Taking Back Heaven (Part 1)

Likely, you already know that Tim Russert died last Friday suddenly of a heart attack. For nearly twenty years, he has been the host of Meet the Press. From that post, he made an indelible mark on the press and political happenings of America with his inimitable interviewing style. He combined respect, intensity, fairness and friendliness. I often lamented to myself that such an excellent news show aired live Sunday mornings while I was at church, forcing me to only catch snippets later in headline news.

While death is nearly always sobering, especially one as sudden as Russert's (he was 58), it's often a good opportunity to learn about someone's life and influence. I have enjoyed reading reflections on Russert by fellow journalists, pundits, and politicians.

However, eulogies of public personas are frequently accompanied by platitudes. These range from empty appeals to transcendence to gross misrepresentations of Christian glory. Heaven is painted in all its humanist glory, in this case, an American political scientist's paradise, with Jefferson and Hamilton and Roosevelt and Kennedy and McGovern all having a grand time reflecting on their own greatness, with the deceased at the center of it all. In the next case, maybe it would be Hollywood's greatest. There are as many manifestations of heaven as there are eulogies, with one thing in common -- there is no Christ. There is no Creator God. There is no cherubim chanting, "Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty." Plainly, there is no resemblance to the biblical portrait of Heaven.

It's hard to listen to these, even harder to call them into question, without feeling insensitive to the truly great experience of loss, even if that loss is not truly communicated. Yet, while it's meant to assuage my hurt, it intensifies my sadness.

This is the price we are paying for merely innoculating people with the truth of the gospel. This is empty Christianity. They understand it enough to pacify themselves when suffering comes, yet not enough to tremble. With Neitzsche and Marx, we can agree that religion, at least in these cases, is merely an opiate for the masses.

Please know, I am not speaking against the confessed faith of Tim Russert. I pray that he was a believer; I cannot know myself. I am speaking about those left to mourn, who grasp at the transcendence nearest to them, which is usually Christianity.

What are we, as Christian pastors, to do when the gospel is corrupted by truly mourning people? Does "mourning with those who mourn" include ignoring heresy? Think with me about these questions. I'll post some thoughts in the next post. You post yours.

(EDIT: Newsweek has an article about Tim Russert's devout Catholic faith. HT: Denny Burk)