CHRISTIANITY: THE ART OF DYING?

There’s a new book floating around called "The Book of Dead Philosophers" by Prof. Simon Critchley. It’s a cheeky retrospective of what 200 of the most famous philosophers and theologians think about death and ultimate meaning, from the Ancient Greeks to the Post-Moderns. Included in the mix is St Paul, St Augustine, and St Anthony.

This book is extremely provocative for Christians. It firstly charges that Christianity is essentially death-oriented, and then it takes an accusatory swipe at Christians for ignoring their vocation to ‘die while living.’ Here’s the passage that initially struck me (from Critchley’s entry on St Paul):

"What dies on the cross is not just Jesus, the God-Man, but our former sinful death-bound existence. Through the identification with the passion of the Christ Christians die to their selves in order to be born to eternal life. Thus to put the central paradox of Christianity at its most stark, Jesus puts death to death and in dying to for our sins we are reborn into life. To be a Christian then is to think of nothing else but death, for it is only through meditation on morality that the path to salvation may be sought." (The Book of dead Philosophers, p.70)

This is hardline, yet Orthodox Christian theology. It is put bluntly, but since Critchley’s book is centred on death, his hyperbole is understandable. But in terms of emphasis, Critchley has it all backwards. He’s looking at the glass being half empty, whereas I think it is more fruitful to look at it optimistically, emphasizing not so much the death part as the rebirth into life. In the words of Jesus;

"As the Father has loved me, so I have loved you; abide in my love. If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father's commandments and abide in his love. I have said these things to you so that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be complete. This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you." (Jn 16)

This to me is the best rejoinder to the death-centric charge of Critchley. Jesus comes not to morbidly focus our hearts on death, but to bring us to a richer, fuller, deeper life in God--and that God's life may be in us.

But its where Critchley goes with this that bugs me, taking a swipe at that infamous straw man, the nameless mass of ‘hypocrite Christians’;

"Christianity is about nothing other than getting ready to die. It is a rigorous training for death, a kind of death in life that places little value on longevity. Christianity is a way of becoming reconciled to the brevity of human life and giving up the desire for worldly goods, wealth and power. Nothing is more inimical to most people who call themselves Christian than true Christianity. This is because they are actually leading quietly desperate atheist lives bound by a desire for longevity and a terror of annihilation." (The Book of Dead Philosophers p.248)

Thankfully we have non-religious super-Christians like Critchley to chastise us back to a Kierkegaardian purity. How he so intimately knows (never mind diagnose) the collective Christian soul is beyond me. However I would temper this gross generalization with a grain of generosity; it is better to be on the right path—though at an early stage of the journey—than to be lost in the woods altogether.