Jun 30, 2010
Christian means nothing.
To refer to peregrinating Celtic monks and fundamentalist lobbyists, Origen and Oral Roberts, the Desert Fathers and Tim LaHaye, Dante and Tammy Faye, St. Francis and the TV “Prosperity Gospel” hucksters, Lady Julian of Norwich and Jimmy Swaggart, John of the Cross and George W. Bush, all as “Christian” stretches the word so thin its meaning vanishes. The term “carbon-based life-form” is as informative.
David James Duncan, God Laughs & Plays, 49
I’m all about Christians looking different than the world (which is I think one of the subtexts here) and too much passes for “Christian” that is manifestly not, but isn’t this just another example of wanting to draw narrower lines than God does? Try this:
“To refer to former harlots like Mary Magdalene and high-brow folks like Joseph of Arimathea, robed Pharisees like Paul and Nicodemus and compromising tax collectors like Matthew, Simon the Jewish Zealot and Cornelius the Gentile God-fearer, Luke the medical doctor and Peter the unwashed fisherman, all as “Christian” stretches the word so thin its meaning vanishes.” Just saying…
Oh and it also seems that the list is intentionally contrasting older catholic (small “c”) luminaries with modern, Southern, pop evangelicals (LaHaye, Swaggart, Bush, Roberts). Is the point that Southern, pop evangelicalism is not a legitimate form of Christianity in any sense? That these folks and those who follow them have no right to the title? Are southern pop evangelicals the new “tax collectors and sinners”? “Surely Jesus wouldn’t hang out with THEM!”
Sorry, one more thing. Latin monks had big problems with Celtic monks and “won” the argument by convincing the king of Northumbria (in England) that the Pope had St. Peter’s keys and would keep him out of heaven if he didn’t adopt Roman Christianity (look up “Synod of Whitby). Origen was a universalist who believed in the pre-existence of human souls and that demons would eventually be reconciled to God. Julian of Norwich was an English mystic who had intense visions of divine love. They get to be “in” but Tim LaHaye doesn’t because he believes in the rapture and wrote some goofy novels? George W doesn’t because he invaded Iraq?
I know I’m reading between the lines here, but the list is not accidental. It doesn’t simply point to the diversity of expressions of Christianity (Look at the Korean Presbyterians and the Nigerian Anglicans and John Calvin and John Wesley and Gregory of Nazanius and the apostle Paul and Pope Benedict and Charlemagne. Doesn’t God save some crazy people?). The point has something to do with a certain type of American-evangelicalism. I’m just not sure what it is.
You make some terrific points. For some reason, it’s so easy to forget just how screwed up some of the Christians of the Bible were at different points in their walk. Thanks for the reminder.
That’s the beauty of Christianity… it is not a race or philosphy or language… it is not how you dress or how much make up you wear, or where you live or how much money you make…and it is certainly not about politics.
Christianity is what all of these people have in common.
It is not what we want it to be.
So I do have a profound connection to Oral Roberts and Celtic monks (I sing both of their songs), and I love this connection.
answers 1 & 2 rock!
The first response I think is far more clever and well put than the original quote itself (though I agree that the quote is provocative and interesting enough to deserve a place here). Two things:
1. The “carbon based life forms” comment is so obviously overblown that it seems silly even for intentional hyperbole. There are bunches of people through history that have never called themselves Christians, but these people did. Rather than simply stating that the term signifies nothing, I think it’s more interesting to ask “What can be the common thread(s) amongst these very different people who call themselves Christians?”
2. There’s a fair argument that at least one of those individuals may not have been a Christian at all despite whatever they may have called themselves. I don’t think anyone would want to say that the phrase “follower of Christ” is meaningless, and yet all of those people would probably call themselves “followers of Christ.” The phrase or the term denotes something very meaningful. I think it would be more useful to say that a profession of Christian faith alone (through whatever terminology) doesn’t tell us much about the actual state of the soul of the one making the profession.
As long as there are Non-Christians, Agnostics, Buddhists, then “Christian” will mean something. Generally the problem with vague words is not a lack of meaning, but a problem of a multitude of meanings.
I think that one of the main problems with modern day Christianity is that it HAS invaded our society but through politics power and culture. Being “christian” is easy and thus takes little sacrifice. You look at places like China however where Christians are oppressed and it flourishes.
Also, I think that we have confused tradition and teachings with learning and self-evaluation of what we really believe.
I grew up Southern Baptist and saw just how truly ignorant many Christians are. The whole heart of our belief is about good towards common man is more important than any sort of technicality or legality, yet we still do things like cast out homosexuals and even people who don’t dress like us. (There was an elder in my church literally escort out a guest who had never been to church before because he was wearing a hat)
I enjoyed reading these thoughtful comments. Nice to see light instead of only heat and smoke.
Matthew 7:21-23 “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. On that day many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?’ And then will I declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.’
This quote hits on something I’ve been wondering about for the past few years. Namely, when is a title so abused and misleading that it ceases to be an honest description of yourself at all?
I lived in Iraq for a year and found that describing myself as a Christian was downright unhelpful. In the ears of my Muslim friends if I called myself a Christian I was saying I was a historic Middle Eastern Catholic (Assyrian/Chalean), that I believed in three Gods (Mary, Jesus, and the Father), condoned the crusades, and that I loved to get drunk and sleep around. So every time I described myself as a Christian I had to spend a long time attempting to clarify what I meant, “Everything about your definition of a Christian is what I’m not…” The local Muslim-background believers understood that they needed a clearer statement of identity and used different titles to describe themselves: believers in Jesus, disciples of Jesus, people of the gospel (Injili). So they avoided having to redefine the long-held, history-laden, cultural understanding of what a Christian is, but still had to explain what these new titles meant and usually came away from the conversation being viewed as “some kind of Christian,” anyway. Still, they abandoned the historical title, “Christian” (Masihi) without betraying orthodoxy at all or any allegiance to Christ or his global body, and perhaps at the same time created some new categories for their unsaved friends.
Coming back to the States I was more aware than ever that the only people who got the right idea when I described myself as a Christian were a certain brand of conservative evangelicals. But to many, calling yourself a Christian in the States means that you hate gays, are a die-hard Republican, and are constantly passing judgment on those around you. Or perhaps that you are pleasant universalist who happens to like Jesus, the kind of person that makes a nice neighbor.
In our country alone “Christian” includes Catholics, liberal Protestants, and millions of Bible-belters who said a prayer at VBS when they were little but haven’t ever really been regenerated. If even a tenth of those who currently call themselves Christians are actually believers, then should I still refer to myself as a Christian? Or am I being misleading/deceptive because what I mean by Christian is so far away from what someone hears when I say Christian? Is it more helpful to introduce a new title that will still require explanation but avoids getting you put in a box? (e.g. follower of Jesus – currently popular on facebook religious descriptions). Or is it inevitable that true Christians will always be misunderstood and labeled and have to patiently explain themselves? After all, early Christians were commonly believed to be cannibals in Rome, yet they kept their title. On the other hand, like the Iraqi believers, what would we lose by letting go of the title, Christian, when describing ourselves to unbelievers?
I haven’t myself arrived yet at a conclusion to this question. Currently I call myself a Christian when speaking to the churched and try to avoid labels when in evangelistic conversations.
However, it seems that David James Duncan would advocate throwing out the title… One side of me hears what he’s saying.