Eugene Peterson's Views On The Role Of Religion

While often people presume that Christian leaders have the same values and have the same thoughts regarding the definition of spirituality, the role of the church, and how the world affects our relationship with God, this assumption can be contradicted by the works of Eugene Peterson, John Van Sloten, Barbara Taylor, and Krista Tippet. Each has different views about these main topics, and these views generally reflect the different views of the church today. While spirituality is often defined today as the synonym for religion, there are many dissonant voices in Christianity who would disagree with this meaning. Peterson is one of them, arguing that spirituality is not religion or exclusive, but that spirituality is deeply integrated in the

Van Sloten sees church to be a community meeting together, with a traditional building as a barrier to the community. Peterson disagrees, seeing church as a place to make people uncomfortable with the world, a place full of problems but a place of protection for the people of the church. While Tippet does not mention her views on the role of church, she does imply that the church should have a role in communication and in compromise with the world, in order to encourage conversation and interaction between the church and world. Taylor takes an unique view that the church is a place to commune, but also a place to remind us that the whole world belongs to God and that the world can also teach us about God. While Peterson sees church as a protection from the world, Van Sloten, Taylor, and Tippet see the church as a method to interact with the world and point to the

Peterson sees spirituality as an integration into everyday activities, the church as a protection for the people, and the natural world as a method for cultivating an association with God. Tippet views spirituality as a philosophical method to discover, church as a method to compromise and communicate, and the world as an interaction location. Taylor perceives spirituality as a longing for something more, the church as a reminder of the entirety of God’s dominion, and the world as a place to praise God. Van Sloten sees spirituality as an extension of everybody and everything, the church as a community with the building as a hindrance to faith, and the world as an entire palette to commune and interact with God. While it may seem that Van Sloten is vastly different than the others, each can be shown to be beneficial to the general Christian