SESSION 9

Sin, Atonement, and Guilt

Alan's father tells the psychologist, "I'm an atheist and I don't mind admitting it. If you want my opinion, it's the Bible that responsible for all this. . . . A boy spends night after night having this stuff read to him; an innocent man tortured to death--thorns driven into his head--nails into his hands--a spear jammed through his ribs. It can mark anyone for life, that kind of thing. I'm not joking. The boy was absolutely fascinated by all that. He was always mooning over religious pictures. I mean real kinky ones, if you receive my meaning. I had to put a stop to it once or twice. Bloody religion--it's our real problem in this house." The film "Equus" is only an extreme version of the impact that the Christian doctrine of sacrificial atonement may have on its adherents.  Brown and Parker analyze potential problems in virtually all atonement doctrines.  Pence calls into question the assumptions upon which atonement doctrines rest.  Can a doctrine of atonement be salvaged?  How?

In class we will view excerpts from the video,  "Equus". (The text is available as a Penguin Play: Peter Shaffer, Equus. Penguin, 1996.)

Read:

• Joanne Carlson Brown and Rebecca Parker, "God So Loved the World?" in Brown and Bohn (Eds.), Christianity, Patriarchy, and Abuse: A Feminist Critique.
• Responses by Carol R. Jacobson and Lou Ann Trost, in Currents in Theology and Mission. Vol. 21, February 1994.
• Gary Pence, Sin: An Abusive Doctrine?
• Gary Pence, The Gospel in Evolutionary Perspective.
• "A Sampler of Hell" -- when threat of damnation runs amok

Post your comments for discussion to "IX. Sin, Atonement, and Guilt" in the Discussion Board.