Thursday, April 19, 2012

When You Talk About God and Church, Exact Words Mean Everything

          From Ghandi to the Huffington Post, there have been hackneyed slogans, titles and discourse that discuss or criticize the current state of “church” or compare “church” or “religion” to Jesus. And this isn’t just from those who don’t regularly attend church or consider themselves biblically illiterate. Author Dan Kimball and the ministry Spoken Word have partaken as well. 
          Of course it is the admonishment to every Christian (of which the Church consists) to strive to be more like Jesus in their life and work, but the problem with these eye-catching and popular editorials is that they sometimes speak in so many unqualified terms and phrases (on which they don’t elaborate) that I often don’t really understand what they’re trying to say. (Some of these are the words in quotes in the above paragraph). And sometimes their operating definitions (more likely a connotation I don’t know) are just plain wrong. 
          Take, for example, Andrew Sullivan’s Christianity in Crisis - Forget the Church; Follow Jesus, which made the cover of Newsweek. What does he mean by “church”? Churches with certain teachings or practices? A certain denomination? All Christian organizations? All gatherings of (or individual) Christ-followers altogether? Readers are somewhat left to either wonder or interpret for themselves in radically and eerily different directions. Also, when he said to “follow Jesus,” did he flesh out that concept using the stories of Jesus’s actual followers? No, he actually used Thomas Jefferson’s incomplete picture of Jesus that more portrays a passive, overtly-apolitical, non-impacting, ascetic lifestyle of privatized spirituality. That’s not following Jesus. And what does he mean by “crisis”? I could go on.
          To be fair, ambiguity and error in terms, I believe, happen within the Church as well. Spoken Word’s video “Why I Hate Religion But Love Jesus” made a lot of rounds in cyberspace and even got a review in Christianity Today. But its definition of “religion” was largely limited to American self-righteous legalism and hypocrisy, whereas the definition of religion (even if we’re just talking about Christianity) encompasses much more. The video might have left some confused about the relationship between law and grace, and it certainly poisoned the well of all local churches who don’t suffer from Pharisaical aspects.
          Also, the appropriate response to questions can heavily depend on such definitions. When Diana Butler Bass of the Huffington Post writes that Americans long for churches without “inflexible dogma,” what does she mean? If she’s referring to theological and cultural non-essentials (e.g. philosophy of education, musical preference, earth’s age, etc.) that a church has wrongfully canonized on par with Gospel Truth, then yes, I understand her allegation. But if this “inflexible dogma” refers to the deity of Jesus Christ, the Doctrine of Atonement or another essential where the Bible seems clear, we can’t compromise on that. Again, I don’t know what Bass is referring to. Otherwise, I could provide a response.
          Choose words wisely. No doubt that some ambiguity and exaggeration using certain words was intended, perhaps for more readership or spice, but people that are striving to be mature Bible-readers and Jesus-imitators, like myself, honestly want to have a productive conversation. 

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