I did not come up with the following rationale on my own,
rather I listened to a good friend who is a deeper thinker than myself
explaining to someone why they were a Christian and found it to be one of the
best and most rational reasons for giving the Bible a good looking into that I
had ever heard. On this our most
important, and sacred day of the year it seems like a good topic for the
blog. I was already a Christian when I
heard it, but if I hadn’t been it would have caused me to do some serious
thinking about the issue.
The empty tomb of Easter Sunday is an extremely compelling
thing. Roughly 2,000 years ago – a sizable group of people saw something they could not explain: a man who
apparently rose from the dead.
Christianity, in it’s infancy at the time, was basically a
lunatic fringe offshoot group of Judaism which was viewed with great suspicion
by the government in power. After all,
its leader had just been very publicly executed in an excruciatingly painful
way – shortly after which his followers were hiding out in terror of meeting
the same fate.
And then that leader turned up again – very much alive. Had this been some kind of hoax pulled off by
the tiny, powerless and frightened group of people in question it would have
been a very easy one to put down.
Instead – it grew. Instead – more
people saw him, and saw him, and touched him, and heard him speak, and the
lunatic fringe group only continued to grow like a wildfire despite all of
those holding power at the time wanting it to go away.
More than any feeling I may have, I find this simple set of
straightforward historical details well worth some looking into.
Hallelujah, my Redeemer lives!
Why I don’t claim to be a Christian: Because I’ve met and witnessed far, far too many self-proclaimed Christians of a variety of denominations use, rather than the Gospels, the minutiae of Holy Scripture to justify some of the most un-Christ-like behavior imaginable. Christ preached unconditional love and care for all; the loudest Christians today preach hatred, selfishness, and intolerance.
ReplyDeleteI understand your frustration because I often share it. I find it interesting though, that your decision not to be a Christian isn’t based on the tenants of the founder of the religion itself (which you seem to find good) but rather on the behavior of people who claim to follow those tenants – but are very obviously not doing so.
DeleteQuite simply – the people you are talking about aren’t Christians, they merely claim to be. I can claim to be a Buddhist but if I do it while slaughtering innocent animals “in the name of Buddha” I’m quite obviously full of crap and, in reality, I have nothing whatsoever to do with peaceful Buddhism.
Words are meaningless, but actions speak volumes.
Also – if I know you in my life – I am deeply sorry that the way I live mine has failed to change your opinion of the faith at all. If I do not know you, then I sincerely hope you encounter some real Christians in the future rather than empty charlatans.
Anonymous - Specific examples of "the loudest Christians today preach hatred, selfishness, and intolerance," please. Note that to count for this purpose, they must be "loud" in that Christians actually listen to them, not "loud" in that they are a favorite source of inflammatory statements for non-Christian sources. Also, definitions of "hatred, selfishness, and intolerance" which amount to "they disagree with me on which social and political polices will best help people" do not count as "hatred, selfishness, and intolerance".
ReplyDeleteIt's a very popular meme that "they" say these terrible things, but going to church and listening to WFIL Christian talk radio, I don't hear them. I suppose all groups have their problem children and we all tend to hear only the bad stuff from groups that are opposed to our news sources. Certainly I could tell you stories about people calling for unpleasant things to be done to me because of my religion, my gun ownership, my gender, my race.
I totally get not wanting to be associated with "Christians", for example the Westboro Baptist Church which is actually a hate group. But it's hard to judge all Christians by one small group of cruel and confused people, just as it's hard to judge all people who ascribe to other religions or beliefs by their small groups of associated crazies, it's unfair to everyone. I'm sorry you've had bad experiences and met people who were hypocritical and/or hurtful. I hope you meet some Christians who are actually Jesus-like someday, as well as great people from any religious affiliation or set of beliefs! :)
ReplyDelete