Wolves in the airport

Jesus’ critique of purity as a challenge to twenty-first-century surveillance

Datos Bibliográficos

ID20242536
AutoresEric Stoddart (0000-0002-1261-6510, University of St Andrews, autor de correspondencia)
Año2018
Volumen11
Número1
Páginas54-66
Fecha de publicación2018-01-01
Peer ReviewedSí
Open AccessNo
TipoARTICLE
RevistaPractical Theology (JOURNAL)
Identificadores de la revistaISSN: 1756-073X • E-ISSN: 1756-0748
EditorialInforma UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/1756073x.2017.1414483
OpenAlexW2781373978
IdiomaEN
Citas recibidas1
Referencias citadas18

This article draws on Jesus’ critique of holiness as purity to build a Christian theological challenge to unjust twenty-first-century surveillance. Categorical suspicion is directed against populations deemed to be risky. The Temple of Ezekiel’s prophecy is set alongside the contemporary airport. Using the analogy of the management of the flows of people into and through sterile spaces, it is argued that purity paradigms have a functional equivalent in the twenty-first-century attempt to control a chaotic world through surveillance by social sorting. The importance of scrutinising those with the power to name categories and the dispersal of notions of ‘risky persons’ into broader social imagination form one direction of critique. The church is challenged as to its reinforcing of unjust stereotypes, particularly of Muslims, and the call of compassion to reach over boundaries, without ignoring the existence of actual dangerous people

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