Life Without a Shepherd

Recently Salon ran an article about Evangelicals not letting in refugees. They laid the blame completely at the feet of the religion while paradoxically chastising Christians for not doing what their holy book told them to do. They did this through referencing a Stephen Colbert vignette.* 

The story goes that American Evangelicals would be better off if they dropped the fetters of Christianity and embraced the zeitgeist of American secularism. It is a myth that is repeated so often that it has been accepted as true. Yet, like all tall tales it accepted for convenience sake rather than internal logical consistency. When we examine the tale told by Salon (and others), it is one where the lay Christians have decided some political decision quite against the opinions of theologians and church leaders. Despite the fact that the Public Policy group for the Southern Baptist Convention or Christianity Today magazine or the National Association of Evangelicals or a myriad of other Evangelical (to say nothing of Catholic or Mainline) groups have called for welcoming the stranger; the average conservative Christian will have none of it. But who do they follow then if they do not follow the church? My guess is the glut of Republican nominees for president who all seem to be in one accord on this issue.

This brings me to the enigma inside all of this. Under these circumstances we know that the theologians, pastors, and church leaders are logically correct, factually sound, and faithfully grounded. Furthermore, the church leaders have not coerced or bullied their members to believe something. Rather, they have sought to appeal to Scripture and plain reason for why they should allow the window and orphan into America. I imagine that many a sermon has been preached and many a pastoral blog has been made in favor of welcoming the refugees. Those ministers and theologians who have stated otherwise are actually in the minority of Christian scholars and clergy though they are in the minority of “American Christians.”

This nuance is something that the media has not published. I don’t fault them for that. The news’ job is not to provide catechesis or interpretations of such thinking per se; but rather information. In other words the media must make sure not to bear false witness against someone or they have violated their sacred duty as truth tellers. 

There are times of course when we accidentally give bad information. There can be times when we felt that keeping silent on an issue was far worse than not having all of the facts; and, truth be told, we never do have all the information. Yet there comes a point when you have to re-examine yourself. Sometimes this comes emotionally when you realize you have not given someone the kind of kindness you would have desired. Worse still it can come when you have found out that you don’t make any sense anymore logically. 

In an interview with noted personality Bill Maher; Ross Douthat explained that while many atheists may have longed for a day when Christians were loosed from orthodoxy, they may not like what they turn into then. Douthat pointed out that they will not become agnostics or atheists, but rather heretics. They will form a sort of pseudo-Christianity which vaguely overlaps with Christian orthodoxy, but which is not really Christianity. Maher, of course, was credulous; yet Douthat’s prognostication is true and is becoming truer every day. It is not just the so-called progressive Christians who shirk scriptural authority, but Evangelicals. Whether it be Evangelicals clamoring for Trump despite the warnings of preachers or Bush shrugging off the Pope’s opinions because he “ think[s] religion ought to be about making us better as people, less about things [that] end up getting into the political realm”; the real problem with Christianity in America is that we have so few members of the Body of Christ. 

Seeing this disintegration, church leaders are seeking to prevail upon their congregants to root themselves in Scripture and Church. They are being taught to understand right doctrine and orthodoxy. Paradoxically the secular culture is blaming church leaders for the fault of not following proper teaching while simultaneously scratching their heads as to why people are disobeying Christian orthodoxy. The simple fact is that our zeitgeist has become the arbiter of sound doctrine. It has called for the disintegration of the church while simultaneously declaring itself to be the new unifying element.

This of course gets to the worst part of the whole issue: One should not be able to invalidate orthodoxy and then blame orthodoxy for the problem. Yet, this is exactly where we find ourselves. We have a million little heresies which are nothing more than American first-world self-centeredness with a veneer of deism to make it seem plausibly Christian. Secular culture cannot woo away the lay people and then blame the reasonable practitioners of the faith when the going gets rough. Yet this is exactly where we find ourselves.

My problem with secular culture is not that it is another belief system. (As a Christian I am aware that we will always be surrounded by those who don’t believe what we believe.) My problem with secular culture is its inauthenticity. It bullies around the other cultures and then whines when things don’t go as it planned. It usurps authority and then lays the responsibility on others in the ensuing disaster. The problem with the Evangelicals not allowing refugees in isn’t a result of close-minded Christian bigots, its the result of nationalists spreading fear. Until that story comes out though, we Christians will just keep on preaching the Gospel. Small voices can still be heard even through the whirlwind.

* I however believe the article was too heavily edited from its original source to be valid. It said exactly the same thing of course in an abbreviated format, but I disagree with what it said so I must be right. 

What I hope is my last post on The Red Cup incident of 2015

People often ask me what news I read. (Okay, they don’t ask me I just tell them.) My usual response is that I stick to precious few subjects. I read mostly business and science news updates. From time to time, I will glance at “The Economist” and “Christianity Today.” However, my places where I get news are very limited. The reason is that I really hate having to do background checks on my news. I reading a story and then having to probe into online articles, books, and audio samples to find out if it is true or not. Usually this is just simple bias. (One way to get factual news is to see if the people touting it would normally tout that news.) There are all sorts of ways to lie with statistics and quotes being taken out of context and information just plain not being shared. 

However, something happened recently that moved from mere curiosity, to annoyance, to actual outrage. Every so often a satirical news article is taken out of context and thought to be real. This is usually something that occurs when proponents of a particular viewpoint become desperate for someone to back up that narrative. (For instance, a few years ago the president of Iran touted that he was more popular with Americans than President Obama. His source? The well-known satirical site: the Onion.) Fact checking is fantastic and we need honest brokers. Sadly, we Christians have gotten targeted though.

You may think I am talking about the fact that we feel threatened that Christmas is being removed from this time of year; and that I am quite outraged by the “persecution” of not being able to say “Merry Christmas.” No, what I am angry about is that so many people know so little about Christianity, that they believed this story. This goes for Christians and non-Christians alike. I have met so many people inside and outside the church whose view of Christians is that we are all hate-mongering boycotters of anything that doesn’t come with Kurt Cameron’s stamp of approval. My question is simple, do you even know the Christians in your neighborhood or, heaven forbid, at your church? 

When this story broke, do you know that the major conservative Evangelical publications not only denied this but went a step further to talk about charity during the Christmas season? (Be honest with yourself, when was the last time you took charity seriously any time of the year, let alone Christmastime?) Did you read the articles from Christianity Today, Think Christian, or even Charisma; or did you just pile on like the rest of society? Did you bother to see the articles posted in Conservative or Liberal journals alike that said this was nothing more than a ploy by an opportunistic charlatan deliberately mis-reading a satirical article in Breitbert? My guess is no.

I have come to expect this kind of behavior from the majority of Americans who do not care whether they are inside or outside the doors of the church. I have come to expect this behavior from people who only get their news in thirty-second snippets. However, I am deeply hurt that similar responses have come from clergy as well. I am angry that so many of my friends who are pastors shared memes made by secularists chastising Christians rather than pointing out that this was a big lie. I am outraged that they didn’t operate with Christlike wisdom or pastoral care to a world in need of the Gospel; but rather decided to declare themselves “not those kinds of Christians.” The problem is that “those kinds of Christians” didn’t exist except for the small fanbase this charlatan has accumulated. Rather than being pastoral though, many of my clergy and lay friends decided to accept the myth that this really was a movement among Christians. They chose to speak alongside the lie because it was easier than fighting for the truth. I will not post anything about how Christians should advocate for the homeless or care for the poor or feed the hungry, because that has already been posted in a much older text by a much wiser being. I will not post that Christians should not worry about the new design of a coffee-chain’s cups because that was never brought up by any true Christian except in jest or pharisaical judgement of a straw man.

Today I am ashamed to be a Christian, not because so many of us believe there is a war on Christmas being perpetrated by the red hue of a coffee cup and so few spoke against it. I am ashamed to be a Christian because so many non-Christians lined up to mock the body of Christ as hypocrites and so many Christians joined in the taunts or remained silent. Merry Christmas everybody, from one scoundrel who doesn’t deserve to be called a child of God to another, Merry Christmas

The Sporting Life

In 532 Constantinople was rocked by a series of riots that put the entire Roman Empire in peril of self-destruction. The lofty empire had, of course, seen better days; but the rising of Islam and Western Europe were still off in the Horizon. No one could equal its power and prestige. Its influence in its vicinity was second to none. So what could have caused these riots to break out? Simple, one sports team didn’t like another sports team. As one side was victorious, the other side took to torching the city.

This of course seems to be a common occurrence in America these days. I was embarrassed a few years ago when downtown Columbus witnessed such barbaric behavior; but the Buckeyes aren’t the only place where this happens. George Carlin once famously pointed out that American culture is divided into two very different mindsets with two very different sports at the center. One sport is baseball and the other is football. One represents coming home, business acumen, and the American pastoral; the other is terribly reminiscent of war. Over the years baseball’s allure has waned, while football seems to take up more and more daytime, night time, and airtime. (It is quite literally the only fantasy many men do not feel ashamed participating in either.) Despite the very aggressive nature of the game and the recent scientific evidence that it is leading to deaths and disabilities; Americans seem to love it even more.

However, even more troubling is the sport’s mentality which is seeping into every part of our nation’s consciousness. Politics is not a place for ideas, but a winner take all blood sport. Our schools are becoming more defined by what happens on gridiron than what happens in the classrooms. Our relationships are based more on who is right and wrong; than on caring for one another. 

We can simply look back on Nika riots of Constantinople and laugh, but each day we involve ourselves in the mini-riots. Each day we slash and burn relationships with people because we have to be on the right side. We have to beat someone to be better. We have to win. 

There is a violence to being right at all costs. Bonhoeffer famously addresses this in Ethics when he discusses the fact that human beings have now become arbiters of right and wrong. When we love being right, rather than reconciling another human being with what is right; we are just as guilty as they are because we become the ultimate judges of the universe. 

At the end of Nika, the emperor courted the faction opposed to the rebels. The allied with him and 30,000 rebels were slaughtered. That isn’t the end of the story though. The fighting without a purpose came to dominate the Byzantine empire and would eventually fall. When you embrace a faction to point blind obedience, your end is insured. When you embrace a purpose with the aim of helping one another, your future remains unwritten. Time will tell if Americans will abandon “the bloodsport mentality” of winner-take-all for the hard work of life together; but that is a victory I long to see.