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Killing Christianity

There is great fear in American society that Christianity is a dying religion, and its followers being persecuted.

Those who think this are right — but likely not for the reasons you expect.

Indeed, Jesus is dying yet a second time, even before His second coming. And it is not Jews and Romans putting him on the cross this time, nor is it even the invasion of Islam we have to fear: it is Christians themselves.

How? Christians, myself among them, have become deaf and defiant to His most righteous and imperative message. I take it from a story in Holy scripture, in which Pharisees, law experts, and Herodians were sent to test Jesus:

~Book of Mark, 12:28–31
The New Testament

In a land that is predominantly Christian, I have seen quite the antithesis of this commandment. Christianity is persecuted by selfish defiance of God. The behavior of the common Christian in America is certainly cause for Jesus to turn the tables in our temples yet again.

So we are to love our neighbor? This is quite vague it would seem. Let us return to scripture, and see the expert of Biblical law question Jesus on how to inherit eternal life in Luke 10:25-37:

I think we can find many in this world who have faced such adverse circumstances, even specifically those beat by robbers. Our neighbors are all around us. Many have come to The United States for refuge.

So many in the United States have feared we are being invaded by foreigners, and a corrupt, violent, sexist, religion — Islam. But our country, and Christianity, has been undone on the inside, infected and infiltrated from within, by its own ranks, by failing to observe those simple commandments. So many have been following Christ merely to mimic Him in order to play a part of spiritual sophistry on a societal stage, not actually obey Him. Perhaps it may seem I exaggerate and only examine the caricature of Christianity, but it has become all too common.

I concede I find it unfair and disingenuous that media and those with liberal bent often give moral acceptance and behavioral passes to Muslims while Christians are scrutinized; but then again — so?

As Christians are we not supposed to focus on ourselves and our own sins first? To take personal responsibility? Should we not solve our own problems and see if we are the cause before casting blame on others?

Moreover, when the common Christian condemns his neighbors first, and forgives second (if ever) especially the foreigner, how can others trust the Christian? How should they believe he is an arbiter of fairness or a mirror for God’s mercy? Is the Christian not supposed to serve in a state of humility; they know they only have received salvation through God’s grace — through Jesus’ sacrifice for their sins. When the focus is constantly on the ‘alien’s’ sins, the Christian then is seen not as a living example of Christ’s compassion, but one of judgment and self-righteousness. Citizens tend to support certain immigration policies out of fear and frustration, not compassion and wisdom. Are the Christians who want to build a wall truly drawing a just line? I wonder in the words of Robert Frost’s ‘Mending Wall’:

We treat immigrants as stray dogs, deserving of compassion, but ultimately they are lesser; minorities are aliens — the ‘other’. We forget that these immigrants are often here because they face ethnic or religious persecution — much like many of our immigrant ancestors. And they fled only to face discrimination here. Protestants were considered separate and unequal to Catholics (and vice versa), despite both being Christian. But our memories are short, perhaps willfully so sometimes, and we forget the lessons learned from this era, and every era like it throughout history. Christians judge Muslims and criticize the cultures they hail from, corralling them with extremists and terrorists, instead of seeing them as individuals first, who need helping hands and open arms — good Samaritans.

Not only do Christians fear and stigmatize the ‘other’ in the form of immigrants and those of other faiths, they have been criticized for years for their relative lack of compassion towards those of other faith; they have attacked, judged, and excluded women, homosexuals, and the poor. They only seem to deem it necessary to closely examine these issues when Islam is put into the cultural picture.

Despite Christianity being the largest current religion, Islam is the fastest growing religion in the world. One can argue that some of these conversions (or reversions) are forced, yet there is no doubt willful newfound appreciation of Islam in the Western world. Many African-Americans to seem find greater kinship with Muslims, because like them, they too have been unjustly labeled and persecuted in America. Historically African-Americans have been converted Christians; but much of this ‘conversion’ was done during their enslavement and the Jim Crow Era. Like with Native Americans, they were converted less for the sake of compassion and making better souls than for the goal of making a more culturally homogeneous society and ‘taming the savages’. This indeed took place in Islamic countries. No doubt that many were convinced they were doing Gods work by this coerced conversion, similar to how Thanos is convinced he is merciful in destroying half of life in the universe, and Lex Luthor believing will make the world more safe by murdering Superman. Yet with the clarity of historical and moral hindsight, one can likely appreciate the palpable irony of this religion’s role, which is borne of forgiveness, humility, and compassion, in the supposed voluntary conversion of African-Americans and Natives throughout such cruel, captive circumstances. Jesus preached acceptance of all, yet so the majority of white Americans — whom called themselves Christian — routinely and actively discriminated against non-whites.

Today, there is much less active discrimination and Christian America has certainly come a long way; yet discrimination has become more passive in form, and equally or more dangerous in many ways. I hear the staunch Constitutionalist and egalitarian as they say, “there is equal opportunity! That’s all that matters!” They are not whom I’m primarily addressing: it is the Christian. For it is the Christian who touts compassionate, pursuant activism on behalf of the weak, sick, oppressed, and poor, against logic and pragmatism sometimes — and yes, even on behalf of their enemies. For it is a supposedly Christian nation we live in. It is not enough to be nice to those you meet, and drop your 10% check into the offering basket on Sundays with the occasional mission trip sprinkled into a Spring Break: you must seek those in need of alms, healing, and salvation. Throughout, you must not be ailed yourself by what I call ‘Convenient Compassion’ — helping only those in the immediate vicinity or whom are easiest to help. And you certainly must not be like the Pharisees, who helped only for the self-aggrandizement, to feel the ‘warm fuzzies’ after charitable acts, or to signal their virtue to others.

Christians seem to love to help those like themselves, but struggle to help the ‘other’, whether they be someone from another country, ethnicity or even political party. I surely risk alienating audiences by mentioning these things, but they must be addressed, as again, Christians are called to actively love even and especially their enemies — that is, through their actions. Few Christians (save for a burgeoning group of White supremacists and nationalists) are actively hateful and prejudiced: they are simply naive in knowing how to best emulate Christ, who was an inclusive, sacrificial being.

But let us suspend that thought and pretend it’s not as severe as scholars and the media make it. Let us even say that ‘black culture’ is a problem in American society. There are too many single mothers, gang-life and criminality is glorified by rap, and they received too many government entitlements: this needs to be fixed. Where are all the fixers then? Especially Christian ones? Most simply ignore or even denounce these ‘criminals’. As the (Christian) Russian author Fyodor Dostoyevsky said,

“Nothing is easier than to denounce the evildoer; nothing is more difficult than to understand him.”

Why are all of these problems so? Could it be that having been cast aside from the white majority of society and being seen as sub-human or endure suspicion long after slavery officially ended, they still struggle to succeed? And in a way that white American largely didn’t have to experience? Perhaps the former invented their own culture.

In either case, even if blacks are just ‘fools’ failing to adapt, enabled by inept politicians, Christians are still actively at worst, and passively at best, ignoring them: in doing so, they ignore Jesus. They say, “Let them help themselves first” They misattribute the quote of Benjamin Franklin to God that says, “God helps those who help themselves.”

Minorities like Mexicans also don’t feel welcome in our churches either as they’ve been conflated as an entire group with rapists and human-traffickers (despite the demographic largely being of the Christian faith). Those of differing sexual orientations neither felt at home, as transgender citizens were called by Trump to be banned from military service. And we can hardly expect Muslims to feel like converting to Christianity when they have been specifically targeted by many Christians in power, with Trump’s travel ban listing Muslims-specific countries despite Isaiah 56 stating: “My house shall be called a house of prayer for all the nations.” If America is indeed God’s country and is blessed, would it not be a “house of prayer” for all nations?

But let’s not just make Christianity a black/white or racial issue; let’s sidestep that specific problem. There is a colorful cornucopia of peoples in the world who need help. Some of them are white — the poor, unsightly ‘white trash’ — but not only the white trash. Our elders — who God called us to honor in the Ten Commandments — are too old to care for themselves and we ship them away to nursing homes. Group homes filled with physically and mentally challenged individuals, desperate for funding and compassionate individuals. Let’s not forget the “Walking Well” — those high-functioning individuals with mental disorders like depression, anxiety, ADHD, and PTSD. Both my family members and myself have been told to simply ‘pray away’ the demons and our pain. In the wake of a series of school shootings, many leaders call for better mental health treatment, yet have consistently voted against measures aimed at granting more disadvantaged people mental health insurance coverage.

Farther outside our comforts, borders and walls, much of the world grieves, having lost their loved ones to disease from unclean water or starvation from famine. They simply don’t have water to drink and food to eat. The average American family throws away 25% of their food annually. Where’d all that food go at that good ol’ church potluck? Fun Fact: potlucks were started during the Great Depression in the U.S. to feed a whole neighborhood, particularly for the sake of the families who did not have enough food or money to survive. Have we invited these individuals to our tables and broken bread with them? Or even gone further and brought bread to theirs? In my own life, it is the Muslims who offer me their meals on lunch break, not Christians.

Many early American Christians did not bring bread to the meek and less fortunate: they brought disease, death, and cultural destruction. Much of the failure of current Christianity lay at the cracked, sandy foundation of the United States foreign policy.

Even the most dated history textbook states there were already Native inhabitants when the first European settlers arrived. The first settlers were Spanish Christians and conquerors — ‘conquistadors’ — like Christopher Columbus. There began the systematic forced labor of the Native Americans, under ‘Encomienda’ — a practice that rewarded conquerors with the labor of particular groups of subject people — which were previously Muslims and now Native Americans. To the Spanish Crown and Conquistadors, they were entitled to someone else’s labor, and functionally treated Natives as slaves. In this system, per historical precedent, women were raped by Christians on the pretense that they were property of men, thus did not have the right to say no.

The English settlers did not fare much better morally in the New World: this is quite ironic given that they fled religious persecution only to persecute the Native Americans. Many of them got along quite well with the locals; however as I’m sure many are sick of hearing by now, many did not get along well, and the historical result was the gradual eradication of the Native Americans. It wasn’t simply wholesale murder and disease that did them in. The early American government executed a serious of deals that swindled the Natives of their lands, they destroyed their food source via the Bison, and they eviscerated their culture through forced schooling and family separation. Andrew Jackson, infamous for the Trail of Tears — in which 16,000 Natives were forced to leave their homes — was a Christian, as were most Presidents and American statesmen who participated in the enslavement of Natives and Africans.

The moral quandary of being a ‘good neighbor Christian comes deeper into play when we examine the wealthy Christian — as I’m sure that’s how many would prefer they be judged (and will be judged according to Christianity). So much attention and time is focused on accumulating wealth and perhaps passing it on to one’s children, that they forget Jesus’ teachings:

This was not a gentle parable suggesting the rich were simply un-Christlike: Jesus Himself attacked the very institutions that were deceiving people and profiting from others’ needs and desire to worship. Jesus was a radical aiming to undo the status quo of the rich and greedy. In Matthew 21, Jesus drove the money-changers out of a holy temple because they were corrupt and charging usurious* rates.

Jonathan Parnell, a pastor from Minnesota, extrapolates the point of this story further:

And here sits the crux of the matter: the lenders were seeking to first aid themselves, not aid in the worship of God or help His followers. They were too focus on helping themselves to help others. Moreover, their selling of the doves and money-changing to worshipers were merely vehicles to their own success. They weren’t innocently making a living either; they were enriching themselves — at the expense of others no less. The meek, weak and outcasts were of secondary or no import. For the Christian, this man-made barrier between God and his most needy, wayward followers is a grave sin, and one the very things Jesus came to Earth to break.

Surely, genuine compassion towards the needy is not this simple in every situation, especially in modern times. There are many Christians who are compassionate to individuals, but reject what they see as compulsory ‘giving’ via government social programs which draws funding from their taxes. But much of this rejection is due to conservative propaganda that the very notion of taxation is theft, and that Jesus would not support such ‘hand-outs’.

Jesus never spoke on the matter that taxation for social programs would be hand-outs to the slothful, nor if it was unfair to have a progressive income tax and wealth distribution, but He did indeed address the matter of government taxation and whether it was just to pay it. The scribes and Pharisees question him in Mark 12:14–17:

Furthermore, given that Jesus never ruled aid via taxation as ‘sinful’ it is quite possible acts of compassion and charity can be done via such laws, especially if they result in a better functioning society — like affordable healthcare, food stamps, a clean environment, and housing. The Christian often wishes to retain the ‘freedom to give’ (or freedom to be selfish conversely). But in The United States, we are free to hold our representatives accountable; otherwise what is the point of our republic? Sporadic, individual charitable giving is generally less effective at improving poor demographics’ conditions, especially if they are structurally caused.

But less us again play Devil’s advocate and say the government is wrong for progressive taxation as it’s theft and God says not to steal in the Ten Commandments. Should there not be legions of autonomous, compassionate individuals, perhaps together in groups that provide aid to the unfortunate? Yes, there are the Catholic Charities, Salvation Army; but how much do they give (I don’t donate to ANY charity unless I see their financial disclosure forms and know how much their CEO makes)? Do they discriminate? More importantly, how much do YOU give to them? Is it a meager 10% tithe? Do you provide your time to those who need it as well? Is your pursuit of helping the needy greater than your pursuit of self-enrichment, Youtube virtue-signaling, or a tax write-off?

So many Christians have a great misconception of generosity. Generosity is not merely a random act; it is planned, sustained giving and sacrifice. A kind and generous person does not wait for a disaster to happen or misfortune to befall a person; they seek out these victims and crises and meet them head on with the love of Christ. A good neighbor is not good merely one day of the week. Instead, most of the average American’s week consists of working towards what would look good on their lawn or legs.

The Christian author C.S. Lewis stated, “This is the American Dream: Work. Buy. Display. Repeat.”

Though written several decades ago, I don’t find him too off the mark.

The Prosperity Gospel likely owes its roots to the New Thought movement of the 19th century, ushered forth by thinkers like Ralph Waldo Trine. He exhorted his readers to “See yourself in a prosperous condition. Affirm that you will before long be in a prosperous condition.” Here, the individual and their will was of greatest import, and anything the mind could conjure, it could have. The outlook married perfectly with the roots of American individualism and free-will, growing alongside American exceptionalism and capitalism. It is an even more perverse reversal of the antiquated Catholic system of indulgences, on which Protestantism was supposed to improve.

Admittedly cynical, writer Max Weber saw the burgeoning Protestant Christian religion acting in tandem with capitalism.

This what the sociologist Max Weber meant when he spoke of the “Protestant Work Ethnic”. Coupled with American’s unique sense of “Manifest Destiny”, an atmosphere and expectation of work as an inherent virtue mandated by God materialized across American culture. It is of course nigh impossible to denote a de facto cause and effect relationship here, but there is at least a correlation. The Prosperity Gospel began to take off in the roaring 20’s, and continued despite the Great Depression and the Second World War:

Catherine Bowler conducted an ethnological experiment into Prosperity Theology. She found the strong coupling of financial optimism spiritualism spilled into the secular too. In the latter part of the 20th century, ‘life coaches’ were employed in nearly every corporation, self-help books stormed onto bookshelves, and even the American Psychological Association promoted the power of positive psychology. Bruce Wilkinson’s New York Times bestseller The Prayer of Jabez begged God for spiritual and material increase through an Old Testament prayer. These ideas were soon embedded in the psyches of many Americans through popular talk shows like Dr. Phil and Oprah as Bowler describes:

Sure the man beaten by robbers whom the Samaritan helped had befallen bad luck, no? The man with leprosy? Perhaps Job? Can we part with coin to help him?

The crucial flaw and tragedy in the Prosperity Gospel (or any Christian justification of retaining great wealth) rules as a trio:

My former best friend’s rather well-off parents adhered to the prosperity philosophy, and their house was littered with religious positivity books like, “The Purpose Driven Life” — which while it contains some good spiritual advice, it interestingly enough, centers around predeterminism and giving money or “resources” to the church (and author). Once again, the church was the primary conduit for faith, and the outcasts, lepers, and poor were scarcely mentioned. My family struggled with money: my mother has a learning disability that prevents her from advancing in careers, and my father has worked 80+ hours a week as long as I can remember. Their own parents were gone long before I was born. I began to peer outside my somewhat sheltered suburban life and saw the abject poverty, suffering and oppression all over God’s Earth, and wondered why all of my wealthy Christian friends here, and brothers and sisters abroad did not do more to help them. I could not merely pray away our pain. Thus, I inwardly concluded, “Either our financial failures exist because we are not good, or something in this message is not right.”

Some may say that there is enough food and fossil fuel to last humanity until (if) we go to space and colonize that. But even if this is true, why are so many of God’s children going without basic necessities? The crux must be a distribution problem then. Is it simply poor government? Even so, can we not work with NGOs, and foreign governments to get food and clean water into the hands of those who need it most? Perhaps instead of cooking copious amounts of food we don’t need or even eat (especially as we bitch about being too fat when summer comes)?

In allowing ourselves to be ‘blessed’ so richly, we don’t simply gain from ourselves: we take from others. It is a simple law of thermodynamics. Energy cannot be created: it can only be changed or moved. When we buy something, we don’t simply buy the ‘thing’; we buy all of the resources, labor and energy that went into that thing — often the energy of much poorer countries and poorer individuals. In our great freedom to consume, “Americans eat 815 billion calories of food each day — that’s roughly 200 billion more than needed — enough to feed 80 million people.” How can this be when America is so blessed and populated with Christians? Why are we not multiplying the bread and fish for all of God’s children?

Despite our reverence for family values and children, we seem to only care if its our own children. We overindulge our children and they grow up spoiled as a result, ignorant to the damage we cause to the our communal home, and plights of children elsewhere, who often are ones making things for our children.

The legacy the average American leaves behind is not just a well-educated child with a bright future, but waste. “Americans throw out 200,000 tons of edible food daily” and “The average American generates 52 tons of garbage by age 75.” But we don’t seem to care. Some of us believe our lives are so poor and that our enemies are actually destitute individuals from developing countries. We make excuses why we cannot help them. We are focused on ‘starting our own family’, regardless of the cost to others or the contribution to overpopulation and overconsumption. We wear spiritual horse-blinders: we lack perspective.

The Earth is the home to ALL of God’s children — especially the poor, sick and destitute — for the “meek shall inherit the Earth”. But we have convinced ourselves that it is the lack of good work ethnic, a cultural curse from the ‘wrong religion’, or a given country’s political instability that are the primary causes of sickness and poverty; moreover, we have washed our hands of helping them, as Pontius Pilate did in allowing Jesus to be crucified. Our own safety, power and comfort are too tempting to give up.

“But can I not still be a good person with money I worked hard to earn? I can’t help that I was blessed.” In the parable of the rich young ruler, Jesus reaffirms that one cannot rule in heaven with wealth, and that the poor and lowly will enter Heaven before them. In Matthew 19:30 he states, “30 But many who are first will be last, and many who are last will be first.” Christians conflate being equal in needing salvation as equal in opportunity of wealth or worse — actually do believe God has ‘blessed’ them over another. Worse still, they do not give all they can do those who are not blessed. We strive to be prosperous more than we strive to be good. You cannot buy salvation any more than you can buy time. I ask you as Jesus did,

I have been constantly reminded (as so many youth were by the older generations) that liberals were the harbingers of moral degradation and decay. Not only is opening one’s mind to liberal ‘values’ essentially inviting a nefarious, demonic, blight into one’s personal life, it signals the contribution of a corrosive moral malaise into society: the “snowball” effect gains vicious momentum and engulfs even those who didn’t listen to liberal values. First, masturbation, then premarital sex, then homosexual sex, culminating in sex with animals. Surely God knows our hearts, and stops us at masturbation for our own soul’s sake.

But I’m sure you’ve noticed that these concerns are mostly for the future; the immediate moment is of secondary import. After all, can we not ask Jesus for forgiveness if we stumble and fall out of our moral clumsiness? Especially if our soul’s sight was toward the right place?

But is our soul ever in the right place if we not seeking to act like Christ NOW?

I believe Christians are too often concerned about their moral past and future, and not concerned enough about their moral present.

Jesus has already secured the future; the past is forgiven. Yes, we have been saved and if we died right now our souls would ascend to heaven because we gave our lives to Christ and he paid the price for our sins on the cross; but (and there is a big ‘but’) what would God say to you on this Day of Judgement? Are we not supposed to ask ourselves this question daily as Christians? As we living as Christ would? Are we walking with Him? Are we sacrificing ourselves for others daily? Including and especially the lepers, the prostitutes, the aliens, the unbelievers, and even the criminals? Is this not the price we pay back to Jesus for His sacrifice?

We are called to be ‘little Christs’ — Christians.

However, as mentioned previously, Christians have been compassionate — towards other Christians. This compassion has been an exercise in confirmation bias, focused on the treatment, particularly of Christians abroad, and of Christianity as a belief-system.

One must also examine the political climate prior to said religious persecution, as in the cases mentioned previously. In Syria, after the fall of Ghaddafi, there was a power vacuum in an already ravaged, fragile socio-economic system. The essentially secular (tyrannical) leader was replaced by an equally tyrannical, Muslim leadership, which in turn used its power to oppress rebels, which includes Christians AND other Muslims. In Nigeria, there is mutual murder on both sides — Christians and Muslims, though Muslims hold a slight majority. The West primarily hears of Boko Haram in Nigeria, an Islamic militant group: but this is a terrorist and minority/extremist group, like Al Quaeda, the Klu Klux Klan, or other white nationalist groups (that call themselves Christian).

Aside from the pivotal disagreement regarding who is the final prophet of God, Jesus’s divinity, and the consumption of pork, Muslims and Christian share far more commonalities than differences. Indeed, many Muslims know this and harbor great respect for Christians. They are not the vanguard against saying “Merry Christmas” at Starbucks nor are most in support of homosexual marriage. Muslims tend to be pro-life on abortion, believe men should be the head of a household, and that sex outside of marriage is a grave Haram (sin).

Nevertheless, our concerns have centered on what others do, not what we do: we peruse the implications of others’ actions, and less so our own actual actions.

Is it any wonder why youth have become disillusioned with Christianity and are quick to criticize it (they didn’t grow up with Muslim parents)? So many grew up in homes where if they were gay, under-performing academically, became pregnant, or God-forbid, became a Democrat, they would be ostracized from the family informally or even outright, and forced to move out. This intolerance occurred parallel to parents’ and pastors’ calls for compassion and forgiveness as Christians.

Ask yourselves: would your actions appeal someone to Christ? Did we call our children to Him?

This is not merely a snarky liberal news headline cutaway: it is a call-out specifically for Christians’ hypocrisy and failure throughout current events. It is not enough to think about another’s welfare and to pray for its improvement.

In the golden age of social media,the practice of virtual signalling is all too-common and unfortunately, all too-potent. To many, doing good for another is far less important than showing you are doing good for another. While sometimes the person is helped all the same, the moral purity of the good act is lost and the acts occur far less often as a result. The attention is shifted from the act to the actor. It is Guilded-Good. Jesus was prophetic as always in this point in Matthew 6:5:

A common devil’s-advocate defense I’ve seen for these Christians is “but is it not the most honorable and appreciated effort, that someone calls upon their all-powerful god, directing all of their concern, all their faith and hope that their god will improve another’s sorrowful situation?”

I provide two simple refutations:

Thoughts and prayers are not enough. They do not feed the hungry, treat the sick, nor guide wayward souls. Compassion and love are not merely words, feelings and gestures; they are actions. They affect another.

A key difference between Christianity (presumably) and other religions, is the method of salvation: it is beautifully simple. God recognized He needed to sufficiently show His followers how they were to worship, to live, and to achieve salvation, so He sent His only Son — Himself — to show them.

Jesus showed humanity how it was done. He sacrificed himself. He turned the other cheek.

When God said it is not by actions but through Jesus that you achieve salvation. No longer the sort of formulaic, hollow rules and rites like Sabbaths, prayers, and tithes, that so many ‘followers’ had been following to a ‘T’, thinking they had tricked the spiritual system while they cared little for the welfare of the needy, and did only what was written for them. He did not mean that actions were irrelevant: actions are indeed the MOST relevant — the actions of Jesus, of which faith and love are essential parts. You must carry the crosses of others. You might even need to die for them: you certainly need to live for them. By devoting your life to helping others — the most needy — you walk alongside Jesus, and in His salvation. Only through Jesus, can you know and become ‘good’.

Good is not a permanent status nor personal inscription like so many people wish; it is an action that needs persistent practice to remain effective; it is a muscle that needs constant exercise; it is an ointment that heals only as much as it’s reapplied. Giving your life to Christ and going to church doesn’t make you “good”, walking with Him and for Him does.

We were supposed to be a light unto others and the world. What have we become?

So many Christians are outwardly ‘nice’ but not ‘kind’. They state they do not ‘judge’ another, but their voting record reflects otherwise. Furthermore, they do not go out among God’s children and aid those who need in most. Very few are like John the Baptist and missionaries teaching the gospel, and more importantly, MIRRORING the gospel so that others will be called to Christ not through mere words, but actions. After all, it is quite difficult to believe a man who makes more time for golf games than helping the needy is the highest example of the religion you are supposed to believe in. It is especially difficult to be concerned about adopting a new, morally-superior value system when you don’t have enough food in your stomach or a roof over your head.

Yet so many (myself included) need to be yanked out of bed to simply give a shit about others. We can quickly and happily post ‘good vibes’ on Facebook and Instagram or outrage about injustice in the world on twitter, but can scarcely be bothered to do actual, physical good in the world for the needy. We will help another, but only if we do not have to sacrifice much. The good we do is for the sake of being ‘nice’ and maintaining a more pious appearance. Doing good is merely a necessity like brushing one’s teeth. This behavior evokes Luke 11:7–8 :

I do not remember growing up in a school that prevented me from praying or wearing a crucifix. I was not forced to abort any children nor to use birth control. The theory of evolution has scientific, factual backing, whereas Old Testament/Creation based scientific teachings do not: thus, children are taught this in public schools, and Muslims or Hindus are held to this same standard. If this fact changes, I will be the first to protest. Supporting science and the rule of law is not refusing Christianity.

Marriage between homosexuals is a government-ordained practice, as there are legal benefits that have been afforded for heterosexual couples, so to ‘force’ a priest to marry gays is only upholding a law and being consistent, and practicing a separation of ‘church and state’ — something our forefathers designed. The relatively recent American trend of Christianity not being mandated by law is only aligning with this philosophy and practice. And despite these more ‘secular’ changes, religion is very much still a cornerstone of American institutions. Religious organizations operate with tax-exempt status and provide large chunks of funding and charity like Catholic Charities or the Salvation Army on which the poor are dependent: their aid is sometimes conditional, excluding homosexual people. Many large corporations are not open on Sunday or have limited hours due to a traditional observation of the Sabbath (day of rest). The Christian holiday of Christmas Eve and Christmas are still one of the only government recognized religious holidays where almost all businesses are closed. Ultimately, it is up to the individual or family how they wish to worship and practice their faith. The freedom of religion the forefathers designed is not equitable to the freedom to impose it upon others, especially through legal means.

What does it say about our focus on Christ, when we are more concerned about owning a gun than protecting our children from guns, even as we pray for God to protect us? As Christians, we have exercised the right to refuse cake to homosexuals: have we also exercised the right to refuse love to them? What should be more memorable in an interaction with a Christian — their strictness or their love? Do we allow all immigrants to be demonized and separated from parents from children and imprisoned in cages because it is the ‘law’ and we feel more safe? Perhaps a law such as this may make some of us safer, but perhaps also less Christlike as a nation, and our souls less free.

We still feel fit to judge though, out of our car windows, through our phones and computer screens. The internet has made it so easy to find like-minds, and to look out, and down — able to view others but not have to face them.

Is it the Republicans who are primarily to blame for your struggle? No! it is the Democrats! Or illegal immigrants? Muslims? Black people? Whites? Perhaps more personal: is it your husband or wife?

Perhaps we climbed to our moral mountains through hard and good work; perhaps we were once the downtrodden and sinful. But we can just as easily tumble back into that valley of ruin, knocked over by gusts of circumstance and dragged down by the gravity of our complacency and self-satisfaction.

And what good is this ascent if we are alone? If we do not help carry those who struggle to carry themselves? What good is freedom if we do not help others become free? Are you truly free while your sisters and brothers remain enslaved? What is the purpose your strength if not to help others? Do you not remember the child who wanted to lift burning buildings and fly other children to safety?

We often cannot see them struggling below because our heads remain above the clouds. Make no mistake: I am not judging you nor stoning you to death. Only God knows your soul and whether you will sit with him in the Kingdom of Heaven for eternity. I am convicting your actions; I am not condemning your person. I am not the first to do this, nor will I be the last: I do not believe one needs a theology degree or Priest robe to do this. I wish to make myself and society better. And God already knows how broken and sinful I am. As angry as I am with the world, there is none I am more angry at than myself. Short of physically flagellating myself like Martin Luther, I have beaten myself badly; I have been shattered and remolded in defiance and humility time and again. For all my shining skills and moments, I am still weak; still stupid; still sinful, and I could be even less with different genes and circumstance. Yet my humanity and personal failures do not forbid me from calling out bad behavior and moral inconsistencies. As a Christian, it is my duty.

I see so many modern Christians wish to exact revenge on their enemies in the name of justice or even in the name of God. They criticize the Muslim or non-believer for being too vengeful and acting without moral restraint, while sinking in the quicksand of hypocrisy. They cling to their guns, and shutter their doors. They act as though they are vindication through God’s hand. But they are deaf to Jesus’s commandment of forgiveness and love in Matthew 5:39–45:

Martin Luther King Jr. was one of the most profound Christians in American history, as he came to personify that Bible verse. He brought together a nation so deeply divided by race, with nonviolent protest and civil disobedience, and helped usher in the Civil Rights Act. His legacy endures today, partly so because he and his black brothers and sisters endured so much violence and insult against them throughout their nonviolent protests. His form of resistance and change was so potent because he sought to emulate Christ.

These accusations only further demonstrate how effective his Christian rhetoric and message of nonviolent resistance were in attaining racial equality, that others felt compelled to destroy his reputation to discount his message. Likewise in the manner of Jesus, he was a radical, and eviscerated the social status quo. He asked a Christian nation to behave more Christ-like towards African-American citizens and all other walks of life. That meant racial integration of schools, relationships, and ceasing the dehumanization of African-Americans by calling them “nigger” or “the negro”.

Many people love to quote MLK Jr. because of his call for racial equality through non-violent protest, and for his view that racial ‘color didn’t matter’. But when he asks us to understand those who commit crimes and act out by saying “riots are the language of the unheard”, people are aghast and think he is justifying violence. No, he is just giving voice to people who have been hurt saying one must seek to understand them in order to heal them and solve the social problem at hand. It seems strange to defend rioters just the same as it seems strange to defend a racist from being attacked. Christianity — Jesus — is strange in that way: it sacrifices and loves against logic and self-interest. If you want a strictly rational, hedonistic, eye-for-an-eye lifestyle, then Christianity is not right for you.

I have come to still consider that perhaps that Christianity is special — even after falling out of faith and seeking other beliefs. It seeks to understand the sinner and forgive them: it goes even further beyond and sacrifices for them. It pledges continual pursuit of mercy and love for others, not for rewards on Earth, but for an eternity — of which we have no evidence. Best of all, it accepts that we are sinful and realizes there is nothing we can do to truly atone for that: we are forgiven only as we accept Jesus and His message. We are not ruled through fear nor through shame: we are ruled by love. But love means nothing without extending it outward to others, and Jesus showed by sacrificing Himself for us. He showed that even, and especially, in great suffering, even when we can destroy or ignore another, we can love them, and show how strong we are in the process — true strength. Yet sometimes we are alone, imprisoned, and there is no one to love but ourselves and God. But in this forgiveness proffered to us, and from us to others, we remember what it means to love, in and turn, what it means to matter when nothing matters, to be human — and we can survive, and thrive, anywhere, anyhow.

I have stubbornly persisted in the belief that this story — whether fiction or not — revolves around a central story and message of compassion, sacrifice, and mercy through Jesus Christ, that is unrivaled in any other religion’s story and commandments. Or else in the absence of belief, love was dry and simply a biological function if not divine. Without innate good, humanity is doomed to become the Godless society our parents warned us about. I cannot believe we are just smart dogs doing tricks for spiritual treats. But there is nothing innate about our love: it must be continually sought and given. What good are these words if they are not actions? What stops this story from merely being a story, if it is not lived and told to others through mercy and love? You can often tell if a common person were a Sikh or a Muslim just by their attire, but how can you tell if someone is Christian?

We should be able to spot a Christian easily not by their clothes or crucifix around their necks, but by the cross they carry for others daily. In the ebullient kindness, sacrifice and love for others, even enemies, there should be no mistake that one is dealing with a Christian — for only a Christian could so persistently and deeply evoke those values in their actions — just like Christ.

Tragically, I can not tell most Christians apart from others. I have experienced and seen some of the greatness kindness I’ve known on this Earth from Muslims and non-believers, and seen the greatest exclusion and persecution from Christians. How can this be? To be blunt, I could not confidently spot a Christian even if I were singing in the church choir and looking right at the attendees on a Sunday morning.

So come out of your palaces — your hovels and huts alike. Come out of your churches, for the churches are not contained within the walls, but within the collective hearts and souls come together to worship God: and what better way to worship God than to mirror his Son’s sacrifice and help those in the greatest need?

Remember we are royalty. We will we be mocked; but we will wear our crowns of thorns with dignity, with love. For, “Today you will be with me in Paradise.”

*Fun Fact: Usury means to charge an exorbitant rate for a loan or to unfairly enrich the lender. Historically in many Christian and Islamic societies, charging any interest at all is considered Usury.

**Jackie Chan’s also actually a piece of shit who abandoned one of his daughters after he was done fucking her mom and gives nothing to her, nor tried to make amends. He also parrots pro-Chinese government propaganda like the Chinese people “need to be controlled” and that air pollution in China “doesn’t exist”. Nonetheless, he said a true thing.

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