As pleasant as pastordan's "The Word for the Week" was in some ways, I have serious questions about it.
The "Love Gospel" is fine in some ways, but it only goes so far. Even for Highly Liberal Democrats.
Obviously pastordan is a religious professional, but even us lay folks get an opinion, whether correct or in error...
So a word for the week is "skepticism", in a thoughtful, not corrosive, sense.
I'll try to keep this brief, by the way. (People have written libraries on this stuff.)
1. It's too bad, perhaps, if it "grinds" to insist on belief in Christ as a necessity for salvation. --If I came down from Heaven, died for people's sins, and then people didn't even admit it was true, or weren't grateful for it, I might not be too happy myself.
Religion may actually require sacrifices, commitment, and choices, e.g., Jesus Christ as exclusive personal savior, eschewing others as equals.
If "grinding on people's sensibilities" is a problem, maybe we should beg Jews and Muslims to start eating pork and not be so ""exclusive""? Or maybe we could beg them to be open to polytheism. Less exclusive, after all, than monotheism. We don't want to "grind on" all the pig-eating polytheists, after all...
"I am a jealous God" (Exodus 20:5).
2. We learn that if we love babies, congratulations, we're Christian.
...What if someone doesn't WANT to be Christian? Would every Orthodox Jew who loves babies be happy to learn that s/he is "now a Christian"? Whoops! Maybe not!!!
Does Ayatollah Sistani love babies? Likely. --So we get to call him a Christian now? Would his fellow Shi'ites appreciate this?
3. No, I don't believe in forced Christianity or other forced religion; as for state religion, I'd like it destroyed, and the tax credit for churches as well. They can collect the tithe instead, if anyone thinks it worth paying.
Of course I am not calling the esteemed and valuable pastordan a Ned Flanders (nor should he or others call me a Torquemada, Jimmy Swaggart, or Dracula, I believe). Still, the portrayal of Christianity as being about a generalized "love" rather than about specifics such as,
believing in Christ as your Savior--which is why they call it "Christianity", not "Vietnamese Buddhism" or whatever--;
some serious degree of Christlike ascesis and sacrifice, including giving up fulfilling many of one's various urges and desires, whether for power, sex, money, or whatever;
etc. (including, yes, action for social justice, political integrity, et al.)
, is only one point of view, and not one which everyone endorses.
The democratic hook here may revolve around INFORMED belief and action, that is,
- Christian salvation is democratically open to anyone who is willing to pay the price by making certain commitments and sacrifices--just as voting may be democratically open to anyone who has properly registered, is not a felon, votes on the proper day rather than 2 months late, etc.,
- you actually have to WANT to be a Christian, rather than being a "sleepwalker" Christian without knowing it. (If you were a Christian against your will, maybe that's not democratic or libertarian at all...)
(Yes, I know, many atheists behave "more Christianly" than many Christians do, but internal belief is important too, believe it or not.)
In conclusion: yes, "Jesus loves you." Sometimes, even the other way around, too. That reciprocity thing is really important. In democracy, and other forums as well. Even "skeptics" can believe in that.
