Gradually over the past few years, my evangelical sister and I have been sharing a respectful dialogue about the complex mix of homosexuality, religion and politics in our society. She and others in my family were Bush and McCain voters and very concerned about abortion and gay issues. I recently sent her an article about the seeming recent demise of Evangelicalism which she found interesting and replied with another article from the Christian Chronicle on the same theme suggesting that Evangelicalism is not dying, but perhaps refocusing to being less political. I want to share here my reply to her.
Yeah, the article you sent was also thoughtful and interesting. I think much of his perspective can be agreed with. You may have heard of or already seen this recent Newsweek cover article. It started a huge internet conversation. The title is a bit of a stretch I think, but it points out some very interesting information.
http://www.newsweek.com/...
Here's a recent Newsweek column by Anna Quindlen that may seem unrelated at first thought, but the gay issue in our society has a direct bearing on what's happening to Christianity in general and Evangelicalism as a political force. With the recent gay marriage news out of Iowa, Vermont, Wash DC and perhaps soon New York (and California when the Supreme Court there makes a decision this summer).....well, I think the dam is bursting. We are near the point of no return on gay marriage, if not already past it. And Don't Ask, Don't Tell is in it's final months.
http://www.newsweek.com/...
Tho skirmishes remain, the Religious Right has lost the culture war. I'm sure you are among those who lament that and regard it as another sign of the falling away of faith that Jesus mentioned. Well, he may have been right, but might have had a perspective that many religious Christians aren't thinking of.
Education and critical thinking are anathema to religion. If there is a falling away, it is precisely because the "noisier" Christians have become too political while at the same time unable to present rational justifications for many of their cherished prejudices that, after centuries of social and political power, are finally being questioned......and are not standing up to rational examination. What prejudices, you may ask? Well, just ask the slaves. Oh, hmmm, guess you can't do that now. OK, how bout asking women who can't vote. Um....ok, how bout interracial marriage. Well, oh my, that won't work either. Hey, how bout blacks in the military.......oh! Well, damn, homosexuals are all that's left to go after, but now they're talking back too, and with intelligent argument. We know, for instance that the early Christians sanctioned same sex unions before fledgling Christianity became a patriarchal, sex obsessed Roman Catholic political organization.
You see, for centuries no one dared question the reigning power of "Christian" Biblical interpretation. It was always right, therefore it must always be right. Circular reasoning of course, but since they controlled the levers of social and political power, they could lop off your insubordinate head or torture and burn you if you bucked the system or, more recently, just bash you with a baseball bat, or gun butt and tie you to a Wyoming fence to die slowly and alone. Even until the 1990's, two men could be arrested and jailed for making love in their own bedroom until the Supreme Court said, "Um....NO!!" The most recent story making the viral rounds right now is that of the 11 year old black boy who hanged himself because he could no longer stand the anti-gay harassment he was getting in school, never mind that he never self-identified as gay but was only PERCEIVED to be. And the school ignored his mother's pleas until too late.
The traditional religious argument against homosexuals cannot be seriously defended even scripturally. It is, at last, getting the critical examination it never had, and does not stand up to scrutiny. For centuries FEAR kept all kinds of questioning at bay, but people have begun to understand that it never was God that was to be feared, but THE CHURCH and now the church is beginning to look silly at best, if not downright evil and part of the problems.
The religious conservatives have not come up with rational arguments against homosexuals and gay marriage; they became too political and made the electorate nervous by taking over the Republican Party and moving it too much in the direction of theocratic fascism focusing on homosex and abortion while winking at much greater financial and political immorality (they being a great part of both); the latest Pope is busy making himself look like a demented old fool declaring, among other things, that condoms contribute to the spread of disease; one after another, so-called conservative political and religious leaders are getting caught in their own hypocrisy, while a holier-than-thou President, wallowing in unprecedented political corruption, deceived us into war and economic ruin, and is now, along with his puppet master, beginning to look seriously like a war criminal. He made religious people look like fools. Small wonder religion is taking a beating. And frankly, about time.
"Religion" is failing, as it must as a new era of Spirituality is beginning. Jesus' essence was a Spirit of Love that became corrupted by religion. Whether or not you subscribe to his godlike ability to see the future, you must suspect he understood what would happen and that in time, we would begin to understand it also and begin to change our thinking about "religion". I think THAT is what is beginning to happen throughout humanity but particularly in America. A falling away from religion is not the same as falling away from faith tho it may well be the same for those who's "faith" is not really in God, but in unexamined tradition, something that is obviously tragically the case for millions. I am beginning to believe that His second coming is not going to be a temporal thing, but rather a spiritual evolution in humanity tho I concede it may, somehow, be a combination of both.
We are transitioning into a new age. The end time prophecies of Jesus, Daniel, Nostradamus or Edgar Cayce, the astrological transition from competitive Pisces to peaceful Aquarius, the end of the Mayan calendar and 2012 cosmological planetary/galaxy juxtapositions.....they are all interestingly coming together in time. But, whether thru cosmological, environmental, social or political upheaval, that spiritual process will include terrible birth pains and I think we are seeing the beginnings of that painful evolution that you might more traditionally think of as Revelations.
If you really believe in your Bible, then you know that "God is Love, and he who lives in Love, lives in God, and God lives in him" (1 John 4:16) and that "Love is the only law you need" (Rom 13:10). All the other "rules" are merely part of our own egotistical, self-righteous inventions, personal prejudices, and fallible interpretations. We must love our world and our humanity, not think of both as part of the fallen evil.
If you think about it, you can see that the historically religious dualism (evil earth and humanity/good spirit and religion) has been the great deception all along and the primary contributor to most of our worldly difficulties, for "as a (person) thinketh, so is (s)he". For example: Our family grew up in a religious tradition of being "unworthy" of God's love. How many times did we (and do you still?) say some variation of, "Oh, Lord, tho I am unworthy....." ? Well, that kind of thinking carried over and crippled me in many other areas of life until it occurred to me (very late) that it had to be a lie designed to maintain religion's power over me. After all, if I was so unworthy, then Jesus was apparently a fool to die for me, so logically, I must be worthy if he is not to be thought a fool, which he obviously was not......unless a fool for love.
As for homosexuality; well, Love is Love and "in Christ (Love) there is no male or female." Whatever anyone may think of how I have loved in my life, my epitaph will be very simple.
"I have loved," something I stopped fearing 20 years ago.