Saving Paradise: How Christianity Traded Love of This World for Crucifixion and Empire

What if we could reconstruct Christianity from the ground up, preserving the love, community, and commitment to social justice (the things Progressives like), and discarding the elements that justify war, greed, hatred, and the despoliation of the environment?What if we found that Christianity had been like our reconstruction during its first centuries?This intriguing book explores the roots of Christianity through some of its earliest writers and posits that, as the subtitle indicates, the religion began with a thorough love of the paradise that is this world but redefined itself when it became a servant of political power in Charlemagne's time. This redefinition coincides with a shift in Christian art to a focus on the crucifixion in all its gory detail and a shift in rhetoric toward a justification of violence against heretics and unbelievers.The book introduces us to a remarkable array of theologians over the past two millennia, and many readers will no doubt want to learn more about Macrina, Cyril of Jerusalem, Heloise, and other thinkers whose writings have kept alive the vision of paradise in the here and now. I would have liked the book to have a bibliography so that I could more easily add to my reading list.Their concept of paradise in the here and now is intriguing: "Paradise is human life restored to its divinely infused dignity and capacity, and it is a place of struggle with evil and injustice, requiring the development of wisdom, love, nonviolence, and responsible uses of power." Accordingly, what Christians should aspire to is something that they call "ethical grace". "Ethical grace is full-bodied life in the present - attuned to what is beautiful and good and responsive to the legacies of injustice and currents of harm."This book will be of particular interest to Progressives with a Christian, social-gospel background. It may even bring lapsed Christians back to the fold. The authors' vision of Christianity harmonizes with the Progressive goals of peace, social justice, and environmental sanity. Indeed, the authors seem to be Progressives who happen to be Christian rather than Christians whose faith has led them to Progressive values.How important is Jesus to this concept of "ethical grace"? Can people from other religions or even, shudder, non-theistic backgrounds arrive at the same vision? I think so, though the authors may beg to differ. It is an interesting question.

This is one of the few books I've purchased since I became an Amazon Vine reviewer, and my commitment to that program explains why I have not prioritized reading it. But as a matter of fact, I didn't select it as something I'd read cover-to-cover, but as an opportunity for ongoing reflection and study.I have been concerned for many years at the increasing obsession in Christian theology with the crucifixion of Christ and the concept of heaven as an afterlife, despite the many statements in the gospels in which Jesus insists that the realm of God is here and present. This book is a magnificent verification that this second focus is the true reality of "Immanuel" - God with Us - as the primary teaching of Christianity. It was sustained for the first 10 centuries of Christian belief, and as the authors insist, the ongoing presence of God's Spirit culminating in Christ and continuing in this world is essential idea.This book was brought to my attention by my favorite author, Kittredge Cherry, in her "Jesus in Love" blog a few weeks ago. Since I know her theology to be totally congruent with my own, I was completely certain that I would find this book an absolute gem, and I am certainly not disappointed. The authors' use of both art from ancient churches and appropriate scripture quotations adds beauty and power to the narrative.

"Saving Paradise" is a remarkable book and reading it has both deepened and changed my theological and religious perspective. I don't think I will ever look at Christianity in the same way again. Over and over I found myself saying: "so that's what that means." Things that troubled me are now better understood (the authors make clear that in man cases I was right to be troubled!) and thing that I never thought much about now trouble me! I couldn't begin to summarize a book that covers the history, art, and theology of the church; the religious, economic,and political forces Christianity has confronted in 2,000 years; and the reason why the faith needs to save paradise today. More than a history, not a work of abstract theology, it provides a feminist perspective without ever becoming just propaganda for that perspective. "Saving paradise is a call to return to the paradise God created for all of us in this world. All I think I can do is quote the final paragraph of the last chapter: Entering paradise in this life is not an individual achievement but is the gift of communities that train perception and teach ethical grace. Paradise provides deep reservoirs for resistance and joy. It calls us to embrace life's aching tragedies and persistent beauties, to labor for justice and peace, to honor one another's dignity, and to root our lives in the soil of this great and difficult earth."

It's a wonderful book, and it may well change your emphases if you are a Christian. The early Christians were very life-affirming--even though they were treated horribly because Christianity was seen as a bizarre cult. With respectability, however, the Christian message became distorted, and with that distortion came the Crusades and so much misery that changed Christian symbols from life-affirming images and the dove to death and the crucifix. The authors trace these developments and the intrusion (and infusion) of politics and power into Christianity through a historical survey of religious art.This is not a book for a pew-warmer. But if you are serious about studying the Christian faith, it's a wondrous resource. However, I'll caution you again: it will change your emphases. I have not, since reading this book, been able to recite the Nicene Creed, for example. I know it by heart, but I also understand its political origins now. Nor have I had the same enthusiasm I once had for stigmata; I'm not sure what the phenomenon means, but I'm fairly certain that it does not mean what I once took it to mean.

If the truth sets you free, this book is an exercise in release. Exposing our preoccupations with atonement rather than creative purpose, restored through God's self-giving, this book uses an evidence-based approach to challenge and expose our theological inadequacies. The authors lead us to dwell upon God whose goodness knows no bounds and who invites us to reconsider our relationship based on love rather than fear. They expose the impetus that has led the church to hunger after power rather than wisdom and they offer a radical way forward for those who can respond to the invitation that God offers. It is the best bit of original theology I have ever read.

This book is long overdue and radically changes the way we understand our faith.

Looks radical but really isn't. Al lot seems to be based on some assumed premisses which I'm not sure are true, or are only partially true.