The Message Is Good But Does The Data Support It?

Mark Woods, a managing editor for Christianity Today (no bio available), has just written an article for Christianity today lamenting the attitudes of European Christians toward religious foreigners to their own country (click here for the article and click there for the study on which his article is based). And the news is not good if you're a Christian, at least it isn't suppose to be good. The news is this, that Christians, regardless of their church attendance, are more likely to harbor attitudes that could be construed as at least being partially bigoted than the religiously unaffiliated.

What are those attitudes that indicate bigotry? Those attitudes were part of a survey given to people of Europe. Those who claim to be Christians are classified as Christians and a distinction was made for those who regularly attend a church from those who don't. The approximate statements are below:

1.  Immigrants from the Middle East are not honest.

2.  Immigration should be reduced.

3.  Islam is fundamentally incompatible with their national culture and values.

4.  Are not willing to accept Jews in one's family.

5.  Are not willing to accept Muslims in their family.

In all of the above statements, more Christian showed intolerance in their answers than the non-religiously affiliated. From this, Woods concludes that Christians see their own religion as a 'cultural marker,' as a sign of national identity and belonging to their own society. And Woods has some legitimately strong words for those for such Christians.

What are Woods's words of correction? He calls the use of religion as a marker of cultural identity a tool for discrimination that can marginalize people from other groups. But more importantly, he sees the use of Christianity as a marker of national belonging as idolatry, and I could not agree more with his view. I see what he sees here. Making the Christian faith a symbol that identifies one earthly belonging is to put that earthly belong ahead of Christ.

Basically, I express Woods's analysis in a different way. I simply say that all of us Christian belong to multiple groups. And the temptation for us Christians is let our loyalty and our sense of significance from belonging to those other groups can become so high that those groups replace Christ in our lives. And one of the signs where group loyalty to an earthly group becomes greater than our loyalty to Christ will be indicated by how we treat other people, especially those who are different from us.

But before we sign off  in complete agreement with Woods here, we should note that further studies are needed to confirm his analysis. Why is that the case? It is because in the study Woods references, the percentage of church attending Christians who believe in the God of the Bible registers at only 64% while 32% of church attending Christians believe in another kind of god. And for those non-church attending Christians, only 24% believe in the God of the Bible while 51% do not. Thus, without a more detailed set of statistics, we can't firmly conclude from the study cited by Woods that being a Bible believing Christian in Europe positively correlates with holding to bigoted views of others.

However, we should note that what Woods said about European Christians, might also be said about religiously conservative American Christians, especially those who support President Trump's policies. Many of them have at least partially conflated their version of Christianity with what it means to be an American or even a Westerner. And there are plenty of religiously conservative Christian leaders who direct people to accept that view as their write disparagingly about the growing Muslim population in Europe and America.

Now national identity is not the only cultural idol that religiously conservative American Christians bow down to. Those Christians are just as happy at bowing down to the idols of their pet political and economic ideologies as they are to their national identity. This is easily seen when a fellow Christian challenge their political and/or economic sacred cows. Such a fellow Christian is often treated as a unbeliever for challenging those allegiances.

Perhaps, what is currently hurting the Church's credibility and witness to Christ the most are the loyalties we believers have for the other groups we belong to. Though belonging to these groups is unavoidable if a Christian is to live in the world in a way in which one can do his/her part in carrying out the Great Commission, having too high of a loyalty to those groups is not.
 
So though Woods needs better data to support the point he wants to make, his warning to fellow Christians regarding their loyalty to other groups could not more important to heed as it is now.






 
 

The Church That Cries 'Wolf'

Writing for the British Christian website, Christian Today (click here for the website), Mark Woods (no bio) wrote an article on why we American evangelicals should not look at ourselves as victims as society's mores change (click here for the article). This is a needed message because, from what I have observed, many an evangelical leader, be they teachers or pastors, have opted for describing our future as containing certain persecution.  Portraying American evangelicals as the victims of future societal attacks has become a cottage industry for the benefit of certain teachers only. And the effect that such widespread teaching is rather predictable. The effect according to Woods is an ever tighter circling of the wagons. Another effect that was not noted by Woods is that such an expectation of persecution and suffering makes many listeners more compliant to certain teachers.

Woods documents that American evangelicals perceive a growing difficulty in living life as a Christian by citing a Pew Research survey. What has changed that gives evangelical Christians their belief? According to Woods, the Obergefell v. Hodge appears to be the straw that broke the camel's back and despite that, Obama added another straw with his bathroom bills. Much has been written in various Christian websites warning us that granting the LGBT community more freedom will result in us evangelicals being persecuted and marginalized. But here, Woods cautions the Church that because society has grown to exercise a greater tolerance for the LGBT community, we cannot afford to think of associating our troubles with changes that make persecuting the LGBT community more difficult.

Citing a book written by Andrew Brown and Linda Woodward on how the Church of England lost the people of England, Woods gives American evangelicals a warning. That warning says that churches that become congregational by being counter-cultural can lose touch with society by becoming more and more both antagonistic to society and inward. Yes, such churches might succeed in drawing like-minded people who like end times, us vs. them scenarios. But as they draw more and more such people, they sacrifice their ability to stay in touch with society. Woods sees this happening in America and tells American Christian conservatives that they need to better to determine which battles to fight with society and which ones should be avoided. To fail to learn how to appropriately choose its battles with society, the conservative Church will condemn itself to becoming more ineffective in reaching out and speaking to society. With that goes our ability to evangelize.

What Woods says is true. American Evangelicals are, to an extent, making themselves irrelevant to society as they act like a child who  picks up his own game and leaves for home because his friends are winning all of the time. Thus we are isolating ourselves from society and feeling justified in doing so. But Woods misses another perspective. That one is from the Left. That perspective says that the Church is just another institution of indoctrination that maintains the status quo for the benefit of the those with wealth and power. From this perspective, the American Evangelical Church would be succeeding in removing itself from society over issues like society's increasing acceptance of the LGBT community and same-sex marriage because these issues themselves allow the Church to believe it is preaching God's Word while it remains silent on the very important sins committed by those with wealth and power. This analysis pretty much fits the American Evangelical Church despite the fact that it blames society's elites for promoting changes in societal sexual mores. It fits because the most serious crimes of those with wealth and power lie not in the promotion of certain sexual mores, but in maintaining an economic system based on exploitation and an imperial foreign policy that serves their own financial interests at the expense of many lives.

Woods' comments are worthwhile in reading. He just needs to add more perspective to better speak against the legitimate concerns he has about the current direction of American evangelicals.
This current direction kills two birds with one stone. Those two birds consist of the Church feeling like it is fighting the good fight while fulfilling its mission of supporting the status quo for the benefit of those with wealth and power. Yes, what Woods says about American Conservative Christians is true, but he could have said more that would have supported his case that American Evangelicals are sabotaging their own chances and influencing society. 

How Shall We Christians Then Not Vote

Mark Woods (no bio available) has just written an excellent article regarding how Christians should not vote (click here). And the diving board that helped him go head first into this topic is Ted Cruz. 

Woods objects to Cruz's personality and campaign for 3 reasons. First, Cruz favors the Republican view on issues like climate change. Second, Cruz's personality suggests to Woods that Cruz seems to be far more interested in winning than on being right. Last but not least, Woods believes that Cruz has so identified his campaign with the Bible that he feels that Cruz has co-opted the Scriptures. And it is this last perceived characteristic of Cruz that has broken the camel's back for Woods.

But Cruz is not alone in co-opting the Scriptures, other Republican candidates have too according to Woods. It's just that Cruz won Iowa because he outdid his Republican rivals in so doing. 

What tipped Woods off about Cruz co-opting was a statement Cruz made after he had won Iowa. He cited a verse from Psalm 30 to the crowd that said that joy comes in the morning following a night of weeping (click here for the verse). He then equated his win in Iowa with Iowa's way of telling the world that morning is here.

Indeed, Republicans have for years sold Evangelicals on the idea that a vote for them is a vote for God's program. What Woods did not mention is that Republicans have used the abortion issue to do this. For how can a Christian vote for a pro-choice candidate when such a candidate sanctions the murder of unborn children in the womb? The result of such reasoning is that abortion has made many evangelicals 'single-issue voters.' 

Some Christian writers have become sensitive to the single-issue voter label. Joe Carter, writing for the The Gospel Coalition website, just wrote an article trying to correct this perception (click here for the article). In his article Carter stated that single issue Christians should vote on is justice, not abortion. However, he asks how can anyone who is pro-choice be sincerely concerned about the human dignity of people who are in other dire situations. So he implies that though one should not vote for a candidate because that person is pro-life, Christians should not vote for any candidates who support woman's choice to elective abortion because it isn't possible for anyone who is pro-choice to care about justice.  

Woods' solution to the problem he sees is that while Christians should let their individual convictions determine their vote, they should not allow the Christian label to be attached to a particular political party or candidate. That is because once we have done that we have allowed our faith to be constrained by our political views and thus have corrupted the faith rather than vice-versa. Woods notes the irony here because rather than relying on the First Amendment's statement on the freedom of religion and Jefferson's 'separation of Church and State,'  Christians who allow their faith to be dictated by their political beliefs are becoming American counterparts to Muslims who support theocracies in nations like Iran and Saudi Arabia.

This equating Christianity with America, however, is a practice that is older than the Republican Party. In fact, it is a practice that is older than America's life as a nation. In reality, such a strong association between America and the Scriptures is done in order to ride the coattails of Christianity to obtain some degree of authority for their own political position or embrace self-aggrandizement or both. 

Woods' article is really excellent and should be read because this blogpost cannot do it justice in this brief review. However, we could add one point here. Even though we should never attach the Christian label to political positions or campaigns, it is legitimate for both individual Christians and the Church to tell society and  the State that certain practices are unacceptable. In other words, and I think I've written this before, while we cannot identify any single candidate or political party as being the one Christians should support; both individual Christians and the Church should be more than willing to speak prophetically to society and the State in denouncing its sins and injustices. Yes, elective abortion must be one of those injustices preached against. But other practices or results such as an ever increasing wealth disparity, immoral wars (a phrase that is sometimes almost redundant), and destroying the environment are also wrong and immoral and thus must be opposed. In this way, both individual Christians and the Church itself can speak prophetically to the world without risking the corruption of the faith.