jonathan stegall

So, to come back to this theme for another post (you can see how long this would be if it were one post), here’s another thing that has gripped me both before and during my thinking about this issue.

Many evangelical pastors seem to perceive just about everything to be a threat against Christianity. Evolution is a threat. Gay marriage is a threat. A swear word uttered accidentally on television is a threat. Democrats are a threat. I don’t see how any of these things pose a threat against Christianity.

Of course, this idea relates very well back to the last post, and that’s fine. I’m going in a different direction here. Over the years, so many people have said it that I’m not sure who I’m quoting at the moment, but my essential thought is that “The greatest threat to Christianity is Christians.” Countless people have said this. Ghandi, I believe, said he’d be a Christian if it weren’t for Christians. In any case, that’s a significant thing. Dan Kimball often writes about the idea that people in emerging culture like Jesus, but they don’t like Christians. These ideas are a huge support to the idea that external things are not our biggest threat, if they are threats at all.

But the issue I would submit is that they are not in the least bit threats. Evolution, gay marriage, cussing, Democrats, and of course abortion, liberals in general, drugs, and similar things are the issues chosen by some as the threats to Christianity. If it weren’t for these things, America would be a Christian nation and the world would fall at our feet. I’ve briefly addressed the facade of a Christian America, and others have done so also, so I’ll leave that alone.

Christianity works the best when it is not the majority. When it does not have power, political influence, political influencers, and all the other things it has gained in America. Power corrupts. It can easily corrupt those who are legitimately trying to follow Jesus, and it attracts those who are looking to advance their agendas. So, when an idea (or religion, or philosophy, or whatever) is in a position of power, it is susceptible to this corruption, no matter how good it may be. It loses much if its attractiveness to those outside of it, and it usually loses sight of its core ideas (which is where we stand). This isn’t to say that faith should not have any political power, but it is to say that faith should not seek political power, as we have done.

Those outside the church in America, and around much of the rest of the world, believe that Christianity is synonymous with stereotypical Republican ideas. Whether those ideas are held by Republicans is not the issue at the moment. We are believed to be pro-war, anti-separation of church and state, pro-rich, pro-white, anti-environment, pro-imperialism, and all around pro-backwardness and anti-progressiveness. I believe firmly that these ideas are specifically opposed to the message of Jesus, and that in them and others we see the corruption the church has received since the time of Constantine. Until and unless this perception (and whatever parts of it are true) changes, we will be stuck in the position we’re in with the friendly atheist.

Clearly, most churches have aligned themselves against non-religious people. By adopting this stance, Christians have turned off the people I would think they want to connect with.

To return to the ideas presented by the friendly atheist, this is the first statement of several that I want to look into. It’s no secret to anyone, I don’t think, that this man is absolutely correct in the above statement. I won’t be attempting to argue with the points he has presented, but rather to take them to heart. I want to warn myself, at least, in the hopes that I won’t forget the heart of God. The issue that is behind this first statement is the sobering thought that we deserve many of the words that Jesus had for Pharisees and the rest in his own time; specifically the idea that we refuse to enter the kingdom ourselves, while refusing to let others enter either.

We do this for the same reason they did: we feel threatened. We (and the people Jesus rebuked, in the same way) feel threatened by the way non-religious people think, the way they talk, the way they live, and the challenges they put in our faces. They challenge our own ways of thinking, talking, living, and the assumptions that we have about ourselves, about them, and about the world. We think they’re going to take our children, kick our dogs, change our minds, and convince us that we don’t know everything.

Obviously, if they are able to take our children, either:

1. we haven’t taught our children in such a way that they took hold of it for themselves, and were prepared to be real with it
2. they’ve got something better than we do
3. our children simply wanted something else

Whichever it is, either it’s our fault or it’s the choice our children made. The same points can be made for our other issues. If we’re unable to be real people, think authentically about life, and work out the relationships we have with Jesus, we’re going to be in worse shape than we think we are.

The worse shape we’ll be in is that we’ll never introduce anyone to Jesus, and we’ll miss him ourselves. The Pharisees and Sadducees and the rest were, in all likelihood, sitting in the temple praying for the Messiah while he was riding by on a donkey! He hung out with the non-religious people challenging the religious establishment, and challenged it himself, and they didn’t want anything to do with it. If we’re in the same position, we’ll miss the things he wants to do just like they did.

Recently, a friendly atheist has been appearing in various media outlets. Hemant Mehta, who is the friendly atheist, became the eBay atheist when he took bids to attend church. Bids increased the amount of hours he would spend. The auction money was donated to the Secular Student Alliance, who works for things like taking God out of the Pledge of Allegiance.

<rant>I think it is in every way wrong for Christians to try to enforce prayer in school, put God into the pledge, put God on currency, and any number of other things. America's not a Christian nation; it never was, never will be, and furthermore it shouldn't be. The very idea of a Christian nation is an insult to the kingdom of God as Jesus understood it. Even if it wasn't, America certainly hasn't ever done anything to deserve such a name.</rant>

In any case, this guy visited several churches to learn about Christians. Several people across the blogging Internet have noticed an interview with him in Outreach magazine where he recounts his experiences. Without summarizing the article, I want to note the following:

Clearly, most churches have aligned themselves against non-religious people. By adopting this stance, Christians have turned off the people I would think they want to connect with. The combative stance I’ve observed is an approach that causes people to become apathetic and even antagonistic toward religion as a whole. Many evangelical pastors seem to perceive just about everything to be a threat against Christianity. Evolution is a threat. Gay marriage is a threat. A swear word uttered accidentally on television is a threat. Democrats are a threat. I don’t see how any of these things pose a threat against Christianity. If someone disagrees with you about politics or social issues or the matter of origins, isn’t that just democracy and free speech in action? Why do Christians feel so threatened?

You need to spread the message of Christianity the message being what Christianity stands for: loving each other, helping the people around you. Those are things everyone can get on board with.

Also, atheists: we’re not non-believers. We do believe in a lot of things, but they come from other experiences and other encounters, not necessarily a book.

Many Christians are beginning to notice that the ridiculous war metaphor doesn’t work anymore. I think it was always a terrible metaphor, but it’s worse now. People in western culture, and those who look at and are oppressed by western culture are dealing with enough imperialism and possibilities of totalitarianism in our faces without putting that kind of face on spirituality and the things of God. I’m considering a small series of posts about my views on the various things this man mentions that some Christians believe are such a threat.

After these statements, he gets something that Christians seem to be unable to grasp: Christianity is about loving each other. This man’s quoting the Bible, and he probably hasn’t heard the passage he’s quoting! People will know we are Christians by our love for one another. If more Christians had shown him an authentic love as he visited these several churches, rather than dry ritualism, fear, and an overall lack of genuineness, what would he have said about us? More on its way. I will continue these thoughts.