Part 3 Post Modernism.

If we were to consider a mission trip, one of the first things we would do would be to investigate and try to understand the culture, so as to evaluate how we must talk and act in order for our message to be received. It’s not trickery, its realism. Paul understood this when he said, “I have become all things to all men…for the sake of the gospel”. And so, as it did with the modern age, the church's task is to sort through each new group of ideas to determine what to oppose, what to embrace and what to modify. It is I think a Holy Spirit directed task, where we must be willing to be convicted and change, or stand firm and take the consequences. It is not solely about changing with the times (although in some matters I think change would be welcome). It is not about dressing up the old to make it look like something it is not. Rather we seek to understand the culture, to respect it and respond to it, to communicate meaningfully with its people with the intention that some will inquire about those things we believe.

So let’s look at the way post-moderns think, and then we can consider what changes a church which wants to influence a post-modern culture might make.

In the 1970’s, French philosophers began to question the claims of modernism that science, reason, etc. would emancipate the world from poverty, ignorance, insecurity and violence. Two world wars, Nazism and Stalinism, racism, 3rd world poverty, the threat of nuclear war and other such events suggested that the enlightenment was not imminent. The premises of modernism had proven to be false. Its grand ideologies were not proving to be true. Some had been, and were, perhaps dangerous. An analysis of western culture indicated that it was moving beyond modernism and new thinking related to or even underlay culture. Subesquently the movement from modernism was named post-modernism (pomo).

Pomo has proven to be difficult to define and is usually understood by contrasting its principles to those of modernism in various areas.

Modernism elevated the human thinking self to the centre of reality, seeing the world as a machine whose laws and workings could be discerned and mastered for the benefit of the world. Postmodernism holds that there are no universal truths “There is nothing behind the text” is the post modern response to truth claims, ie. that claims of truth are no more than one interpretation of events among many. Reality is fragmented and plural. Post moderns see society transitioning to a new order where there is a respect for diversity, flexibility, mobility, decentralization. Truth is found in ideas that work for certain groups at certain times and thus “truth” is a shifting concept. What works at one time may not work for a different group at a different time. It is said that post-modernity “does not seek to substitute one truth for another, one life ideal for another … It braces itself for a life without truths, standards and ideals”.

Furthermore, post modernists suspect theories and the all-encompassing universal stories (meta-narratives) which were meant to explain life. They have proved to be meaningless. Rather post-modern people celebrate the local and particular at the expense of the universal. Diverse perspectives are welcomed and difference is celebrated.
Pomo doubts there are clear organizing principles to life. It avoids systems, categories, conclusions and closure and sees itself as unbounded, and concerned with process and "becoming". There is acceptance that there is complexity, contradiction, diversity, ambiguity and interconnectedness. No longer is there a need or a belief that all things can be explained logically or fit into a system. At its worst postmodernism is “nihilistic”, holding that all values are baseless, nothing is knowable and that life is meaningless, though some post-moderns think that a revision of modern notions with new ideas of social thought, science and religion (including pre-modern notions of divinely wrought reality, cosmic meaning, an enchanted nature, non-sensory perception, ancient truth), will still give rise to a “new age”. Overall, post-moderns are more open to the supernatural, mystery and the unexplained than were modernists.

Knowledge is not good and certain as claimed by modernists. Rather it is a means to control and deny power to those without the knowledge. "Power is knowledge" said philosopher Michel Foucault. Post moderns are suspicious of institutions and leadership. Claims to knowledge are meant to serve the powerful, and so post-moderns are becoming less engaged with such things as politics, the goals of institutions. At the same time there is a rejection of radical individualism in favor of a more communitarian understanding of existence. Uniformity is however rejected and difference celebrated. Pomo leadership models respect diversity and seek the help of the community in decision-making.

So there it is. A mixed bag, and presently combined with modernist and even some pre-modern thinking. And if you have concluded that the church is thoroughly modern, then the challenge for the church is obvious. Can it adjust, and if so what changes might be called for? What changes are acceptable? In particular if post-moderns deny that there is “truth”, how shall the church respond?


* None of the above is original thinking by me. I have stolen ideas shamelessly from the internet and condensed them in order to provide an overview for my purposes. In particular however I want to credit Stanley Grenz talks about modernism and postmodernism @ http://www.sonlifeafrica.com/model/pomo2.htm