This news article from Newsweek is very interesting and scathing—is the church what it should be in America? The premise of the article is “Katrina has reminded us that Christian morality should be about responding to the wretched and loving the unlovable—not about other people’s sex lives.” Read the article and feel free to post your comments.
2 comments:
So many thoughts, so little time... I cannot disagree. I think we have allowed the Gospel to be much less than it was ever to be. In a sense we have not only "tamed" Jesus as we talked about last week but we have also inturn "tamed" the Gospel He came to proclaim. My only difficulty is the fact that the article seems to equate a political position with a spiritual belief. These are by no means the same. The other thing that is see is the idea that you have to choose which is a greater "sin" - abortion or lack of compassion for the poor. I think the issue is not the outward display but the heart of the matter. See Phil 2. Just my thoughts. Anyone else willing to brave the waters of opinion???
I am! What I think is most disgusting is this author's obvious use of Katrina to "point out" Bush's fault's as she sees them. Whether you voted for Bush or not, he is not the voice of all American Christians. And as Pastor Rod said, politics and spirituality are not the same. Many of the groups and individuals helping Katrina survivors are Christians, with no other motivation than to show love toward their fellow man. I would bet that many of the police and safety workers in Lousiana who lost their own homes, work through the night for others because they are Christian and believe it is the right thing to do. It has nothing to do with what Bush says is right, but what Jesus preached.
I am also highly skeptical about her statistics...how many Christians believe God helps those who help themselves? And how are they being qualified as Christian? By their own admission? There are many Americans who call themselves Christian simply because they believe in God -- that's not the same as believing the word of Christ. We hope they would go hand in hand, but many times they don't.
Our government has also claimed Christianity as it's own -- leaving many Americans to believe that well known Christian leaders will eventually get into politics. We are to obey those in authority, but I don't think Jesus ever said we had to aspire to BE them!
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