Christianity is Not an Option
Let me tell you why.
It was not an easy thing to turn my back on Christianity at nearly 60 years of age. Since my childhood, church had been the hub of social life for me. Prayer had started every meal, and Christian ritual had solemnized the sacred moments and transition points of life. Many of my mentors and advisors had been ministers of one denomination or another.
What’s more, the congregations I had joined were filled with joyful, caring people, people trying to live good and healthy lives, folks I could respect. They were extended family to me, interested in my opinions and accepting of my foibles.
And church was music. I joined my first choir in third grade, discovering a love of singing and of choral harmony that has not diminished in the 60 years that followed, during which I would sing countless solos, direct some fine church choirs, and write or arrange a handful of anthems. That was probably the hardest loss to face, but one may sing in other places.
As for Christian doctrine, it had been some years since I was able to believe — in any concrete sense — most of what the Christian Bible says about the world’s beginnings, the history of the Hebrew people, or the life of Yeshua of Nazareth. That was all right, though. I was comfortable inhabiting the cosmic metaphors of Creator and Messiah, and the sacred myths whose characters were Pharisees and fishermen, prostitutes and tax collectors, angels, lepers, shepherds, kings, lost sheep, and Roman soldiers. I could see the truth within the book, even if it wasn’t literal.
. . . inhabiting the cosmic metaphors . . .
It was all right, even if I couldn’t buy the bits regarding heaven or salvation. Even though I was disgusted by the doctrine of the “substitutiary atonement” — Jesus died because God’s law demands a human sacrifice to pay for all our sins. I could overlook all that because the central figure in the story preached a vision of a kingdom I could get on board with building here on earth. Looking out for one another, seeing others as your equal in importance, seeking justice for the poor and the oppressed, opting for forgiveness over retribution, showing up when there was work to do, and living humbly as a part of a community. That was what religion meant — still means — to me.
That was why I had to leave. Not because I lost faith in the work some churches do: feeding hungry people, speaking out against the marginalization of immigrants, minorities, and other-gendered people, lobbying for justice, teaching peace. But because the church at large, beginning with the Christian church in the United States, has turned away from that kind of religion.
That was why I had to leave.
To be a Christian these days is a political statement, a statement that my conscience can no longer tolerate. Christianity in 21st Century America has come to represent:
Arrogance. Humility, once the crown of Christian virtues, has been shoved aside in favor of a smug and overbearing pride. Christians teach their children to look down on members of other denominations, mistrust the unchurched, and despise the followers of all non-Christian faiths. Christians claim to be more virtuous than all the rest of us. Christians (like the followers of many religions) claim to be the only ones who know The Truth.
Ignorance. Christian fundamentalism, a movement that began (in this country) around 1910, started with biblical inerrancy and the rejection of evolution and eventually devolved into mistrust of science in general. It is seen as virtue in these circles to be able to believe what rational thought rejects as utter nonsense. Fundamentalists also promote revisionist history, such as denying the holocaust in WW2, the genocide of indigenous nations in North America, and the grim history of slavery in the US. Many Christian parents now home-school their children to shield them from exposure to a world where truth is data-driven rather than defined by doctrine.
Bigotry. The Christian religion has been used in America as justification for perpetuating slavery, prohibiting interracial marriage, hating Jews, and persecuting anyone whose sexuality isn’t strictly hetero. Nothing in the teachings of Jesus justifies such animus, but the prevailing assumption seems to be that God supports the status quo and the traditions of our clan. Or Klan. As in the “Christian Knights of the Ku Klux Klan,” whose best known symbol is a burning cross. When I was growing up in Louisiana, private “Christian schools” sprang up after 1964 to cater to white parents fleeing integration.
Misogyny. “Traditional family values” for a Christian (or a Muslim, Jew, or Hindu) require that women be subordinated to male authority, restricted in their movements, and denied many freedoms men enjoy, while working longer days and being on call 24/7. The most conservative Christian churches still require that wives submit to husbands in all things, including physical and sexual abuse. Fundamentalist movements, regardless of what religion they are attached to, are invariably patriarchal.
Child abuse. Proverbs 13:24 is often abbreviated, “Spare the rod and spoil the child.” Christian parents have for generations used that verse to justify literally beating their children with sticks as well as other forms of harsh physical discipline. (Just for the record, the sherod in that verse is the hook-shaped shepherd’s staff, which was used to guide sheep, not to beat them.)
Economic inequality. Jesus talked a lot about the poor. He ridiculed the rich. He said it would be easier to squeeze your SUV through a revolving door than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven. He said those who have a lot should sell it all and give the money to the poor. Do you hear that message now from Christian pulpits? Not so much. Give, yes — to the church, which can be trusted to pass something on to the “deserving” poor. (Assuming something’s left after paying for the new wing on the pastor’s mansion.) And God will bless you in return with ten times more, since modern Jesus wants you to be rich!
Hypocrisy. Modern American Christianity, especially the evangelical type, involves not just accepting all of the above, but also publicly supporting a lying, cheating, treasonous, racist billionaire who hates democracy. With a straight face. Because the God of love commands you to.
And finally,
War. Every religion preaches peace. Jesus told his followers to “Love your enemies,” by which I think he meant, “Don’t kill them.” Yet his religion, like most other major world religions, has been the excuse for more bloody violence over the centuries than any other cause with the possible exception of human greed. And the modern American version of Christianity has been outspoken in its rubber-stamp support of every military action taken by our so-called leaders.
Jesus told his followers to “Love your enemies,” by which I think he meant, “Don’t kill them.”
“Not all Christians.”
I hope it’s clear from the opening paragraphs of my article — reread them if it isn’t — that I’m not saying that ALL Christians or ALL Christian churches in this country are guilty of the attitudes and actions I described. In fact, there are many major denominations that actively resist the right-wing agenda by preaching what that wandering Rabbi actually taught. I have no quarrel with those who belong to congregations working to restore humanity to human culture. Attempting, as it were, to change our institutions from the inside.
I just can’t do it anymore, myself.
It’s a political decision. I don’t deny it. To me, the Christian Church at large — meaning the part of it that gets the headlines in America — has sold its birthright for a mess of pottage (see Genesis 25:29–34) and given in to the temptation Jesus resisted (Matthew 4:8–9). It has given up its holy mandate to speak truth to power, because it wants that power for itself.
The Christian Church is now the very standard-bearer for the status quo. Which leaves me no choice but to stand against it.
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