Religious Books

Taking Life Seriously

By. ROBIN DENNISTON

THE year, that came in like a lion with the Leslie Paul Report, grandiloquent if incom- prehensible rallying cries from the Toronto Con-

ference, counter-Reformation activities in the Vatican and the far-off rumbles of a doctrinal

about-face on the principle of birth control, seems to be going out rather quietly. In non-Roman ecumenical circles the recent conference at Not- tingham has revealed deeper instincts towards unity, based not on formal negotiations about doctrine but on a common understanding of the position of Christian churches in a post-Christian world. In London a fine row at Church House, with three significant, and sad, resignations, has superseded in ecclesiastical interest such impor- tant matters as the pay and deployment of the clergy and the more radical problems revealed by the Paul report. In more intellectual matters things also seem to be slowing up slightly. While the volume of honest-to-goddery output continues, any new resurgence of religious thought that might carry through to a more than profession- ally concerned minority seems hard to identify.

Amongst post-Robinson literature the most in- teresting work is Geoffrey Parrinder's The Christian Debate: Light From the East.' The trouble with Western theologians is that they know almost nothing of Eastern religions; this makes them assert with all the more enthusiasm the uniqueness of Christianity. Dr. Parrinder shows most convincingly the similarities between the life and teaching, of Christ and those of the great religious leaders of the East; thus com- pared, Christ is still revealed as far the most interesting figure, whose life, death and teach- ing make an extraordinarily compelling impact on the human psyche. But Dr. Parrinder is con- cerned to do more than present the elements of Eastern religious thought and compare it with Dr. Robinson's version of the Christian faith. He opens up the closed world of Christian scholar- ship, which scales down the huge elemental aspira- tions to which Christ gave form and definition to the trivial disputes of narrow-minded theologians. Christianity, seen in the context of much older religions with far more adherents, is seen to grow immeasurably by the comparison; to be more re- markable, more inspiring; and Christ Himself seems to, take on a newer stature, less idealised and assumed,. more existential. There is a cur- rent debate, popularised by Dr. Robinson and oversimplified by millions of non-readers of his book. The debate is about the nature of ,God and of man; and Dr. Parrinder's book takes us several stages further on.

Another part of the debate, more close to home and more immediately compelling, is analysed in The Permissive Morality2 by C. H. and Winifred M. Whiteley. It, too, can be seen to belong to the greater debate, for both matters concern man's putative coming-of-age. If man was a child and is now a man, in what way has his relationship to, and need for, God changed? And similarly what of his need for, and obedience to, absolute rules of condtict? The discussion of the new morality

THE CHRISTIAN DEBATE: LIGHT FROM THE EAST.

By Geoffrey Parrinder. (GoLlancz, 21s.) 2 THE PERMISSIVE MORALITY. By C. H. and Winifred M. Whiteley. (Methuen, I5s.) ' No NEW MORALITY. By Douglas Rhymes. (Con- stable, 12s. 6d.)

is bedevilled by the fact that each side starts with different presuppositions and addresses different

audiences. The protagonists of love-not-law, well exemplified by Canon Rhymes in his No New Morality,' seem more concerned with attacking the unimaginative and unloving conservatism of a previous generation of Anglican clergymen. As such their protest is well founded and deserves to succeed. But as an actual contribution to the prob-

lems of living, their suggestions are sadly lacking —not because we do not all need love, nor be-

cause it •is wrong to say that the best of us do not need rules, but because most of us in fact need both. The Permissive Morality, though too sweeping in some of its generalisations, does at least take the facts of .human inadequacy into account.

'There is,' the Whiteleys write, 'a need to he fulfilled which we suspect the old morality ful- filled somewhat better than the new : the need for something to aspire to.' And, speaking of psycho- logists, 'They have not been able to show with certainty that a permissive way of.life is more favourable to human happiness than old- fashioned strictness. . . . What the psychiatrists have done by their probing into the origin of conscience is to shake our confidence in our moral sentiments and traditions. So, while we have become more candid and open-minded, we have also become much more diffident in our attempts to discipline our children, our criminals and our own sexual impulses.'

The trouble with books like this is that they are often good on analysis and diagnosis but shrill and oversimplified in their positive programme. For instance, generalisations about increased affluence and increased leisure are misleading, because, for most of the population, increased affluence is bought by fantastic stints of overtime which in turn rules out leisure. In fact leisure does not yet seem to be a problem except for the effort- lessly rich, and such people have ingrained habits of time-filling. But to assume that most people are abruptly confronted with both situations is surely wrong. Again to point out (I believe rightly) that psychology has robbed parents of the basic confi- dence they need for bringing up their children; that modern philosophy has abdicated its right to discourse about private and public morals and has left the door open for unscrupulous salesmen of any new product or idea, good or bad; that the permissive morality demonstrably does not lead to happiness—is right and true. But while the old has been being superseded and the new coming into prominence we have all been growing up, and we cannot simply return to our earlier selves even if we wanted to.

It is here that the two debates begin to merge into each other. It is remarkable that in their sur- vey of our present ills, the Whiteleys make almost no mention of religion. While it is both difficult and repugnant, leading swiftly to self-righteous- ness, to impose rules on oneself or on society with- out real conviction, a life lived even remotely in contact with the great subconscious movements we can identify as religious, inescapably involves reflections about living and dying, and the aspira- tions of other people. And these lead to what may seem on the surface to be the old moral sanctions slightly dressed up, but are in fact the unarguable and simple results of taking life seriously.