Liberal Christians?
I have been thinking a great deal about something I heard the other day. A respected friend referred to a place in our country as "A hotbed of liberalism." This person equated it with the idea of not being Christian. I sort of wondered when being a liberal became a bad thing.
During the 1980's a group of very legalistic believers began to say they spoke for all Evangelicals. The began to link social progressive thought with liberal/secular thought. These people began to define the Christian agenda as opposing gay rights and being anti-abortion. There was very little talk from them about fighting poverty, women's rights, or strong educational values. Instead, there was talk of cloistering ourselves as Christians in our own schools and not engaging culture. The tone of the conversation with those who disagreed with them became angry.
After over 20 years of the agenda, we have not found a good answer to the scourge of abortion. We have not faced the education crisis and in fact, the gap between the "haves" and "have nots" has grown. Poverty rates have soared. No real progress has happened in changing corrupt societal structures, through the efforts of this arm of the evangelical movement.
I have always seen the roots of our movement as being socially progressive. Instead of angry rhetoric, the Booths and the group of followers (most of whom came from the depths of poverty) dared to stare the Victorian conservatism of their day in the face and bring about a culture-engaging, poverty fighting, innovative and controversial style of Christianity to the world. They fought child slavery, took money from people of questionable standing and used it to do good, moved into poverty-stricken, crime infested neighborhoods to change the culture. They were frowned on as being less than Christian. They were not respectable. They challenged respectable Christianity. They loved unconditionally. They did not have pet sins which they chose to highlight. They loved in spite of the behavior. I believe they would have been called "liberals" today.
I think you know where I am going. Even though there is a small, vocal minority who espouse a legalistic type of Christianity, I believe more and more are seeing the value and scriptural mandate of being social progressives.
Recent conversations have given me concern within our movement, that we may have veered off course from our early days as social progressives; "liberals" if you will. In fact, someone sometime back used that term almost derisively as they called me a "liberal." I hope that we have not become legalists. It is easy in our Holiness tradition to lean that way, calling it purity of heart and life.
So have we bought into the legalism of some and denied our roots? Are we social progressives? Is that really scriptural? Is it a good thing to be a "Liberal Christian?" Is that what the Booths were?
What do you think?
During the 1980's a group of very legalistic believers began to say they spoke for all Evangelicals. The began to link social progressive thought with liberal/secular thought. These people began to define the Christian agenda as opposing gay rights and being anti-abortion. There was very little talk from them about fighting poverty, women's rights, or strong educational values. Instead, there was talk of cloistering ourselves as Christians in our own schools and not engaging culture. The tone of the conversation with those who disagreed with them became angry.
After over 20 years of the agenda, we have not found a good answer to the scourge of abortion. We have not faced the education crisis and in fact, the gap between the "haves" and "have nots" has grown. Poverty rates have soared. No real progress has happened in changing corrupt societal structures, through the efforts of this arm of the evangelical movement.
I have always seen the roots of our movement as being socially progressive. Instead of angry rhetoric, the Booths and the group of followers (most of whom came from the depths of poverty) dared to stare the Victorian conservatism of their day in the face and bring about a culture-engaging, poverty fighting, innovative and controversial style of Christianity to the world. They fought child slavery, took money from people of questionable standing and used it to do good, moved into poverty-stricken, crime infested neighborhoods to change the culture. They were frowned on as being less than Christian. They were not respectable. They challenged respectable Christianity. They loved unconditionally. They did not have pet sins which they chose to highlight. They loved in spite of the behavior. I believe they would have been called "liberals" today.
I think you know where I am going. Even though there is a small, vocal minority who espouse a legalistic type of Christianity, I believe more and more are seeing the value and scriptural mandate of being social progressives.
Recent conversations have given me concern within our movement, that we may have veered off course from our early days as social progressives; "liberals" if you will. In fact, someone sometime back used that term almost derisively as they called me a "liberal." I hope that we have not become legalists. It is easy in our Holiness tradition to lean that way, calling it purity of heart and life.
So have we bought into the legalism of some and denied our roots? Are we social progressives? Is that really scriptural? Is it a good thing to be a "Liberal Christian?" Is that what the Booths were?
What do you think?
posted by Larry at 4:05 PM
4 Comments:
Unfortunately, I think the real problem is that it has become too easy for Christians of all positions on the spectrum to use terms like 'liberal' 'conservative' and 'fundamentalist' as derogatory terms. In fact, at the root of the whole thing is a 'we are better than you so we'll call you nasty names' type mentality that is about as far from real Christianity as anything can be.
We need to be of 'one mind' which really is about loving in the way Jesus loved. There is no other measure for our faith!
And btw, the evangelicals fought for the abolition of the slave trade, a 'liberal' agenda if I've ever seen one!
good post and good comments from Graeme also. The bottom line liberal or conservative, and somehow I seem to be both, keeping our eyes on Jesus is what should define us. He will work differently in each of us. Everyone, liberal, conservative, need to exist in order to reach the whole world.
I really like what you wrote about the Army's roots in the post. Made me want to be more a part of it.
There are those who have familial army roots, but there are also many who are drawn to the Army from a variety of backgrounds, and we tend to bring our political leanings with us. Those who come primarily to its holiness teachings may look at the world differently than those who are primarily drawn to our work with the poor. I'm guessing there is less political consensus among us (if you count officers, soldiers and employees) than there is in other groupings of people.
Just today, I received an e-mail, kind of a "what's this world coming to" kind, and I happened to agree in principle with the author of the article in question. Can we agree to disagree? I hope so.
“They loved in spite of the behavior. I believe they would have been called "liberals" today. . . ."
I’m not so sure they would be “liberals” . . . that term is loaded with all sorts of ideas . . . To me, they would just be “Christians.” But you’ve made a great point that the idea of “Christian” is becoming negative and/or legalistic and beginning to take on a new meaning.
I like your term “social progressives” . . . I’m not really sure what “label,” if any, we should carry . . . I don’t know, maybe we need to redefine ourselves a bit . . .
Good post!
Blessings,
Bret
Post a Comment
<< Home