the air we breathe

It is easy to become frustrated with the bias against Christianity in our society.  

The bad stuff is magnified, while the good stuff is muted. In a society that champions fairness, it often seems unfair. In a society that advocates tolerance, it easily becomes intolerance.  

Into this dilemma steps Glen Scrivener, with The Air We Breathe.  The subtitle? How We All Came to Believe in Freedom, Kindness, Progress and Equality. 

It is bold, winsome—and readable.  Even a Tom Holland endorsement splashes its way across the top of the cover: ‘punchy, engaging, entertaining’.

He’s right.  It is.

The metaphor  

The point Scrivener is making is straightforward.  Values which we consider to be ‘universal, obvious and natural: the air we breathe’ (12)—so the stuff we take for granted—actually started with Jesus.  Scrivener takes us back to the world before Jesus, ‘the long night before Christmas’ (21), and demonstrates the difference Jesus made, ‘towering above civilization’ (23).

The values

He starts with a description of the core values which we believe in Western society (16-17). 

Equality: We believe in the equal moral status of every member of the human family, no matter their rank, race, religion, gender or sexuality.  

Compassion: We believe a society should be judged by the way it treats its weakest members.  

Consent: We believe that the powerful have no right to force themselves on others.  

Enlightenment: We believe in education for all and its power to transform a society.  

Science: We believe in science: its ability to help us understand the world and improve our lives.  

Freedom: We believe that persons are not property and that each of us should be in control of our own lives.  

Progress: We believe in moral improvement over time and that we should continue to reform society of its former evils.

Then he makes a case, chapter by chapter, for each one of these values having their origins in the Christ of Christianity.  Pretty bold, eh?!  And not exactly the perspective you’ll hear taught in university, or advocated in the media!  [NB: If you prefer to listen, rather than to read, here is a series of short videos which introduces his ideas—and he writes his own summary of the book in a magazine].

A Few Good Paragraphs

I enjoyed the structure of each chapter.  He starts with a person, or issue, in the contemporary world.  He weighs the arguments—then he rises to a crescendo at the end, often with a sparkling paragraph and a focus on Jesus.  

For example, in the chapter on Consent, Scrivener wraps his argument around the story of Rachel Denhollander and that serial sexual predator within USA Gymnastics, Larry Nassar.  

The very things that strike us as abusive—the power-plays, the inequality, the objectification, the clinical use of bodies and persons—were in fact presumed in the sexual morality of the (Roman) day.  It was business as usual.  Then came the sexual revolution …

… If the revolution of the 20th century said, ‘Women can be as free as men’, the Jesus revolution had said, ‘Men must be as restricted as women’.  Given the complete sexual dominance of men in the ancient world, the coup was as audacious as it was transformative (86, 87).

Scrivener takes us back to Paul’s letters and ‘the stunning idea of mutual consent brought into the bedroom’ (93).  For example, ‘the husband does not have authority over his own body but yields it to his wife.’ (1 Cor 7.4).  This may not sound so remarkable to our ears today, but when it was written and believed, it caused a revolution: ‘a radical shift in the understanding of sex, marriage, men, women, bodies and choice’ (94). 

Today we take such mutual consent and commitment for granted.  But we take it for granted now because it was so radical then.  In the ancient world, the gods were violent rapists, sexual agency was solely in the hands of powerful men, and sexual misbehaviour consisted in the violation of reputations, not of bodies or wills.  Into this world came the Christian revolution, where sex is painted on the canvas of divine romance and where two equals unite in a sacred and unbreakable bond (94).

In the court case, Denhollander focused peoples’ attention on one question: How much is a little girl worth?  As part of her testimony, she asserted how we cannot ‘call a line crooked unless we first have some idea of straight’.  Building on this testimony, Scrivener concludes the chapter with these words:

For abuse to be abuse we have to believe certain things: that bodies should be treated as temples; that sex is sacred; that children are valuable, and that the powerful should not exploit the weak but serve them.  These values constitute the straight line against which we judge Nassar’s actions as crooked.  But such values are by no means universal … They are Christian beliefs.  Larry Nassar is not excused of his evils by claiming some kind of Christianity; he is accused by it.  It is, very particularly, the goodness of Jesus that defines the evil of his abuse …

… Listen to your own heartfelt response when Denhollander asks, “What is a little girl worth?”  You do not answer that question scientifically or economically.  Nor do you answer it merely sociologically or psychologically.  The deepest and truest answer to that question is a spiritual one.  And when a guttural “Everything” rises up within you, that is your Christianity talking (100).

So, there is a taste of his approach for you.  He does something similar with each of the other six values.  It is well worth reading.  It took me back to Stage One Psychology at university where we managed to take a year to worship the human mind and how it works, but gave no thought to its creator or to why it works.  Even my little mind, way back then, was aghast.  Similarly, more recently, I was invited by a good friend to listen to a lecture on human dignity by a pre-eminent British academic.  Double aghast!  There was no thought, whatsoever, given to where dignity comes from.  How is that even possible?  On a similar note, Scrivener refers to the Declaration of Independence’s reference to ‘we hold these truths to be self-evident’ as being ‘faintly absurd’ (151):

To imagine that human rights and equality are “self-evident” is audacious to say the least. Self-evident truths are things like “all triangles have three sides” … They should be things you can’t not know.  But outside of a biblical foundation, no one in history—including the world’s greatest thinkers and moralists—have known about human rights.  No one has seen in humans an inherent dignity and value simply by virtue of their membership of the human race.  A survey of human civilizations reveals that the the only thing self-evident about human rights is that they are not self-evident (151-152).

As for ‘a few good paragraphs’, here are two more that reflect the book well… 

On Enlightenment and ‘finishing off the faith’ (104) of those medieval Dark Ages:

… Those who critiqued the ‘age of faith’ of the Middle Ages could not help but be shaped by that faith.  And, at the same time, those who trumpeted the value of reason found themselves being less than rational when it came to the church.  It is patently unreasonable to call the Middle Ages barren when they contain the glories of medieval cathedrals, the founding of universities, the establishment of parliaments, the poetry of Dante and Chaucer … All this was established by Christian thinkers for Christian reasons, yet Enlightenment sages saw only desert.  The failure of reason here ought to strike us powerfully.   Just ten minutes spent in the cathedral of York Minster (1452) should dispel the myth of a ‘dark ages’ and yet the myth persists (124-125).

On Science and its ‘conflict story’ with faith:

It doesn’t seem to matter how historically bogus are the claims of its story-tellers; neither does it seem to matter how Christian were the founders of modern science, how theological were the motivations, how apt their worldview proved in the investigation of nature, how invested the church has been in the scientific enterprise or how widespread faith is among contemporary scientists.  Ironically none of this evidence seems important.  What persists is a compelling story of light versus darkness/science versus religion. The idea will not die … 

… the conflict story turns out to be a religious myth, and when we examine the data, we cannot help but notice that science emerged in a Christian context for Christian reasons. Today, as science continues to advance, these convictions are not being vanquished; they are being vindicated.  The light of science is not driving out Christianity—the very opposite.  Christian convictions (whether acknowledged or not) have been holding the torch from the beginning (146, 147).

Hang On

Another helpful feature of the book are these “Hang On” sections, where the author anticipates the objections and speaks into them: What About the Crusades? (112f); What About the Spanish Inquisition? (115f); the Case of Galileo Galilei (140f); Isn’t Christianity Pro-Slavery? (155f); Isn’t Christian Influence Over in the West? (190f); and Was the Story of Jesus Fabricated? (214f).

These sections added a conversational dynamic to the book—and lifted its integrity.

George Floyd 

Scrivener lives in the contemporary world—and nowhere more so than when he asks why George Floyd’s death affected us so profoundly:

In a sense this whole book is an answer to the question.  Floyd’s death gripped us because our moral universe has been birthed out of similar pains.  It was an echo of what happened on a hill outside Jerusalem two millennia before: an unarmed victim of oppression; an uncaring authority; a public and humiliating death; and a world that came to see the virtue of the victim and the tyranny of the oppressor.  Even Floyd’s cry, “I can’t breathe”, could have been placed on Christ’s lips.  As author and tech entrepreneur Antonio Garcia Martinez has said, “The Western mind is like a tuning fork calibrated to one frequency: the Christ story.  Hit it with the right Christ figure, and it’ll just hum deafeningly in resonance” (188).

Nones, Dones and Won

Scrivener is clear about the people to whom he writes.  Like bookends, he opens with them and then returns to them at the end.  The Nones are ‘those with no religious affiliation’; the Dones are ‘those who feel they have moved on from Christianity’; and the Won are ‘those who are Christians already’ (221).  He closes with an exhortation to each group.

To the Nones: Don’t Leap (221-224) 

Rather, ‘find your feet’.  ‘If you say you have no faith, I’ll say, “I don’t believe you” … We are all believers already. We do not need to take a ‘leap of faith’ … What we really need is some ground beneath our feet … Jesus Christ has proved himself to be a foundation for billions. He is solid rock on which to stand.’

To the Dones: Don’t Leave (224-227)

Who doesn’t sympathize with this response?  The ‘bad stuff is magnified’, as I said at the beginning—and it needs to be!  However there is more going on.  There is a song and then there are the singers (John Dickson).  The singers can be terrible, but it is the song that holds us. “Open the Gospels and hear the song once again” (227).  Then find your way back to be among some ‘weird’ (see below) singers because “We can’t survive with the memory of a tune” (227).

To the Won: Be Weird (221-232)

WEIRD is an acronym with which Scrivener plays in the book.  I didn’t find that part so compelling and so I’ll leave you to read about it for yourself.  However, here he is banging on about what I’ve been banging on about in this blog for a decade (sorry—please forgive the self-referential comment!).  The obsession with relevance as the secret to effective mission is a mistake.  It pushes us towards minimising difference as the key—and that is foolish.  Sure, we don’t want to be a bad kind of weird, or to embrace total irrelevance.  That is not what I am saying.  It is the obsession which is the concern.  We need to find the profoundly intriguing beyond this shallow relevance.  Scrivener calls the church ‘to press into its distinctive strangeness’—and to be ‘properly weird’ (229). Salt and Light—again.  
The church has been potent precisely when it has been peculiar.  Anyone standing against the evils of their day—like gladiatorial games, or infanticide, or pederasty, or slavery—was crazy.  And they were all the more crazy for the preaching and theology that undergirded such campaigns.  Nevertheless they “let [their] light shine before others”, and the peculiar proved to be potent… 
… People would remark on how Christians were promiscuous with their charitable giving and stingy with their sex lives.  Their money was anyone’s but their bodies were not.  Such views defied the classifications of their day, and they defy ours too.  But they were difficult to pin down because they were not following a political programme.  They were not seeking to lean left or right but to follow a call from above: the call of Christ (229, 230).

Not only do I feel some Favourite First Peter thoughts coming on—2.11-12, for starters—Scrivener has equipped me to reflect better both the call to ‘prepare your minds for action’ (1.13) as well as the call to ‘always be prepared to give an answer to everyone who asks you to give the reason for the hope that you have (3.15).  Thank-you!

nice chatting

Paul

PS: BTW—the page number font is far too faint and small!

PPS: While I understand his reasons, it is a shame that the arguments are focused on Western society—because the world beyond “the West”, especially the Christian one, would have so many fascinating things to add to this conversation. 

Archive

Receive new posts to your inbox

I’d love to keep you updated with my latest news and posts.

We don’t spam! Read our privacy policy for more info.

About Me

paul06.16

the art of unpacking

After a childhood in India, a theological training in the USA and a pastoral ministry in Southland (New Zealand), I spent twenty years in theological education in New Zealand — first at Laidlaw College and then at Carey Baptist College, where I served as principal. In 2009 I began working with Langham Partnership and since 2013 I have been the Programme Director (Langham Preaching). Through it all I've cherished the experience of the 'gracious hand of God upon me' and I've relished the opportunity to 'unpack', or exegete, all that I encounter in my walk through life with Jesus.

Posted in

4 Comments

  1. Heather on April 12, 2023 at 11:34 am

    Now that sounds like an excellent book. It seems to be making a case I've tried to make to politically progressive atheists/agnostics a few times – but much better and bringing in things I certainly don't know. I have ordered a copy from the library, thank you 🙂

  2. the art of unpacking on April 16, 2023 at 4:07 am

    Yes, Heather, you will appreciate it.

    It is such a fresh perspective, and one you won't hear spoken about in the university or the media. Plus he doesn't descend into the nasty tone of the 'culture wars'…

    The should be given to every school-leaving Christian young adult :).

    Best wishes — enjoyed seeing you on the telly the other day :). 🙂

    Paul

  3. Steve Van Rooy on June 20, 2023 at 12:19 am

    Loved your review, Paul. Will get a copy.

    Steve Van Rooy

  4. the art of unpacking on June 20, 2023 at 6:39 am

    Best wishes, Steve — enjoy the book

Leave a Comment





This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Recent Posts

true, but not true enough

February 5, 2025

“What is a Christian?” A ‘follower of Jesus’ is the standard response. And it is true, but it is not true enough. Let’s think about this for a minute. So I have this encounter with Jesus. Maybe at a camp of some kind. In the singing and the speaking he becomes so real. It is…

yay! it’s you

January 27, 2025

We had been on holiday in Queenstown. Barby had to come back early to go to work. I stayed on for a couple more days with our daughter, Alyssa, and her family. When I did fly back, Barby had the car and so the easiest thing for me was to get an Uber home—and so…

expect an exception

January 24, 2025

I know I’ve mentioned this one before, but I am not really a flag-in-church kinda guy. All those years ago, as a student in the USA, it was a shock to see the flag up there in the same neighbourhood as the pulpit, the Lord’s Table and the baptistry. “What is going on?” “Have I…

transforming friendship

January 15, 2025

Just when I thought that it could not be possible to have another first-hand account of the impact of John Stott’s life (d. 2011), along comes this book by his close friend, John Wyatt. I am always ready to learn more about John Stott, but also about friendship. It fascinates me. It keeps coming up…

handa leads the way

December 29, 2024

Reading stories to grandchildren over Christmas reminded me again of how powerful they can be. They are so compact and simple in presentation, and yet so clever in construction. There are just so many features at work in an effective story. It is some years since I taught narrative preaching, but when I did I’d…

elchristo, elmina—and beyond

December 19, 2024

Today is Day 56—and on Day 57 we board a flight for home. There has been so much to absorb as Barby and I have encountered the people of God in different places. el-christo, in bolivia A few days before we left NZ, I discovered that I had five sessions to give in Pakistan. Yikes.…

cadeca art

November 20, 2024

The little chapel at Cadeca Casa del Catequista, a retreat centre on the fringes of Cochabamba (Bolivia), caught my eye on an earlier visit in 2017. Lots of photos… I was thrilled to learn that there would be a return visit, this time with Barby—and with lots of video. Enjoy. A 360 view Some Old…

the emus

October 19, 2024

Apart from the eight years in which we were based overseas, Barby has been working at the Refugee Resettlement Center in Auckland since 2002. This year she is a ‘release teacher’, spending one day each week in three different classrooms, with three different age groups. Impressive—and demanding. One day is spent with 11-13 year olds—from…