In February of 1913, the International Exhibition of Modern Art took place on Lexington Avenue in Manhattan. It would not be an exaggeration to say it rocked the intellectual world. Elsewhere J. Gresham Machen had been giving some serious thought to modernism (ideas which inspired and informed the works on display at the New York 69th Regiment Armory), culture and Christianity. The Princeton Theological Review published those thoughts in, as it happens, 1913. If you've never read them, you should do so. He is not commenting directly on the Exhibition, of course; he is observing the whole cultural environment and the modern indifference and hostility to piety.

Machen articulated what he understood to be the problem: "Our whole system of school and college education is so constituted as to keep religion and culture as far apart as possible and ignore the question of the relationship between them." He argued that Christianity might be subordinated to culture, it might destroy culture, or it might consecrate culture.

Despite all we can do, the desire to know and the love of beauty cannot be entirely stifled, and we cannot permanently regard these desires as evil.

And

The chief obstacle to the Christian religion today lies in the sphere of the intellect.

These are interesting conclusions to have drawn at that moment in man's history. These are not conclusions we have drawn, obviously. What American evangelicalism did was indeed to stifle any effort to create favorable conditions for the reception of Christianity. Instead it made "our theological seminaries merely centres of religious emotion".

Matt Olson recently reminded me of this tragedy. I do believe Dr. Olson has helped create a place where the desire to know and where the love of beauty can most certainly be stifled, and where these desires can be regarded as evil. The zip code is 54119.

But DocMatt, or whatever we should call the successor to DocO, is airing his mind on "Current Issues and Trends" here. There is a good amount of unintentional humor contained in his remarks, although I'm not sure Machen would be laughing. One line got a great laugh from his academic audience: he's talking about "no-point Calvinism". There's "no point talking about it".

There really is quite a bit in his talk that entertains. I won't go through the whole list now, but Dr. Olson is not a scholar, obviously. He is a politician, and apparently word has filtered back to him that support for his college is perhaps less solid than it might be. There are "issues" out there. "Issues" and "trends". And he means to deal with them and reassure us that his college is just the place to send the young and ill-informed.

I think one of the funniest lines was this: "When we begin to take our opinions and our lists and our conclusions and dogmatize them, I think we're in trouble." [mark: 27' 20"] I'm sorry, you just have to know the history of fundamentalism to appreciate the humor in that remark. He's a regular Jerry Seinfeld. Can any of us hear the voices of Norris, BJIII, R.V. and Jack Hyles as they echo down the sacred halls of separatism? When we begin to take our opinions and our lists and our conclusions and dogmatize them, I think we're in trouble.

But my point in making this comparison is not to amuse you. We are a gnat's whisker away from the centennial of Machen's warning; less than one academic generation away. Ask yourself how well we have surmounted the obstacle Machen described?

American fundagelicalism has told people they can be cool and hip and well-adjusted and wealthy and off drugs, that they can have great marriages and rewarding careers and more fun, celebrate wonderful Christmases and have rewarding friendships, intimacy with their god, a comfortable retirement and sexual satisfaction....

If someone were to come to your church office and ask what the relationship is between knowledge and piety, what would you tell him?

Would you tell him it's not an important question? Would you tell him it is an important question but you don't have an answer?  Would you tell him it is an important question but the answer is warmly disputed and therefore there's no point in talking about it? Would you tell him there is an answer but we dare not be dogmatic about it?

Would you make up an impromptu answer?

Would you tell him his question is not as important as having a barber's chair located between him and your baptistry?

_______________

I mention this chuckle-headed tragedy to put the problem into a context. A Christian has this irritating way of defining "his culture" as that subset of ideas he approves of, and what he disapproves of is someone else's culture. Soon his culture is limited to his denomination, then his local church, then his own home, and pretty soon the only culture he'll have to answer for is that culture represented on his side of the bed.

Some culture, hunh?

I don't believe we are going to solve this "culture" problem; that ship has sunk. But the next time you are warned about the significance or the consequences of some exciting new idea or promising innovation, remember how different J. Gresham Machen and Matt Olson are.