New Christians and the Third Jesus

This past week a couple of books came across my path. One of them deals with the topic of what is happening in churches around America and alludes to 'new things' happening. The second is Deepak Chopra's new book, The Third Jesus: The Christ We Cannot Ignore. It occurred to me as I was thinking through some of the materials that you won't really get 'new' Christians until you get a 'new' Jesus. Chopra's view is that there have been two Jesus' so far--the historic, human who walked the earth, the second, the institutional Jesus, property of the Church largely understood through doctrine and dogma. He writes that this Jesus leads us into a wilderness with no clear path out. He adds to these two what he calls, the 'third Jesus'--the mystical Jesus, who comes to lead us to god-consciousness rather than to any particular religious position. I don't agree with everything Chopra writes, and many of his concepts are things I don't really use anymore (his continual use of the idea of the subjective soul for instance),  but I do like his idea, and it resonates with me deeply. I have been saying for a while now that the thing that really needs to change is the message/story/narrative the church, or lots of christians anyway, work from--the message is flawed, or if flawed is too harsh term, then linked to other times and spaces, and this story doesn't necessarily connect so much anymore with the many people who are actively seeking some understanding or connection with the sacred. Chopra's characterization of the 'mystic' Jesus is another way of broaching the topic I think, much clearer than mine, but we are in similar territory I think. Chopra went to Catholic school as a child, so Jesus and the scriptures are not unfamiliar to him, and he handles the parables and the like with ease and familiarity.
  I mentioned this book in my class and was quite surprised at how few of the students had heard of him. It reminded me that we tend to live in very narrow worlds when it comes to our religions, seldom reaching outside the boundaries of our own theological comfort zones to see what else is going on. Chopra is a pretty well-known figure in contemporary society and I think we should at least take note of what people are saying. His opening chapter begins with the sentence, "Jesus is in trouble." Some might argue the point, I would say that followers of the second Jesus are in trouble--Jesus seems to have been picked up by lots of other people lately, all of whom seem to be pretty happy encountering him again.

Comments

[Rose]

New Jesus and New Earth...hmmm...thought
there was nothing new under the sun...I was thinking about all the
fervor over the new book about the
new Earth which is classified as
Zen..a Pop Culture word for
the New Age Spiritual supermarket...a sort of spiritual
"Gelsons". I found this amazing
article http://www.engaged-zen.org/articles/Kobutsu-New_Age_Legacy.html which
is quite "enlightening" and
really does speak my language
on the reality of Zen and
this so called "new' consciousness
which is quite scary to me because
it seems to have little to do
with conscience.

[neimbinny]

All I ask is a chance to prove that money can't make me happy.

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