Gone are the days when you can say, “Jesus Christ is the only way to an eternal relationship with God.” Anyone who claims Jesus is the only way – like me – is labeled as intolerant. Of course, tolerance has nothing to do with my views but how I hold my views. And of course, those who label me intolerant are intolerant of my position.
Dissonant Voices
I just finished Harold Netland’s excellent book, Dissonant Voices, in which he defends Christian exclusivism in a world of religious pluralism. Netland defines exclusivism like this,
“…the position which accepts as the basis for its view of other religions the following four propositions: (a) Jesus Christ is the unique Incarnation of God, fully God and fully man; (b) only through the person and work of Jesus Christ is there the possibility of salvation; (c) the Bible is God’s unique revelation written, and thus is true and authoritative; and (d) where the claims of Scripture are incompatible with those of other faiths, the latter are to be rejected as false.” –page 34.
Of course, Christian exclusivism does not claim that every claim of all other religions are false or even that Christians can’t learn anything from other religions. At the heart of Christian exclusivism is the claim that Jesus is the only way to God.
Why is it rejected?
Netland helpfully identifies seven reasons why Christian exclusivism is rejected today. I outline these reasons because it is helpful for us to be aware of why people rejected – and why some Christians may be tempted to reject – the claim that Christ is the only way.
- The unprecedented exposure people in the West have to people of other faiths. In our own community we live and work with Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists, Mormons, and Jehovah’s Witnesses just to name a few. Those who hold differing beliefs are no longer just overseas, but they are right next door. Living near and working with such normal and moral people raises doubts about the exclusivity of Christ.
- The pervasive influence of skepticism about religion during the twentieth century. This is largely influenced by the academy and institutions of higher learning. Over the past century, any claim that God has definitively revealed Himself in one religion to the exclusion of others is viewed with a high degree of skepticism, scorn, and mocking.
- The growing influence of relativism when it comes to truth. This too is due to the influence of the academy. The prevailing mantra is that truth is relative. All people have access to the truth and what is true for you does not have to be true for me. All religions have access to the truth and therefore access to God.
- The tendency today to make a sharp distinction between the public realm of facts and the private world of values, opinions, and preferences. We have all experienced this. The public realm of facts is the truth that can be proven by science. Religious beliefs cannot be proven by science, therefore quests of truth and falsity cannot be applied to religion. Your beliefs are a private and personal matter.
- The pragmatic view of religion which minimizes questions of truth and falsity and emphasizes instead what religion does for its adherents. This reason simply looks at the pragmatics of different religious beliefs and doesn’t question the truthfulness of those beliefs. If their religion helps them live and cope in a complex and hard world, then it is good for them.
- The view that there is something necessarily arrogant and intolerant about holding that one religion is true, and that those incompatible with it are false. This thinking says we live in an increasingly global community and we need to get along with people from other cultures and religions, therefore we accept their religious beliefs as true. Of course we should never be arrogant or intolerant, but that has nothing to do with truth.
- The growing acceptance – even within Christian circles – of the doctrine of soteriological universalism. This is simply the belief that all people, regardless of religious affiliation or belief will experience God’s salvation in the end.
Netland goes on to show that it is logically impossible for all paths to lead to God. There are major differences along major lines of belief, beginning with even the concept of God and the afterlife. Jesus own claim is that He alone is the way, the truth, and the life, and that no one comes to the Father except through Him. If there are many roads to God, what do we make of Christ?
