We need to find new ways to talk about following Jesus’ way. The terms of our parents and grandparents don’t sing to those with ears under 40. What was at one time fresh and vital can ossify and become stale.

For example, the Social Gospel movement of the early 20th century Progressive Era focused on the awful conditions of labor, the poor, and urban slums. Its followers rightly believed that the gospel was not just for your personal uplifting but should uplift the whole society. They promoted labor laws and unionization and were committed to the idea that Christians were called to help bring the Kingdom of God into reality here on earth. A few of its flaws were its general avoidance of addressing racism and segregation, its middle-class audience, and its optimistic view of progress as slowly but surely inevitable. Sometimes, I worry that the term “progressive Christianity” has similar problems: too white, too optimistic, too middle-class, too American.

Taking a cue from the Social Gospel movement, I humbly submit as one possible alternative “the Planetary Gospel.” Like the former, it points to this life and world as the audience for the good news. It has a core biblical term in it, which is certainly a plus. The planetary is different from the global. You can hold a globe or observe it from afar. A globe is an abstraction. But the planetary is right here, right now, the material that makes up you, your context, and our web of relations. It’s simultaneously incarnationally present to your setting and the web that ties us all together in common through our diverse contexts.

A planetary gospel offers good news to the lived situations we find ourselves in. Beyond its obvious ecological dimension in the face of climate change, it includes responding to new jail construction plans in Los Angeles; racism in Ferguson, Missouri; military strikes in Syria and US military aid in the Middle East; transnational corporate exploitation in search of profits in Latin American communities; sexism at your local workplace; and homophobia in Red Cross policies are all matters of potential planetary concern.

Gospel just means good news, particularly the good news that Jesus brings or reveals. But good news only sounds like good news when it addresses the bad news of our world. Baldly stated, any supposed gospel that is abstracted from its actual context, whatever that may be, is meaningless. Only at the intersection of our lived, embodied struggles and our proclamation do we find the good news of Jesus.

Just as we are each in specific contexts, we are also part of a larger planetary network of relationships and interdependence. We need to learn from and listen to our sisters and brothers in other contexts so as to see how the planetary gospel addresses their situation and avoid equating our context as the only context. By doing so, we practice that good news of compassion and justice for our world Jesus revealed and continues to reveal in our planetary living.

Following a Planetary Gospel,
Timothy Murphy
Executive Director, Progressive Christians Uniting

Originally published here