Stephan: Although I have read and studied most of the major religious scriptures and much commentary about them, I have never had the slightest interest in belonging to any religion, although I find much that is attractive in the Quakers. Happily I also had the great good fortune to grow up in a family in which my parents had no interest in religion either, so I was spared having to endure it.
I am all too aware of the prejudice, hate, male dominance, sexual obsessions, and insufferable self-righteousness that is the red meat of religion for so many adherents whatever their faith. It is anthropologically fascinating to see people claim a religion but to hold attitudes and commit acts in utter violation of the person whose teachings they claim to espouse. What has happened to Christianity in the United States is historically notable in this regard, and this essay is, in my opinion, and acurate take on this new "Christian" reality.
An all White Evangelical service
Like so many people in the working poor, I have lost a lot more than I have won in this life. I have been laid off four times. I have lost a house and a car. I owe more on my student loans at 45 than I did at 25. Like millions of others in the working class, I have never stopped working — I’ve done every job you can imagine and I will continue to fight for a better life for my daughters, and my working-class brothers and sisters until my last breath. As an ordained minister trained at an evangelical seminary, I find that motivation to fight for the least of these within what is called the “social justice gospel.” In recent years, however, that gospel has been twisted by the evangelical Republican machine, which now seeks to instill the belief that social justice is the gospel of godless socialism and communism.
Over the last few years, the evangelical movement has gone to great lengths to vilify any message coming out of any church that connects with the social justice movement. In a […]
