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Feb. 2nd, 2010 01:26 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
avevale_intelligencerPaul Cornell said this.
"I say there's no excuse for Christian homophobia. The New Testament references are tiny. There's nothing at all from Christ. But most importantly, he told us that when the book's wrong, you chuck the book and love."
Which is the distinction I've been trying to find between the people who call themselves Christians and preach hate and real Christians, the distinction that's been called a "no true Scotsman" argument by those who need all their enemies to be easily identified and labelled, and don't much care who else gets swept up in the process. That is the difference between someone who believes what Christ taught, and someone who is simply hiding behind a label that he thinks will guarantee him immunity from exposure.
It's real. It's there. And it took a better writer than me to put it into five simple words that I bloody well should have been able to find.
Chuck the book, and love. That's it.
EDIT: it is true that I have a history of being passive-aggressive. It's a flaw I recognise in myself and try to combat. So, let's try some active aggressiveness.
Yes, in fact, I do believe that if a person or an organisation does not adhere to the principles of Christianity as I understand them then that person or organisation is not in my understanding of the term Christian. Whether it be the Westboro Baptists, Pat Buchanan, James Anderton, Tony Blair, or the Pope in Rome and all his hierarchy of cardinals and priests. I don't care how many fancy frocks they wear, how often they wave the Bible at me, or whether their church was personally founded by God, with a marching band of Thrones and Dominations in attendance. If they don't understand "chuck the book and love," if they don't understand "forgive those that trespass against us," if they haven't got the message of the Good Samaritan, or the point of the crucifixion itself, then they have failed the entrance examination and they are not worthy to be called Christian. The alternative seems to me to be tantamount to saying that all you have to do to be a Christian is to say you're one. Which is like saying all you have to do to be a policeman is put on a badge.
And just as not all the fake crop circles in the world can convincingly eliminate the possibility that at least one might be genuine, not all the fake Christians in the world can invalidate the real message of Christ. Which is that all the hate, all the persecution, all the violence and all the bigotry...has to stop. And every day that it doesn't...every day that the sick and the evil and the power-crazed and the greedy use Christ's name to justify atrocities against their fellow man...Christ is crucified again. And again. And again. And again. And again. Ten thousand times over, every day. When we do it to the least of his people, we do it to him. God won't make us stop. We have to do it ourselves, because we have to understand why we need to stop, and we have to find that understanding for ourselves, because otherwise we'll never own it. And when we come to that understanding, we will at last have begun to grow.
At least, that's my take on it.
"I say there's no excuse for Christian homophobia. The New Testament references are tiny. There's nothing at all from Christ. But most importantly, he told us that when the book's wrong, you chuck the book and love."
Which is the distinction I've been trying to find between the people who call themselves Christians and preach hate and real Christians, the distinction that's been called a "no true Scotsman" argument by those who need all their enemies to be easily identified and labelled, and don't much care who else gets swept up in the process. That is the difference between someone who believes what Christ taught, and someone who is simply hiding behind a label that he thinks will guarantee him immunity from exposure.
It's real. It's there. And it took a better writer than me to put it into five simple words that I bloody well should have been able to find.
Chuck the book, and love. That's it.
EDIT: it is true that I have a history of being passive-aggressive. It's a flaw I recognise in myself and try to combat. So, let's try some active aggressiveness.
Yes, in fact, I do believe that if a person or an organisation does not adhere to the principles of Christianity as I understand them then that person or organisation is not in my understanding of the term Christian. Whether it be the Westboro Baptists, Pat Buchanan, James Anderton, Tony Blair, or the Pope in Rome and all his hierarchy of cardinals and priests. I don't care how many fancy frocks they wear, how often they wave the Bible at me, or whether their church was personally founded by God, with a marching band of Thrones and Dominations in attendance. If they don't understand "chuck the book and love," if they don't understand "forgive those that trespass against us," if they haven't got the message of the Good Samaritan, or the point of the crucifixion itself, then they have failed the entrance examination and they are not worthy to be called Christian. The alternative seems to me to be tantamount to saying that all you have to do to be a Christian is to say you're one. Which is like saying all you have to do to be a policeman is put on a badge.
And just as not all the fake crop circles in the world can convincingly eliminate the possibility that at least one might be genuine, not all the fake Christians in the world can invalidate the real message of Christ. Which is that all the hate, all the persecution, all the violence and all the bigotry...has to stop. And every day that it doesn't...every day that the sick and the evil and the power-crazed and the greedy use Christ's name to justify atrocities against their fellow man...Christ is crucified again. And again. And again. And again. And again. Ten thousand times over, every day. When we do it to the least of his people, we do it to him. God won't make us stop. We have to do it ourselves, because we have to understand why we need to stop, and we have to find that understanding for ourselves, because otherwise we'll never own it. And when we come to that understanding, we will at last have begun to grow.
At least, that's my take on it.
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no subject
Date: 2010-02-02 03:11 pm (UTC)Don't Get Me Started. ;-)