So last week a Facebook friend was lamenting the fact that everyone seems to be obsessed with the Mayans and asked why this was the case? I responded in agreement and said that it's odd that no one really consults the Mayans on other daily decisions. No one ever asks themselves "what would the Mayans do." And I suggested that I had some ideas for the obsession with the Mayan apocalypse, but said those would be better suited for a sermon instead of a Facebook post.
Another person, unknown to me, then also replied in a rather flippant and hostile manner to my comment. It wasn't really about the substance of my message, but rather, this person was reacting to the religious tones in my comment. And I wondered, why so much hostility for simply alluding to church and religion?
And it's not just on Facebook. Open a newspaper, or check out the best sellers list and you'll find articles and books about the "new atheism." As many of you know, I like to get out of the office, even if it's just to do "desk work;" so I spend at least a morning a week at Delicious Bakery down the street from the church. I don't eavesdrop, but I do hear things. Often when I sit down, people will talk about religion. If I had a dollar for every conversation I've heard where people start explaining to their friend why they don't like church, well, I couldn't retire, but I would have enough money to buy a bunch of coffee. People see the collar and they react. Why so much resentment towards religion?
You can see it in the news too. Christians, it seems, are hell-bent on being right and fighting. Roman Catholics fight about contraception and healthcare; evangelicals fight over abortion and marriage rights; Anglicans fight over authority and church governance. Why so much fighting?
The title of this post is supposed to be provocative. Is Christianity a four-letter word? I'll let you all come up with which four-letter word you'd like to use, but the ones I'm thinking of aren't quite appropriate for a G-rated blog. How have we gotten this bad reputation? Why is there so much animosity around religion? Why does the mere mention of religion turn people off? Why are we written off as irrational zombies that just follow some old-fashioned mythology? Why do so many people choose to identify as spiritual but not religious (more on that question in a future blog post/sermon)? What is Christianity a four-letter word to so many?
I don't have one answer for that. We do fight too much. We do take ourselves too seriously. We do act with a sense of entitlement. We do talk more than we do. We are hypocritical. We are out of touch with culture.
But this doesn't have to be the case. What if Christianity got back to its roots? What if we focused on being about some other four-letter words. What if we reclaimed "Lord?" What if we focused on the God who created, redeemed, and sustains every living thing on this planet (and I do mean everything and everyone)? What if we recognized that it isn't about us, but is about the Lord?
Or how about that other four-letter word? Love. What if instead of fighting, judging, or playing the game of one-upmanship, we focused on loving others? And by love, I really mean love. What if we visited those in prison, clothed the naked, fed the hungry, consoled the sad, brought peace to the warring, shared the Good News, stood up for the downtrodden, gave abundantly, prayed often? Well, I think our world would look a whole lot more like the Kingdom of God.
Christianity is about love, always has been. Love of God, love of self, love of neighbor. Let's reclaim that love- in our minds, in our hands, in our words, in our hearts, in our deeds, in our dreams. Maybe then Christianity would be another four-letter word: love.
