Becoming Whole and Holy – Brown, et. al.

Becoming Whole and Holy – by Jeannine Brown, Wyndy Corbin Reuschling and Carla Dahl

Summary of the Main Thesis:

In this book, the three authors present an integrative discussion of issues surrounding Christian spiritual formation. They maintain that the central question animating their work is “What does it mean to be human” (page 10). They are quick to say that the title of the book implies the answer: “being fully human means becoming whole and holy” (page 10). Their discussion of what it means to become whole and holy takes the form of individual offerings from their representative disciplines of Social Science, Biblical Hermeneutics, and Christian Ethics, followed by “reception and integration” of these offerings in a series of individual responses by each of the other authors. In utilizing this format they directly show rather than just tell how to address the fragmentation that dominates much of our world.

In offering these perspectives from their various disciplines, each of the authors arrive at certain centralizing themes that contributed to their collective conclusion of what it means to “become whole and holy.” In essence, they concluded that fundamental to being human is the fact that humanity is “on a journey of becoming or change” (page 152). The nature of what we should become is centered on our being created in God’s image. God in being Trinitarian in nature is holy. In being like God (while still recognizing that we are qualitatively different than God), we should be holy. However, in order to move to this place of holiness, we must respond to the initiating and inviting work of God in our life to become personally complete and undivided in terms of who we are and what we do. Wholeness entails being “oriented toward healthy relationship with God and others” (page 153).

Analysis:

Each of the authors places a heavy emphasis on the significance of viewing our being and becoming fully human as a process. They highlight the importance of anchoring our lives as Christians in the story of scripture which begins with our being created in God’s image (pages 40, 76, 113, 145 and others). Carla Dahl begins the discussion by exploring the question of how we change. She indicates that people change in both incremental and instantaneous ways, and the most helpful metaphors for gaining a better understanding of this process are not linear but more spiraling (pages 16 – 18). She states that formation includes “God’s work in us, and…our capacity for orienting ourselves toward God…” (page 38). The process happens in multiple dimensions of our lives, contains both significant events and more drawn out processes, and includes a variety of different invitations to enter into the process (pages 38 – 39).

Both Jeanine Brown and Wyndy Corbin Reuschling respond to Dahl’s discussion of the process of formation in a variety of ways. I agree with Brown that it is important to paint a picture that is “complex enough to account for the ambiguities and realities” of what we find when we examine the issues in the formation process. Brown also highlights the fact that creation has an element of incompleteness associated with it that we see rooted in our finitude, and which “sets humanity on a trajectory of growth and formation” (page 67). Corbin Reuschling adds that in this process, it “does not just matter that we become and what we become; it matters how and why we become” (page 59).

Each of the authors also emphasizes the communal nature of formation and the necessity of viewing formation from a relational perspective. In fact, the integrative approach that they take to collectively explore the topic of Christian spiritual formation illustrates the value that they place on relationships, and the importance of welcoming the “other”…“to listen more closely…and look for connections more deeply” (page 172). This approach stands in stark contrast to the picture that they present of fundamentalism as a process that results in “intensity, rigidity, and a lack of emotional safety”…, and which is a process “characterized by anxiety, defensiveness, and exclusion” where “the worldview takes precedence over the relationship” (pages 26 and 57).

Another helpful general theme that the authors use to anchor much of their arguments about what being whole and holy means centers on the issues surrounding humanity’s creation as Imago Dei. Corbin Reuschling maintains that righteous relationality, which is at the center of the task of imaging God, grows out of a Trinitarian perspective. From that perspective we gain a view of what being in right relationships that maintain appropriate separation in the midst of interdependence should look like (pages 117-119).

The authors also have a communal vision of holiness anchored in the covenant relationship established in the story of scripture and exemplified in God’s love and loyalty. As Brown states, “Perhaps God’s Trinitarian self as supremely stable, and God’s love for humanity…provide the anchor for human being and becoming…[and] might provide a more-than-adequate mooring for human identity” (page 150).

Strengths and Weaknesses:

In my opinion, the authors introduce several themes that are helpful for healthy Christian development. In particular, I think their discussion of the place and importance of practicing virtues in the individual and collective lives of Christian communities is very important. I believe that Corbin Reuschling’s contention that virtues “provide the bridge between who we are and the more whole and holy person we can become” stands as a particularly important point. Likewise, the authors develop the significant argument that we need to be concerned with the communities in which we live because of the multitude of ways that they affect us. In doing so, we should pay much closer attention to both the means and ends involved in living into the Christian story (page 61).

In addition, each of the authors, in one way or another, focuses on generosity or hospitality as a contributor to justice, and as a marker for wholeness and holiness in community as we approach the various “others” in a variety of contexts. I think that their presentation of these two virtues contributes in a particularly helpful way to “concretizing the vision of shalom,” while providing beneficial directions for moving toward holy living (pages 61 and 134).

I also believe that Dahl’s statements regarding “prayerful listening” are particularly helpful for approaching the “other” and “hearing the other into speech” (page 159). Dahl’s statements also correspond well with the reminder given by Brown that “true knowing comes to those who have taken the prior ethical stance of love” (page 103). In the midst of this “hearing,” determining the loving thing to do can be a complex enterprise (page 100). This necessary discernment occurs in the context of the tension that our communities feel between “the already and the not yet” of “God’s reclamation of creation” (page 81).

Though I probably could not be more appreciative of this book, I think that there are two themes or issues that the book raises that I wish were developed more fully. One of those is the theme of mission. Brown makes the important point that “Israel was not to pursue purity for purity’s sake” (page 90). She references Isaiah’s statement that Israel as God’s servant was to be a light to the Gentiles and that this “fits well with God’s missional purposes for Israel in Genesis and Exodus” (page 91). I wish that she (or one of the other authors) had developed exactly how Israel was supposed to bless the nations (outside of the eschatological context of Jesus), and commented upon what exactly they were to show by being a light to the nations (for example – how did the “nearness” Brown referenced in Deuteronomy relate to mission, and what was supposed to happen to the nations from observing this “nearness” in Israel, – [page 91]. I think Dahl’s response to Corbin Reuschling may have begun to approach this subject when she said “We serve and introduce others to the God we imagine” as she describes “symbolic interactionism” – page 144).

Another issue that I wished one of the authors had probed into more deeply is related to the statement that “the Trinity in perfection – the one who does not change – [offers] a stable referent for human becoming” (page 149). I wish that one of the authors had probed somewhat more deeply into how this actually works in terms of God’s interaction with humanity within time. In addition, I wish they had delved into exactly what is meant by the word “stable” (again, I think that Brown may have begun to approach an answer relative to this subject when she asked a series of questions about the historical discontinuity between the differing approaches of theology and ethics to the theological significance of Jesus’ humanity within the subject of the Trinity – pages 147 – 148).