Kenarchy Volume 7.6 – The Kenarchy Journal

Kenarchy Journal: Kenarchy & Peace, 2025, Volume 7

The Double-Edged Sword of Proximity: the Dialectic of Hostility and Hospitality in Light of God’s Cruciform Love
Lenée Fuelling

Abstract

Some religious cultures exacerbate conflict by treating people who are of different religious orientations with antagonism – “othering” them – and rationalizing their treatment with a religious view that God’s nature includes hostility for the sake of justice. Anthropologist René Girard contended that this perceived hostility was in truth a projection of human nature and an effect of mimetic desire fueling rivalry. Girard theorized that utilizing a scapegoat mechanism through the ritual act of sacrifice eased rivalry-built tensions and temporarily reestablished unity. It naturally followed that this scapegoating hostility would become embedded in religion, including in Judeo-Christian theology. Alternatively, cruciform theology interprets God’s nature through what Jesus Christ exemplified on the cross, when he subverted human violence and hostility by absorbing and forgiving it through self- humbling, self-giving love. Contemplative priest Henri Nouwen presents God through this lens, exhorting Christ-followers to move from human hostility into God’s hospitality and insisting that this movement is integral to living a life in the Holy Spirit. So how does one reconcile Old Testament biblical narratives that portray God as condoning or responsible for violence? What about the use of animal slaughter and a scapegoat embedded in the origin of Jewish religious law? This paper will highlight the relationship between hostility and hospitality, consider René Girard’s insight around mimetic desire and the scapegoat mechanism, and apply Henri Nouwen’s wisdom and a Christotelic interpretation to the Hebrew Bible story of the Israelites establishing their Tabernacle and religious rituals. It will conclude that God’s nature is non-hostile and that the church is meant to demonstrate God’s hospitality in a multi-faith world.

DOI:
https://doi.org/10.62950/vupl76

Pages 77-93

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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.

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