I’ve been as open about my hostility to Christianity’s morality as any of my views, frequently calling it the most egregious moral clusterfuck humans ever invented. So, I cobbled together this analogy:
Imagine I’m the principal of a large high school with a diverse student body. A few students might be bullies or treat others well. Others might or might not work up to their potential. Still others might cut class or smoke some pot. The misconduct, while self-destructive, has no direct impact on me, other than me fulfilling my role as judge, jury and jailer all in one.
But as long as I’ve been the principal, I’ve been fair and just. I gave the students a terrific rulebook. And the degree to which a student obeyed it was the degree to which he or she prospered and enjoyed the high school experience.
One day I enroll a special student. He gets all A’s, treats everyone at the school with respect, honesty and warmth. And in all his time at the school, hasn’t done one thing wrong. As a student, he’s unique, and perfect.
He’s also my son.
One day I abruptly decided that because none of the other students have my son’s moral perfection, none are any good at all. It’s not that they DO ultimate bad. It’s that if they do ANYTHING bad, ultimate punishment must be handed out. Imperfection means expulsion.
Still, I do not impose ultimate punishment on them. But someone has to pay for the students’ crime of being imperfect. So I extract that payment. And it’s steep. But I don’t make the mischief-makers, truants and underachievers pay. I don’t punish the wrongdoers.
Instead, I expelled my son.
He is the least deserving of punishment of any student in the school. But as long as all the other students acknowledge what a swell young man my son is and what a terrific student he was before I axed him and show their appreciation for him absorbing the bashing their conduct triggered, they will be spared any proper consequences for their actions.
“The rest of you born-to-be-rotten students better appreciate what my son and I did for you! And if you DON'T appreciate what he did for you, you're in for it! On the other hand, if you tell me how cool my son is immediately after you set fire to the chemistry lab, you'll be fine."
For reasons beyond any student’s understanding, this pleases me… and my son.
Of course, the students love it.
My son, who’s long abandoned any hope of justice for himself goes all ‘Stockholm Syndrome in the head: “Dad, I’m fine with you expelling me. Heck, I’m delighted that you did! I’m happy to bear the ultimate unjust fate for the mischief all the other students made.”
You might cry out that I’m unjust. You might say that I’m morally twisted, evil.
The countless New Testament distortions, misinterpretations, mistranslations, the efforts to mix the oil and water of Judaism and Christianity aside, this is the moral mess known as Christianity.
Considering all this, the real Christian miracle has nothing to do with Jesus. It's the countless righteous moral Christians who became such people in spite of Christianity.