Reflections on Mystery and Poetry

This weekend I started reading Brian McLaren's A Generous Orthodoxy. I really want to get a handle on the Emerging Church conversation that's currently going on, so I plan on reading a series of books on it. I'll give some of my impressions along the way. So far, I've been enjoying McLaren's book. I went into it expecting to be shocked and outraged, but it actually has been been uplifting and even convicting at points. Maybe I'm more emerging than I think?

Anyway, he writes one chapter entitled, "Why I am a Mystic/Poet." I knew I was going to like it right off the bat. He basically says that Western Protestantism has reduced the faith to a series of organized and managable systems (i.e. systematic theology). The attitude is that anything we can know about God, we can know through reason. Phooey, says McLaren. We have distilled all of the mystery out of God, Christ, and the Church. Rather, some things can only be expressed with the wonder and heart of a poet. He recommends that all theologians should also be poets. Amen.

As I reflected on this a bit more, it struck me. This is why Christian art/music/film/ literature sucks! We've lost the mysterious poetic heart of the faith. At one time, the Church produced some of the greatest literature, poetry, and art in the world. Now, the best we've got (at least from the Protestant tradition) is Thomas Kinkade. It seems to me that this mysterious heart will take a long time to be revived. I think it's starting to happen (slowly) in the music world. But, I look forward to the day when I can watch a Christian movie that bestows awe and wonder like Glory or Lord of the Rings.