Kenarchy Volume 3.3 – The Kenarchy Journal

Kenarchy Journal: Starting Points: health and wellbeing, 2022, Volume 3

Towards a political theology of nations

Author:
Roger Haydon Mitchell

Abstract

This paper distinguishes between an apocalyptic and a messianic perspective on the theology of nations. With reference to the gospel emphasis on Jesus’ peripatetic strategy of opening the land to the nations, it proposes that the fullness of expression of a nation manifests when tribes, tongues, and people come together in all their unique variety and chronological history in relationship with a particular geography and pursue a politics of love. It suggests that this is the work of the kingdom of God as distinct from the telos of the nation state, and that enabling this fullness to the uttermost parts of the earth is the messianic calling of the church, now expedited by three new generations of lived experience of the Spirit since the early twentieth 20th century Pentecostal renewal. It concludes that the ecclesia should embark on an integral transformation of ourselves and our ways of living, and open up, utilise, or ignore existing nation state structures and borders and get on with the task. Drawing on Giorgio Agamben’s prophetic sermon, The Church and the Kingdom, (London, New York, Calcutta: Seagull Books, 2012), and Monsignor Peter Hocken’s final book The Challenges of the Pentecostal, Charismatic and Messianic Jewish Movements (Farnham, Surrey and Burlington VT: Ashgate, 2009), attention is given to the notion of the messianic in these two perspectives. Note is taken of the tendency to identify Israel with the messianic in an apocalyptic view of eschatology in Hocken’s work, in contrast to Agamben’s alternative identification of the messianic with kingdom life in the penultimate, which I identify as the politics of love, or kenarchy. Predicated on my research in Church, Gospel and Empire (Eugene, Oregon: Wipf & Stock, 2011), the paper suggests that Hocken’s strong rebuttal of the replacement of Israel by the church needs to be applied to an earlier replacement of the kingdom with Israel. In affirmation of this, the two narrative approach to the Hebrew Bible, advocated by theologians such as Walter Brueggemann and Wesley Howard-Brook is outlined. Finally, Orthodox theologian Brad Jersak’s Johannine and universal exegesis of Zechariah’s “they will look on me whom they have pierced” (Zech 12: 10), and political theorist Warren Magnusson’s encouragement to see like a city, are seen to indicate that a truly messianic ecclesia will advance a progressive politics of love in our twenty-first century cities and their hinterlands.

DOI:
https://doi.org/10.62950/vwhwb33

Pages 29-45

Read / Download Full Article

About Kenarchy

While kenarchy is a gift for everybody, those of us who configure the politics of love in these terms are strongly motivated to do so in a way that deeply penetrates existing socially constructed mind-sets. This is why we combine applied academic research and writing together with grassroots social, economic and political activism. Kenarchy developed initially as a form of political theology and we make no apology for that, but it now embraces a wide and interdisciplinary perspective relevant to the politics and theology of love. The purpose of this Journal is to advance the applied research, and as such, it is an academic journal.

Lead Editor:

Roger Haydon Mitchell, PhD, theologian and activist, honorary researcher in the Lancaster University Centre for Alternatives to Social and Economic Inequalities, and political theologian with the Westminster Theological Centre

Associate Editors:

Sue Mitchell, MSc – co-facilitator for the Morecambe Bay Poverty Truth Commission, leading conversations between people with lived experience of poverty and decision makers, towards a new sociality

Bradley Jersak, PhD – (BradJersak.com) is the editor of CWRmagazine and Clarion-Journal.com, Principal & Director of Theology & Culture, at St. Stephen’s University

Andrew Klager, PhD – Provost & Vice-Chancellor, Professor of Religion and Peace Studies, Director of the Jim Forest Institute for Religion, Peace and Justice, St. Stephen’s University, Canada

Publishing Team:

Mike Winter, PhD
Martin Scott

In order to undergird the academic quality and scope of the Journal we are delighted that the following have agreed to be academic advisors to the lead editor and team.

Academic Advisors:

Linda Woodhead MBE DD FAcSS is FD Maurice Professor and Head of the Department of Theology and Religious Studies at King’s College London

Professor Maggi Dawn, MA, PhD (Cantab), CCTM, APRS, APSE, Principal, St Mary’s College, Durham University, UK

Professor Anthony Reddie, Extraordinary Professor of Theological Ethics at the University of South Africa and Director of The Oxford Centre for Religion and Culture, Regent’s Park College, University of Oxford

Thomas Jay Oord, PhD, Director, Doctoral Program at Northwind Theological Seminary/C4ORT, Director, Center for Open and Relational Theology

Timothy Stacey, PhD, Lecturer in Religious Studies, Leiden University, The Netherlands, Co-Founder and Co-Director, AltVisions, Co-Founder and Co-Director, Lived Religion Project

Submissions to the Journal

Submissions are welcomed from a wide and interdisciplinary perspective relevant to the politics and theology of love. Initial submissions must include at least a 250 word abstract and a brief outline. Please state your full name, your applied research field and any other information you deem relevant. Full submissions from now on should be in the region of 3,000-10,000 words and be in accordance with our Chicago “notes and bibliography” in-house style. Longer articles will be accepted at the discretion of the editors. All full submissions will be double peer reviewed before acceptance for publication.

Use the contact form to submit your proposal.

You are welcome to copy and paste brief sections of the articles for the purposes of your own work making sure that you reference your source accordingly. You are also welcome to download articles from the site but only for your personal use and not for publication or sale.

The Kenarchy Journal (ISSN: 2976-6001) is published in Lancaster UK by 2MT, Charity registration number: 1069653.