So far the feedback on Lightfall has been gratifyingly positive. There has been, however, a category of complaint I've heard more than once, so I probably need to address it here--especially since it's not so much a response to my book as a feeling about me. The comment is usually phrased something like this: "I can tell you hate Christians." An alternate version, which I heard yesterday, was, "I know you think all Christians are crazy." I can be a bit glib about that one, I think: It does strike me as odd that if you say Napoleon or Count Chocula speaks to you in your head, we call the men in the pretty white coats; but if you say God or Jesus talks to you, we let you off the hook. Still, I have to admit it's possible, so no, I don't think all Christians are crazy. Some, maybe. Some. After all, there are crazy people in America, plenty in fact, and some of them at least claim to be Christian. Mostly, though, I think Christians are as sane as I am. How sane is that, you ask? Ahem...
Let's get back to the original complaint, which claims I have a problem with Christians. As an author, I hoped my book, especially its final section, would make it clear what I think about religion. There's a sermon near the end of the book that speaks for me, and I believe readers who make it that far will agree it's sympathetic. Before that, however, some readers infer from my sardonic tone and satirical content that I intend some nefarious campaign against organized Christianity, and those readers might come to the false conclusion that I'm attacking them; so if you have a few minutes I'd like to respond to that impression at length.
I need to lay some groundwork. First of all, America is, if not a "Christian nation," then at least a nation mostly populated by Christians, and in a monolithically Christian nation, we tend to take certain ideas for granted. But I can't respond to any "anti-Christian" complaints, nor can I explain how I truly feel about Christianity, until I point out some flaws in these ubiquitous assumptions. The axioms in question are as follows:
1a.) The Bible is either completely true or completely untrue...
1b.) ...and of course it's completely true. After all, it says so right there in the Bible. "All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable..." (2 Timothy 3:16, KJV--the NIV says "God-breathed.")
2.) If you don't go to church, then you can't be a real Christian.
3.) Christianity was created by God; therefore, it needs no improvement. To criticize a church or its doctrine is to criticize God Himself.
4.) All Christians believe in the Christian God.
Okay, let me deal with these one at a time.
1.) We know for a fact that the Bible is NOT completely true, IF by truth we mean truth in the journalistic sense, a collection of literal facts. We know the human race is more than six thousand years old. We know there wasn't a global flood five thousand years ago. We know rabbits don't chew cuds (Leviticus 11:6), bats aren't birds (Deuteronomy 14:18), pi isn't equal to three (1 Kings 7:23), and the sky isn't a solid "firmament." We also know the Bible contains historical errors (King Herod didn't slaughter the firstborn of Israel), errors in prophecy (Nebuchadnezzar never destroyed Egypt--Ezekiel 30:10), and flat-out inconsistencies (both David and Elhanan killed Goliath--2 Sam. 21:19). But what many people don't understand about the Bible is it was never intended to be literally true. Rather, it was meant to have moral, mythological value, and much of that content is true. Arguing about the literal truth of the Bible is like arguing whether foxes really eat grapes as in Aesop's fable. (They do, by the way. Foxes are, like us, omnivores.)
Do I think the Bible is literally true? Obviously not. Do you, though? Really? Do you honestly believe every word of the Bible--even the words that don't agree with each other? And if not, does that affect your view of God or Jesus or Christianity at all? I submit to you that partial disbelief is in no way heretical or counterproductive. We all have certain quibbles with the Bible, whether we admit it to ourselves or out loud or to no one at all. The truth is, some Christian religions (and religionists) nowadays believe in evolution, mostly because it really happened. It did. Now, that doesn't mean God doesn't drive evolution, using it as His engine of creation. And it also doesn't take away the moral, mythological lessons of Genesis; namely, that we're all part of one huge human family, and we all suffer one way or another for the mistakes of our forebears.
2.) It's true that I don't go to church any more often than your average agnostic. I have a somewhat complex history with church--or, as we called it in my childhood home, "Kingdom Hall." Yes, I was raised as a Jehovah's Witness. That's one reason I know the Bible so well (to be candid, I know it far better than most regular churchgoers do), and Witness doctrine certainly formed the basis for my system of ethics, most of which never changed after I left that faith for good. Yet consider this: Jesus was a regular attendee at synagogue. Does that make him a Christian, or a Jew? Are we defined solely by denomination? One of the reasons I so seldom attend church is that I already know what it's likely to say: God and Jesus are the good guys, Satan is the enemy, and it's better to be a good person than a bad person. So how many times do I need to attend the same class? But if you enjoy the fellowship and reassurance of church, then hey, more power to you. I have no problem with that. Whatever gets you through the week, Gentle Reader, and I mean that sincerely.
3.) Christianity as we understand it was absolutely NOT created by God; rather, it was created by Paul and other first-century church leaders, then recreated by the First Council of Nicaea, then again by any number of human beings. We all know this to be true, but we accept the divinity of the church (whichever church we subscribe to, anyway) because Paul's letters are part of the Bible, and the whole Bible is God-breathed, so Paul must be right about everything. I recently startled my girlfriend's mother by saying I agree with almost everything Jesus said, but I'm no fan of Paul. In fact, I don't think I like Paul very much as a person. It seems arrogant for the former Saul of Tarsus to have told a bunch of Jewish Christians how to behave after spending a fair portion of his life torturing and killing them. He didn't like women very much (1 Tim. 2:11-12); and depending on which translation and/or commentator you read, he probably wasn't fond of gay people, either.
(I interrupt myself for a moment to mention something interesting I found while researching that last sentence. You'll like this. Matthew 8, in the King James Version at least, relates the story of Jesus healing the "servant" of a Roman centurion. Yet the original Greek word was pais, an idiomatic term for "gay lover." In this context, in fact, pais seems to mean the centurion's catamite--a boy kept for sexual purposes. Apparently, Jesus had nothing to say about the soldier's homosexuality, perhaps even child abuse by twenty-first century standards. The Gospel of Luke, written shortly thereafter, softens the term to doulos, a generic word for "servant." See? I told you you'd find it interesting.)
I like most women. (A lot!) I like most gay people, too. I believe women were not created solely to be mothers plus assistants and sexual utilities for men. I believe homosexuality is as genetically predetermined as heterosexuality. Paul doesn't. Simply put, I don't accept Paul's authority on these matters, and I can't imagine why you would, either. I often joke about how much I'd love to see the congregations' letters back to Paul: "Dear Paul...Hey, wait a second. Paul who?! Aren't you that guy who just killed a bunch of us a few years ago? Yeah, butt out, creep. Sincerely, the Ephesians."
Partly because I dislike Paul, I dislike a lot of present-day ecclesiastical "morality." I don't think it is moral to exclude gays or women from visible roles in the church. I don't think it's moral to say a husband is the master of his wife. I don't think it's moral to claim your religion is right and every other religion is sending its believers straight to Hell. You don't know that. I don't know that. Matter of fact, I don't believe in Hell, or the Devil, or some invisible battle between angels and demons ever-raging in the atmosphere around us. If you do, again, more power to you, but it might not be such a great idea to insist we all believe in worldviews you can't possibly prove.
So having said all that, how can I claim, as I do on the last page of my book, to be an "agnostic Christian?" Think about what it meant to be a Christian back around, oh, say, 40 A.D. The church was still disorganized at best, so to be a Christian meant simply to agree with what Jesus said and to act in a way consistent with what Jesus taught. I admire Jesus of Nazareth. As I hope that climactic sermon in Lightfall makes clear, I believe Jesus was centuries ahead of his time--and maybe ours as well--when it comes to acceptance of other genders, professions, ethnicities, religious backgrounds, and sexual persuasions. His behavior toward the Samaritan woman at the well (John 4) makes this clear. I aspire to be like Jesus in those respects.
4.) Agnostic? Yep, I sure am. I don't know if God truly exists, and neither you nor I can know the nature of His or Her or Its being or moral outlook beyond a shadow of a doubt. (If we could, in fact, your faith would be meaningless.) In some ways, it's fair to call me an atheist. This is true from a fundamentalist perspective, and I accept it as such. I do not believe in Yahweh, the Jewish war god, and that's the only God some Christians accept. Jesus believed in Yahweh, so we disagree there, but he also tried to soften Yahweh's public persona into something a bit more groovy and inclusive. I like that. Jesus claimed to be the only possible path to salvation (John 14:6). We disagree there as well, as would billions of Hindus and Muslims and Buddhists and Wiccans and animists and atheists and agnostics and apathetics, but I admit his path probably works. I believe a person can share, or at least aspire to share, Jesus's ideals without sharing his cosmology. If you disagree, I understand, but at least now maybe you understand where I'm coming from when I call myself a Christian. I don't hate Christians. In my own mind, at least, I kind of am one.
I could even say the process of researching Lightfall has made me more sympathetic to doctrinal Christians, because I used to think most Christians were hypocrites. Okay, so I still think most Christians are hypocrites, but at least now I understand why. To follow every last rule in the Bible is logistically impossible! Even Jesus worked on the Sabbath (John 9:14-16). And just as important to consider is the fact that some Biblical rules don't make sense to modern people, so we tend to ignore them, all the while paying lip service to Biblical moral authority. Most of us, for example, don't really believe sex before marriage is wrong. If we did, over 90% of Americans wouldn't have premarital sex, especially the over 80% of Americans who identify as Christians. It's not just that all those people succumb to diabolical temptation; rather, they simply don't find it wrong in their hearts. Like me, they disagree with some parts of the Bible, so they live by situational ethics rather than absolute submission to the Bible or church doctrine. They live their lives. They have gay friends and relatives, they have rewarding sex lives of their own, and they ignore Old Testament rules about grooming, the Sabbath, proper diet and animal sacrifice. They might even believe in equal rights for women or evolution or the fallibility of humans who wrote the Bible--but they can't exactly stand up in church and say so, now, can they? So instead they put on one persona in the company of parishioners while living by another set of morals and ethics. Does that make those Christians hypocrites? Yes, but how could they be otherwise? What I found while talking to Christians in depth, even pastors, was they're doing the best they can to make everyone happy, and they're obliged to let consistency fall by the wayside.
I don't hate Christians. I really don't. Oh, I'm amused by some church teachings, and I do wish Christian fundamentalists would keep their noses out of high school science classes--it's like putting vegans in charge of KFC. But the Christians I know and love enjoy the peace of mind Christianity brings to their lives and families. They use the higher, often menacing authority of God to keep their kids on the right track. They like believing God prevents their consciousness from dying when their bodies give out. And they like sharing their Sunday mornings with dozens, even hundreds of instant friends. I understand all those likes. And as the last part of Lightfall makes clear, what I really think is someday soon we're all going to raise our hands as one and admit that, as Bishop Spong asserts, "Christianity Must Change or Die." Either church teachings will, for lack of a better word, evolve to keep up with current knowledge and sentiment, or they'll become so illogical and exclusionary as to be obsolete. I think some churches are close to that now; and I strongly believe many of my readers, even fiercely loyal Christians, would have to agree.