diversity amid natural vitality affirmed? How are the menacing
hazards that are present within assertions of either idealism
or relativity to be averted? Potential for destructive conflict
are reflected in both. How can Christology speak to human freedom,
recognising that human life is immersed in diverse expressions
of natural vitality, while also yearning for a centre that is
not potentially totalitarian as imperiously idealist or fiercely
tribal as reactionary? For a Christian, there
is no centre—I am crucified
with Christ. This is neither meta-narrative with its totalitarian
potential nor relativity in which no narrative is more significant
than another, however banal or marginal the narrative. Adulation
for centred human life, social and personal, is contested by Christian
testimony to a radically different sense of personhood received
as a gift and affirmed by life in deference to another—a
christological reality. The Christian paradox of being crucified with
Christ and receiving our life as a gift from God can centre our
lives otherwise than any centre. This paradox overcomes the conflict
between identity and otherness within which, every centring attempt
seeks to overcome existential insecurity generated by mortal anxiety.
This anxiety is never able to extricate itself from partisan and
tribal assertions of identity through particular ideals; personal
anxieties over security in quest of a place under the sun are
outsourced to tribal identities, even as inane lip-service can
be given to embracing otherness—inane, for otherness that is assimilated,
even implicitly, cannot be genuine and invariably confronting
otherness! The gospel offers an imperative to generosity, even
for an enemy, from a counter-intuitive centre. Christological reality
summons our intelligence and generosity in the midst of humanity,
with imperatives to enhance the dignity of each in service offered
to all without distinction or deference to a presumed “centre,”
yet with patience for imperfect but necessary social forms or
structures by which we can meet basic human needs and aspirations.
The character of christological reality is known by vulnerability
and potential loss, not by assimilation and potential oppression.
Biblical testimony to the phenomenon that no centre does or can
hold is a crisis prefacing our only possible centre—it is no longer I who live, but
Christ who lives in me. Reference:
Niebuhr The Nature and Destiny of Man I |
