Good Christians challenge religion, says author

Peter Rollins, Irish writer and philosopher, ponders fidelity.

If Judas's betrayal of Jesus was essential to the divine plan, was it actually an act of fidelity to God?

The question leads Irish writer and philosopher Peter Rollins to ponder other instances from Scripture in which people challenge God's will. In his new book "The Fidelity of Betrayal," he argues that Christianity exhorts Christians to wrestle with and betray their religion. The 35-year-old Rollins belongs to a Belfast religious group, IKON, part of the "emerging church" movement that seeks to draw in new Christians by tinkering with rituals and forms of worship. It hosts "gatherings that employ a rich cocktail of music, poetry, prose, imagery, soundscapes, theater, ritual, and reflection," he writes.

Brewster's Paraclete Press, which published the book, is scheduled to host Rollins next Saturday in Boston during the Society of Biblical Literature's conference. He's also scheduled to appear at 6 p.m., Dec. 7, at The Gathering at Salem, an emerging church. Excerpts from a recent interview follow.

Q. Religiously speaking, what was your upbringing?

A. I guess it was broadly secular. I did go to an Anglican church when I was very young. When I was 17, I encountered the charismatic evangelical tradition. I got fully immersed.

Q. I take it you fell away from that.

A. Yes. It wasn't something negative. I started to feel that the language didn't do justice to what had happened to me when I was 17.

Q. How do you personally betray God and Christianity in your daily life?

A. Whenever I talk about betraying Christianity, I'm talking about a structure within Christianity itself. Christianity gives words for God, but at the same time says that God is so much bigger and better than those words can describe. What's beautiful about Christianity for me is that it involves the priesthood, rituals, and structures that have existed for thousands of years, and yet at the same time it involves challenging them and undermining them.

At IKON, for one example, we go to other groups [to] be evangelized. We go from Islamic groups to Jewish groups, Buddhist groups, humanist groups. We even went to Scientology a few months ago. We challenge ourselves, so that we don't become comfortable with our own beliefs. We're there to learn what makes those groups tick.

Q. What is the transformation that, you write, could be ours if we betray faith?

A. I'm arguing that Christian truth doesn't describe the world. Christian truth transforms the world. [It's] not trying to make Christianity into a doctrine [with which] you can tick off the answers. It's about something that radically makes you look after the poor, seek justice for those who have none.

Q. Many conventional Christians, who would never dream of betraying their faith, will tell you that Christianity has transformed their lives. I'm thinking of George W. Bush, who famously said the philosopher he most admired was Jesus, because he changed his life.

A. Somebody like George Bush or some person who has very fundamentalist views - I wouldn't want to say that they haven't had a genuine transformation. Transformation is at the heart of Christianity, but the problem is then [that] a theology is put on top of that experience, which I think often contradicts that experience, a theology that maybe looks down on people who aren't of the same faith or that condemns people for certain practices.

Q. I'm troubled that some acts of betrayal you found in Scripture, like Abraham preparing to slaughter Isaac, require evil. You would not say that betrayal that requires evil is appropriate?

A. Not at all. However, I would say that sometimes a betrayal might look evil to people in the church, and it's actually history that judges whether that betrayal was correct. To be honest, the story of Abraham and Isaac, for me, is impossible to fully understand. I don't know if I can personally stand behind Abraham and what he did.

Q. Boston was ground zero for the Catholic Church's sex abuse crisis, and out of that grew Voice of the Faithful. I take it that would be a living example of faithful betrayal.

A. That would fit in my criteria of what a faithful betrayal would be.

Q. Do you worship at a church?

A. Most Sundays, I don't go anywhere. In the past, I went every week and probably three times midweek. I think I'm detoxing a little. Maybe in a year or two, I'll be back. Seventy percent of the people who go to IKON are part of a local church.

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