Wednesday, April 11, 2012

Authentic Christianity

I've come to the point where I'm beginning to wonder how it's possible for someone to be socially conservative and a Christian. I never had a problem with being a gay Christian because I know God created me gay. My same-gender love has always been a matter of just that- love. But people aren't born bigots... And I am pretty darn sure bigotry is not a call from God.
To me, "social conservative" and "fiscal conservative" are mutually exclusive concepts, though one person can embrace both in his/her own personal philosophy. I understand that there are two major economic philosophies in this country. We have labeled them "liberal" and "conservative." I am personally fiscally liberal and socially liberal, but in what I wrote above, I was strictly talking about social liberalism (as it relates to Christianity). I believe that Jesus preached a "social Gospel" which concerned the poor, the marginalized, and the taboo. Contemporary social conservatives seem to embrace various mixes of white privilege and supremacy, homophobia/transphobia (and hetero-supremacy), sexism/misogyny, and many more exclusive biases. The definition of bigotry: "stubborn and complete intolerance of any creed, belief, or opinion that differs from one's own." In my study of Christian Scripture, such philosophies are incompatible with Christian teachings and are actually institutionalized evils.

What is has meant to be a "Christian" has changed innumerable times over the past two millennia. Dominant Christian cultures have been far too exclusive/bigoted in my opinion. When a misconstrued ideal of Jesus gets molded into an idol and is raised as the pinnacle of government, blasphemy has occurred because Jesus has been divorced from his teachings. The Religious Right can call themselves "Christian" all they want to, but they have just become as the legalistic religious leaders that Jesus challenged in his day. Authentic Christianity follows the teachings of Jesus: love for God and all people, care for all people (servanthood), and peacemaking.

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