Conveniently, Judgmentally Rigid
`Why do you hate Christians?”
That was, if I recall, the complete text of the e-mail. It showed up in September after a column criticizing fundamentalist Christian attempts to organize “spontaneous” prayer at high-school football games. The prayers were a means of subverting a Supreme Court ruling that outlaws state-sponsored invocations. And, though not exactly unexpected, the question still took me aback. I think it was the unstated assumption that bothered me most, the idea that criticizing a subset of Christianity amounted to hating Christians.
Which is why I promptly fired off a note in response. I don’t hate Christians, I wrote. I am one. Heck, I don’t “hate” anybody. But I don’t like bullies, which is what religious fundamentalists - Christian and otherwise - too often amount to.
Apparently, I’m not the only one who thinks so. Or haven’t you seen the recent headlines documenting the slow fracturing of the Southern Baptists, otherwise known as the most fundamental of fundamentalists?
A few days ago, Jimmy Carter, arguably the denomination’s most famous member, broke his lifelong ties with the organization, calling it theologically “rigid.” Now, hard on the heels of that blow, comes another: The Baptist General Convention of Texas has decided to withhold a $5 million contribution to the national group. Its reasoning is much the same as the former president’s, which, in turn, resembles that of the dozens of churches reported to be splitting from the denomination. The Baptists, they say, are too harshly conservative.
Is anyone surprised? Southern Baptists are, after all, the folks who waged jihad against Disney because the company provides health benefits for the same-sex partners of its employees and allows gay pride events at its amusement parks. They’re the folks who riled feminist sensibilities by calling on wives to “submit” to their husbands and refusing to sanction the idea of female pastors.
To be fair, they’re also the folks who apologized in 1995 for their historic role in condoning and perpetuating racism. Unfortunately, the denomination tends to make more noise with its prohibitions than its penitence. Which is, I guess, the thing that troubles me about religious fundamentalists in general. They wield God, the architect of all creation, as if He were a baseball bat they’ve been given to knock down any thing - or person - that offends them. And if you call them on it, their first line of defense is that all-purpose excuse, “The Bible says.” Which is all well and good, except that the Bible says many things these same people conveniently forget, neglect or ignore.
For instance, it says I should stone to death my misbehaving child (Leviticus 20:9) or adulterous spouse (Leviticus 20:10). It says that if a man rapes a girl, he must pay her father 50 shekels of silver and marry her (Deuteronomy 22:28-29). It says that if your clothing mildews, you have to give it to a priest to be examined (Leviticus 13:47-59).
But you know what else? The Bible also says, judge not. It says love your neighbor. And it says that Jesus washed the feet of his disciples as an example of humble service to others.
The Bible says. If we are honest, we have to admit that we pick and choose among the things the Bible says all the time. Some - like forcing a girl to marry her rapist - we discard because they have become offensive to our sense of right and wrong.
Others - like washing the feet of an underling - we overlook because they demand of us a vastness of spirit and humility most people find difficult, if not impossible, to achieve.
It’s easier to just skip through to the passages that let you use God as a baseball bat against others than to dwell on those that demand something daunting of you. Easier, lazier and wrong.
Publicly, Southern Baptists are taking the spate of defections in stride. Is it too much to hope that privately they’re reconsidering the rigidity that caused it? Maybe even realizing that that which is rigid breaks but that which is fluid flows. And that it matters less what faith is used against than what it is used for.
At the very least, you hope they’ve reached one understanding that’s long overdue: God is not a Louisville Slugger.