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Christianity Today, October (Web-only), 2007 |

Reading the World

Cultural exegesis is a necessary skill in Christian life, says the editor of Everyday Theology.

Interview by Susan Wunderink | posted 10/16/2007 08:43AM

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Just as we learn to read English, Christians need to move toward cultural literacy. We have this movement in our schools, No Child Left Behind—I'd love to see our churches have a similar program called No Christian Left Behind that was all about literacy—biblical literacy, theological literacy, and also cultural literacy.

How would they go about doing that?

Just as we learn how to read step-by-step, you have to teach the basic steps to reading culture. You should start by asking questions of a culture that you would ask of a text. Such as, Who is the author of this? What is the author trying to accomplish? How is this structured? What does the structure tell us about the intent of the people making it? What is it saying, what is it doing, what effect is it having on people? We need to start asking a barrage of questions.

Related Elsewhere:

Also see "The Gospel According to Safeway", which was excerpted from Everyday Theology.

Everyday Theology and an excerpt of the introduction are available from ChristianBook.com and other retailers.

Christianity Today profiled Vanhoozer, along with other new theologians.

Resurgence also interviewed Kevin Vanhoozer.

Other articles on books are available on our site.

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October (Web-only) 2007, Vol. 51

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Zuo	Posted: October 18, 2007 10:28 PM


This is waste of precious time that christians cannot afford because the days are evil: Harry Potter, Halloween, evolution, abortion, etc. It is not about disengagement but rather separation from the culture. This is evangelistic junk food to be avoided.

Floyd Heideman

Posted: October 17, 2007 10:46 AM

I have been a christian all of my 75 years and have attended church and ss all of those years. There is nothing new in this discussion from what I have experienced over all those years. We have always taught scripture in light of the culture we are addressing. I have heard missionaries over the years and they all have been faithfully doing this all along. The Gospel enlightens any culture and transforms the hearers who respond positively to the invitation to join the Lord's family.

Richard

Posted: October 16, 2007 10:52 PM


The question is who's culture. I have worship with Christians on three continents and met Christians who I could not communicate because we spoke different languages. What I have seen is the Gospel should transcends the culture and not be conform to it. To me teaching cultural literacy is just another distraction that gets in the way of a pastor duty to preach the Gospel.

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