After Modernity… What?! Part 2: Are We Really Postmodern – Or Are We Ultramodern?

This is the second installment in a five-part essay series. It may not make much sense out of context. To view the previous installment, click here.

ODEN’S PROPHECY: STILL UNFULFILLED?

One of the most stunning things about Oden’s book is how timely it still seems. Overall, little has changed in the world of theology. Of course, new movements have come and gone, and there have been some positive changes – an increasing evangelical intellectual presence, for instance. But generally, things are either the same or worse.

Perhaps the saddest part in Oden’s book comes when he looks to the youth, whom he thinks are beginning to rebel against modernism’s false promises. “They are gaining fresh courage” he says. “It is first of all the courage to say no… Increasing numbers of young people are no longer willing to buy into the assumption that modernity holds a legitimate moral authority over Christian conscience, Christian language, Christian child-care” (35).

This wonderful prophecy, of a youth uprising for the sake of traditional Christian thought and language, does not seem to have come to pass. Of course, some small sector of youth has rebelled against modernism – and sometimes a remnant is all Oden seems to suggest – but they have not yet grown into a larger movement.

A loss of faith in modernity has indeed occurred, but orthodox Christian faith has not replaced it. Instead, I fear, we are diving headfirst into the very “ultramodernity” which Oden so diligently tried to distinguish from the “postmodernism” he advocated.

ULTRAMODERNITY – WHAT IS IT?

Oden leaves an introductory note in the second (1989) edition of his book lamenting that “the term postmodern has been pounced upon and taken captive by the followers of certain Continental writers (Lyotard, Theofilakis, Foucault, Derrida, contra Habermas)” (11). This kind of postmodernity is what Oden refers to as ultramodernity, which he clearly contrasts with his own vision.

By “postmodernity” Oden instead means a theology that can legitimately be seen as coming after modernity. He means a movement beyond the modern and back to the ancients; and advocates not simply a return to ancient orthodoxy (as though we could simply drop back into the ancient world, no problem!), but rather a return through modernity – a return which carries with it the insights, the lessons, and awareness of the troubles of modernity, bringing them back to the ancient sources.

This is not a radical return in the sense of eschewing history to return to the root; it is instead a return that cultivates and honors all twenty centuries of Christian tradition. Yet it also understands that constant compromise has caused a devolution of Christian thought in the last 300 years – something that can only be remedied by a return to the ancient forebears of the faith.

Today, then, we might think of Oden as a “right” or “conservative” postmodern, along the lines of Hans-Georg Gadamer or Alasdair MacIntyre. He desires a reverent, yet critical, conversation with the Christian heritage – a discourse guided by a deep determination to salvage the faith by ancient and ecumenical means. (For the record, a more conservative postmodern hermeneutic does not here entail a more conservative or right-wing politics. This is clear in both the case of Gadamer and MacIntyre.)

This is what Oden means to signify when he replaces “the postmodern” with the term “postcritical.” To be postcritical is to reject the negative relationship to the past that has characterized modernity, and to enter into an affirmative relationship with the tradition that precedes us.

It is to affirm our location, our where and when; to respect the majesty of the mountains one dwells on, and neither curse them nor look – foolishly, longingly – at the sweet open sea, for utopias elsewhere.

It is to affirm just as much those things that we do not choose – our family, hometown, nation, heritage, and the great Christian tradition, to which the Holy Spirit brings us – as it is to affirm those things we do choose.

But this is anathema to modernity: “The key to modernity is the notion of choice – choosing oneself, and choosing for oneself over against all traditional ways. The key to hairesis (root word for heresy) is the notion of choice – choosing for oneself, over against the apostolic tradition” (74).

It is anathema to modernity, for fundamental to modernity’s outlook is the solitary, abstract individual, freed from the shackles of tradition, who may use unfettered reason, free thought and free choice to act in whatever way they see fit. In this view religion, family, community, etc. may add meaning to our lives, but they are not fundamental to our person. They do not grant us dignity. Rather our freedom, the rights which secure that freedom, and the reason which guides free choice – this is what makes us human, is what gives us dignity. This is what elevates us and makes us human (here the word is always said with emotive emphasis). And this truth, for the modern, is just self-evident.[1]

It is anathema to today’s postmoderns as well, whose chastened understanding of our emplacement receives society’s networks and hierarchies and pre-set meanings wholly negatively, hoping to subvert them from within for the sake of liberation, creativity, and the endless play of possibilities. This attitude is fundamental to the postmoderns (or ultramoderns). For them, choice is paramount; for them, heresy is freedom.

Oden spends most of his book critiquing this arrogant dismissal of the past, this “modern chauvinism,” and our endless celebration of choice. (Implicitly, this critique could extend to contemporary postmodernity, which couples an increased awareness of the power of the past with an open hostility towards its continued influence. I noted this in the prior paragraph.)

In broad and sweeping – yet fairly accurate – criticisms, he takes the modern enterprise to task for its attack upon family, community, and religious faith, and he takes on (in the 1989 edition especially) the naturalistic presumptions behind contemporary “Biblical criticism.” He also distinguishes his enterprise from those of fundamentalism and neo-orthodoxy.

ODEN’S CALL: BECOME (REALLY) POSTMODERN!

Finally, he tries to set a broad agenda for theology (the original title of the first edition, and the subtitle of the second) by naming those fundamental influences, those connections, which theology must again recognize, utilize, and even learn to love. He says this with great expectation, as though calling a cavalry forward that has only been waiting, ready in the ranks, for his clarion call to march forward.

And yet – no march happened. Oden’s call caught the attention of friend and foe alike, and inspired many a seminarian, but it did not create any great change in the mind of the mainline churches. It influenced evangelicals more, by encouraging many of them to return to patristic sources for inspiration. But it did not create any deeper, lasting change in the church at large.

The problems Oden named forty years ago remain, and have largely gotten worse. A negative attitude towards the past, a reductionist and relativist attitude towards faith, and an absolute affirmation of choice as the prime good – all of this has not just remained in the intervening years; it has intensified. Did Oden’s agenda then fail? What, in the end, are we to make of his agenda for theology forty years after its first publication?

How would you answer this question? What do you think of the effects of “ultramodernity” (i.e., postmodernity) on the church today? Let me know in the comments below. And look for part 3 of this essay next week!

[1] Though, as philosophers have long noted, this doctrine is hardly self-evident at all. It is really a transformation of the old Christian doctrine of the imago dei – the idea that we are made in the image of God, and that this image consists in our reason, which makes us free when we follow it into truth “for the truth shall set you free” (John 8:32). Thus most self-consciously anti-Christian societies of the modern world have, justifiably and consistently, done away with this modern “superstition” quite easily.

DAN TATE is a writer and blogger at Christ & Cosmos. A former atheist, he’s been surprised and amazed by the God of all things, and he’s passionate about sharing the gospel in ways that respond to contemporary concerns about theology, philosophy, spiritual practice, science, art, and more. A lifelong writer hailing from Upstate New York, he has a B.A. from Allegheny College, an M.A. from Syracuse University, and an M. Div. from Princeton Theological Seminary.