First: the actual context. Israel has a long history of using culture as a means of normalizing the oppression and mistreatment of Arabs in Palestine. We all know the Arab-Israel conflict is complicated and no one is helped by antagonism or violence, least of all from the side with all the power. I support Israel's existence, but I can't support the way it treats Palestinians. The very fact the artist himself doesn't want the piece displayed in this context should be reason enough to change something.
My bigger concern, though, is with those trolls and click-baiters looking to use this to inflame the old "Christians are persecuted in the US" trope. That's irresponsible for a number of reasons. One, pretty importantly, a large part of US "Christianity" these days is just a cover for specific social or political beliefs that stand up better under the banner of religion. That's nothing new to Christianity - our popular theology and practice has been shaped by politics for centuries; religion is not inherently the opiate of the masses, but it sure works well for that purpose.
The second issue, connected somewhat, is simply the scriptural tradition of such prophetic statements of religious hypocrisy, perhaps unfaithfulness would be a more welcome word (although I doubt it). This image is meant to express how society treats consumerism like religion, maybe not with words, but certainly with our actions. Western Christianity is far more concerned with immediate gratification, comfort, and power than with anything resembling "Biblical" Christianity.
That's also nothing particularly new, which is precisely the point.
The Hebrew Scriptures (Old Testament) is chock full of confrontations between court prophets and those who end up becoming the writers (or at least subjects) of scripture itself. The court prophets told the people (and especially the rulers) precisely what they wanted to hear: you're doing a good job, things are looking up, we're right to live the way we do. Prophets like Isaiah and Jeremiah are pointing out the sins of the people, the hypocrisy, and error. They're pointing out the areas in which God's people fall short; an important elements of any faithful religious belief.
Statues like this one make a very traditional prophetic statement, even if the artist isn't from among God's people (I'm not sure if he's a Christian or not, but that's never really been an issue when God calls a prophet anyway). God's people hear the words of correction with humility rather than defensiveness. Yes, this image should anger you, as a Christian; it should be offensive. That doesn't make it bad.
In scripture, those people who decried public prophetic statements of religious hypocrisy were called false prophets. Something to remember as we engage with the realities of our own personal and collective imperfections.
Last week there was more than a little hubbub about Cam Newton, Carolina Panthers Quarterback and all-around mercurial dude. He answered a question about the routes one of his receivers was running - asked by a woman - by saying it was "funny" that a female was asking about routes.
It was a terribly awkward thing to say, made worse by the accompanying body language that came off as more than a little dismissive of someone just trying to do their job. The reporter said as much in a statement following the press conference - she was insulted, both personally, and on behalf of women and female sports journalists everywhere.
I think it's very likely Cam Newton is a sexist - or at the very least, felt like one in that moment - sexism is the devaluing of a person because of their sex, in our society, it's women, valued less than men for no real reason whatsoever. However, the actual words the man spoke merely expressed his feelings receiving that question in that moment - the interpretation of their meaning is left up to the beholder.
We know how the reporter felt - and rightly so - it seems most of the world agreed with her, again, that is their right. But the way in which this "story" was covered in the media took a slightly different tack. Instead of discussing what those words could mean and having opinions on those various meanings, most outlets I saw, heard, or experienced, decided that Cam Newton meant that women shouldn't be covering sports and proceeded to fill their time arguing against that point.
It may be a slight difference - and one not worth really arguing about since almost no one is giving Newton the benefit of the doubt here (although, in subsequent statements, Newton both admitted the reporter's interpretation of his words was correct and argued she didn't understand what he was trying to say). There's a large cultural point at play here, though: namely that we've reached a point where almost everyone is comfortable treating their own opinions as fact.
We don't really know what Cam Newton meant. In fact, in statements since the incident he's apologized for saying exactly what everyone thought he said and also defending himself, claiming he was merely commenting on how rare it is, still today, to see a women covering sports and that his comment was intended to be a complement.
The proper response to all this is to argue what should be the interpretation of the comments and explain why. We just didn't do that - we extrapolated meaning from the words and then claimed that meaning as fact.
It then happened again, in a different way, on Sunday - when the Vice President of the United States and the owner of Dallas Cowboys made statements that equated kneeling during the national anthem with disrespect of the flag, the country, and/or the military. These echo the comments of the President, but as we all know, in the current administration, the words of the President don't count until someone else repeats them.
Equating the various protests taking place at NFL games during the anthem with disrespect is certainly a valid opinion, but, of course, stating that opinion works against the direct statements of most of those very players - and, indeed, with Colin Kaepernick, the originator of the protest, who moved from sitting on the bench to kneeling specifically because he wanted to avoid the kind of disrespect Mike Pence and Jerry Jones happen to see.
Now I get that someone could mean no disrespect, but have their words or actions perceived as disrespectful anyway. Both parties, in that case, have a right to their intentions and opinions. But it is a far cry from fair to simply state your opinion as fact and cluelessly defend it. It's the kind of behavior you might expect from a twelve year old, whose brain development hasn't yet let them truly grapple with the reality of a non-binary argument. It's not the hallmark of mature individuals.
Yet here we are.
This is the world in which we live.
I find it particularly interesting that we're quick to call out those who devalue others. Sexist, racist, traitor - yet we seem to do it in such a way that we devalue those we accuse of devaluing others. If people are indeed people and worthy of respect simply because of that fact, then we should probably treat them that way.
That's not to say we don't oppose those ideas, actions, words, and opinions we deem to be wrong - but we need to do it in a way that honors and values the person who said, did, thought, or expressed them. People come up with the stupidest, most inane, illogical, and all-around terrible ideas out of great earnestness of thought. Not that every idea is a well-wrestled achievement, but many of even the stupidest truly are.
We should be able to say to or about Cam Newton: the words and actions he used the other day really make it sound like he doesn't think women should cover sports without automatically making our interpretations truth. The frickin' Vice President of the United States should be able to say, "your actions during the anthem bother people who love this country," and those players should be able to say to the Vice President of the United States, "the inaction of the country in the face of injustice bothers people (like me) who love this country," without having to denominze, devalue, and denude the dignity and respect of those who disagree.
I guess it's better radio, better tv, better click bait, to just make the most outrageous claim possible and wait for the fireworks. We can excuse it as business or marketing or entertainment all we want, but most people don't see it that way; they see it as life and death or at least a matter of honor. It's not just in good fun when its so pervasive and half the audience isn't in on the joke.
We've engaged the post-modern post-truth world in exactly the wrong way. Instead of coming into every conversation holding our facts and opinions lightly, willing to have our minds changed, we enter in combat mode, willing to denigrate the different and deny the validity of anything but my own ideas. One of the biggest problems we have right now in this country is that everyone thinks everything they think is a fact. When in reality, we could all use a little bit of humility...
...or maybe a lot.
Why does it feel like we always secretly hope, no matter how nice and accepting we are of other people, that they'll some day see the light and think like us? Yes, I suppose, on some selfish level, life would be easier if everyone thought exactly like me, but, really, if we're thinking about it, life would also kinda suck.
For one, there would be no one to tell us an idea is stupid until AFTER we've done it. Everyone would think it is a great idea and be really encouraging, right up until the point it goes horribly wrong, then they'd be all, "that was a terrible idea." Yeah, thanks. I got it.
We really need people to be different and think different. It's good for us. It's good for the world. We need to disagree. We need it. It's that important.
Now, of course, there are going to be some fundamental things that we'd like everyone to agree on - things like, "don't kill Ryan," that's a big one for me. Perhaps more generally, "don't kill people," but honestly, we don't really agree on that one anyway. The best we can hope is to be sincere in our desires, willing to change if our conscience leads us to do so, and respecting when others think differently.
I don't get this notion that my sincere beliefs should be those of other people. Yes, it's nice to have the validation when people do actually accept my reasons for belief and we do all need people who agree with us at some level for community and support, but why do we really expect everyone to agree?
This is especially troubling among Christians - who have (supposed) unity in Christ. It's not like we're coming from vastly different foundations when we disagree, we're essentially choosing different beliefs for the exact same reason.
I'll just call it out - my denomination responded to the Supreme Court ruling this week with a pretty well-worded conservative statement (as expected), explaining that its position has not changed and generally wishing good will towards all people. Great. But it ends with the line, "We pray that God will help us be examples of His truth in a world that needs to see God’s love demonstrated in word and deed more than ever."
This line could be construed just as it says - longing for truth - but earlier in the paragraph, truth was defined as a particular view of gay marriage. Now, I'm not expecting my denomination to change its stance over night (in fact, I think we ask the wrong questions and focus on the wrong things - as I've written about before), but it might be nice to be charitable and humble.
We're essentially saying, "We disagree and we hope God uses us to bring other people around to right thinking." I guess it's honest, if nothing else, which is good, but it's also sad.
I don't have a problem with what we believe (although I wish we'd talk about it better). I do have a problem with us assuming our convictions are definitive of a "Christian" of "faithful" position. It reeks of arrogance and it turns my stomach.
We also believe that we shouldn't drink alcohol. That's a Nazarene distinctive. We do it not because alcohol is inherently evil, but because we desire to be open to all people, even those who struggle with alcohol addiction or were hurt by its effects on their family, so we choose to forgo it as a means of supporting those people. Other Christians choose differently. We don't demonize them or use this veiled "truth" language to insinuate they're somehow wrong.
We just disagree.
As I said, I don't mind disagreement. It's a good thing. But we don't have to do it self-righteously. We also don't have to do it apologetically. Wouldn't the statement have looked better if instead of closing with a prayer that all people would be converted to our way of thinking we said something like, "We pray that God will help us be example of His truth in the world, that all people, ourselves included, would be converted to the Way of Christ, even if it means changing our long held beliefs."
That, to me, is the crux of real, healthy disagreement. I believe this, but I might be wrong. If I am, forgive me, but I can only do what I think is right. Let's keep talking and maybe one of us will change their mind, but if not, that's ok, too.
There have been a lot of comments about the newly dead "being with Jesus" or "meeting relatives in heaven," and the like. Sentiments, which can be very comforting, but which I don't believe are quite supported by scripture - at least not as definitively as everyone seems to believe.
One of those phrases has gotten be thinking - someone said, "I envy her being able to see Jesus face to face." It struck me strange. Obviously I admire Jesus quite a bit and I am certainly grateful for everything that he has done for us - at the same time I wonder if I would be starstruck meeting Jesus. What's more, I wonder if Jesus would ever have wanted me to be?
There's a lot made of Christ downplaying himself while on earth. He was always deferring to the Father and pointing people to God. There's little overt reference from Jesus concerning himself - so little, in fact, that there were hundreds of years of doctrinal controversies about whether Jesus Christ was God at all.
Perhaps because of those problems, we seem, today, to have relegated Jesus' humanity to the back-burner. Yes, Jesus is human, but he is God! The life, ministry, teaching, and gospels of Jesus Christ seem to do the opposite. There's a casual reference to his divinity, but mostly they are about the ways in which human beings can live in the way God created us to live.
We are not fascinated by Jesus because of his power, but because of his humility, because of his embrace of human frailty.
Jesus never asked to be worshiped. He never expected it. Most times when people tried, he rebuked them or asked them to wait for his death and resurrection. I'm not arguing that we should not worship Christ, but simply that it doesn't seem like something he wants us to do with him present in the room.
When I look forward to the consummation of all things, I look forward to a world of justice - where the wolf and the lamb lay together, where enemies embrace, and love reigns in the absence of fear and loneliness. I don't really look forward to spending time with Jesus, I look forward to living in the world he has created and redeemed.
I'm sure Jesus will spend plenty of time in eternity with each of his creatures. We are all beloved and important - from the most dedicated saint, to the lowliest plants and animals. I don't want to condemn our looking forward to any of that. I'm just not sure we're going to want to spend more time with Jesus than with anyone else.
If we really believe the words we speak and the power of the Holy Spirit - eternity begins now. While we await the fulfillment of the promise, the new Kingdom has already begun. We are already living into the future we'll live for eternity. Perhaps our worship of Jesus Christ is less about awe for the savior and more about loving those he loves.
In a world remade in love, in a word absent selfishness and sin, sure, Jesus is the reason we are here, but he's not any more important than anyone else - and I think that's precisely the way he wants it to be.
