I'm a Christian... I'm Sorry.

So there's this book I'm reading. It's called Blue Like Jazz by Donald Miller. In it, there is one chapter where he talks about "confession". He totally didn't go in a direction I thought he would. His story goes like this:

He's attending the auspicious Reed College, a school reknown for its "progressive" thinking. He and a few Christian friends have been forced into a nearly underground status because of what I could only describe as an "antagonistic" attitude held by the vast majority of the student body towards Christians. Basically, they were seen as naive, small/weak minded and conservative or at least, -gasp- republican. One very telling sign of the negative sentiments held towards the Christians on campus is illustrated by what happened when they announced they had opened a prayer room in a corner of one of the libraries on campus. After they left the prayer room, their fellow students proceeded to have a drunken-drug orgy complete with the sacrificing of (what I think I remember was) a stuffed animal lamb on the very same collection of carpet squares their Christian colleagues had prayed on just hours earlier. Not exactly a note of affirmation.

I guess, even the super-intellectual, cultural elite like to celebrate. So how else would they choose to get down but a hedonistic, drug-infused, semi-pagan festival!?!?! Well, the Christians were talking about what was going to be going on with the upcoming festival. One of them quipped: "we should put up a Confession booth". They thought "Genius!"

So they decided to build a Confession Booth for all of the hippies hyped up on drugs running naked upon their campus grounds. Only there was a twist. Instead of the hippies being asked to confess their sins, they would be asked to listen to the Christians in the tents (in monk gear) confess their sins. And not only their sins but the sins of all Christianity. Crusades, trampling beliefs of others, murders, rapes, sodomizers, travesties done in the name of God, clinics bombed, people judged, all these things.

I thought this was pretty darn awesome.

Later in the book, the author goes on to talk about how Christians love to use the metaphor of "war" to describe the struggle against what is going on in the world.

"They would talk about how we are in a battle, and I agreed with them, only they wouldn't clarify that we were battling poverty and hate and injustice and pride and the powers of darkness. They left us thinking that our war was against liberals and homosexuals.... Jesus taught that we are all bad and He is good.... God wants us to think of them as more important than ourselves." (Blue Like Jazz, p.132)

It was kind of eye-opening to me to realize that I might someday need to apologize for the sins of my fellow Christians. Anyone can take responsibility for the sins they, themselves, have committed. But I submit to you all that it takes a true member of the Body of Christ to take responsibility for the sins committed by a fellow member of Christ's church.

I want to be clear about what I'm saying here. I'm not saying that we should just apologize for the sins of those who have embarrassed us in the same way a blushing mother would to the other people in the supermarket when her two year-old is throwing a hissy fit in the middle of the candy aisle. I'm talking about OWNING the crimes of those perpetrated by our brothers and sisters in Christ. At some point we have to sac up and decide whether or not we're going to be part of the Body or not.

Nearly as importantly, we need to talk about what we, as Christians are fighting. Are we fighting each other? I'm not saying that we should "all get along, all the time'. Forget that. I'd never insult your intelligence by even propositioning it is possible. What's more, I'd never stifle the learning that can take place when different minds, perspectives and world views meet to discuss the wonder of our God. Besides, I'm just too contrary to exist in such a world.

I fear more and more, that we, as a church are becoming more and more like the Pharisees. Fat, comfortable, complacent and self-ritious. Jesus spoke constantly of how the Lord's people had lost sight of what was important. Again and again, the disciples would start to argue some point amongst themselves only to be corrected and put back on course by Jesus when he reminds them to keep their eyes on the prize, the well-being of their fellow children of God.

I'm just afraid that with all of the in-fighting that's happening between the Catholics, the Methodists, the Baptists who agree with the SBC, and those that don't, the SDA's, and even [cringe] the Church of Latter Day Saints, we are only acting like dogs fighting each other over a steak only to have it taken up to the trees by the crows.

Maybe I'm idealistic, maybe I'm just confused, maybe I've only had 4 hours of sleep. But I think we need to worry more about becoming one body of Christ. We don't have to always agree with what the right hand is doing, quite the contrary. I think we have a duty to speak speak up in those cases, but not at the cost of hurting the Body.

We're family. It's like my mom always says: "I didn't have a family to make friends." But no one would ever be able to accuse my mother of showing a family member anything short of unconditional love. She's my hero like that. Horrible fashion sense and all.

As I said, we need to make a decision whether or not we're going to be part of the Body. As with any family, you're going to have to accept the good with the bad, and at times, the bad with the worse. What's it going to be?