I’ve added A Bad Christian Blog to the links list on the left. It’s a fascinating read, and I think he says a lot of things I’d like to say, but more articulately and, er, stuff.

The label “Bad Christian” is an interesting one; it’s one I’d apply to myself – for several reasons. First of all – and mainly – there’s the closet Calvinist in me who is aware of his total unworthiness and sinful nature, and the knowledge that I am, as compared to Christ, not exactly spotless. That’s the answer that doesn’t upset too many people, and consequently, it’s perhaps the one I’m less interested in, even if it’s more important theologically.

The more provocative reason is that the kind of person who uses the label “Good Christian” and “Bad Christian” tends to be the kind of person who attaches political and absolutist moral meaning to those terms – that is, a “Good Christian” is one who votes conservatively, condemns homosexuality as sinful, is anti-choice (sorry, pro-life – that’s another rant, anyway), and who places a high value on individual “holiness” and “purity” – and, more significantly, is someone who speaks out on those issues. A “Bad Christian” is someone who, well, doesn’t. And I don’t, because on one level I think a lot of that stuff is culturally bound and as such a simple, literal reading of the Bible doesn’t count for much, and on another level I think it’s utterly hypocritical to be whinging on about things like your kids doing marijuana and watching TV after 9 at night when there are hundreds of thousands of people dying every day as a result of global injustice, curable diseases and unacceptable poverty.

Tony Campolo said this:

First, while you were sleeping last night, 30,000 kids died of starvation or diseases related to malnutrition. Second, most of you don’t give a shit. What’s worse is that you’re more upset with the fact that I said shit than the fact that 30,000 kids died last night.

That quote so neatly sums up exactly what is so fucked up about the church today; it makes me cry every single time I read it.

(the badchristian himself has a very good post on why he calls himself that)

This entry was posted on Tuesday, August 16th, 2005 at 12:53 am and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.