I absolutely love this guy in my program. He's part Jew, somewhat Buddhist, somewhat agnostic, completely cynical, and totally hilarious. The main thing we share is our support of Obama and love of rehashing the side-splittingly funny things that tend to happen in Golden Age Lit. However, when it comes to matters of faith we have some obvious disagreement, but interesting conversation.
He expressed to me his dislike of the hypocrisy and pushiness of the so-called Christian Right. I agreed. There's definitely enough hypocrisy on the part of some well-known Christians to go around (Ted Haggard, anyone?), and I could sympathize with his gripes about grandstanding and self-righteous rhetoric, and I conceded that federally funded faith-based programs blur the line between the separation of church and state. But what I tried to get him to understand is that the Christianity that he sees portrayed in the media and in politics is not what Christianity is truly about. I told him that Jesus himself reserved his harshest criticism for the "Religious Right" of his day, the Pharisees, for the same reasons he mentioned.
"So, you're making me a Christ figure? Wow! Thanks. I really appreciate that, Chantell."
2 comments:
Now that was a total left turn on that conversation!
Well . . . not exactly. He was definitely being facetious--we both laughed after he said that because he knew that wasn't my point.
I think (hope)what he got out of that conversation is that the type of Christians that bother him were the same type of religious figures that bothered Jesus. So if even Jesus (the guy who defines Christianity) criticized it, then it is not a part of what being a true Christian is about.
Post a Comment