I had a discussion on Christianity with a few friends of mine about a year back, all of whom were either atheist or agnostic. Surprisingly, I found a few of my answers to their questions saved on my computer the other night. I've decided to share them on here in hopes they might be of benefit to someone. Even if you disagree--I'd love to continue the conversation. :)
The answers are kinda long, so I may spread them out over several notes. The bold parts are the questions, and the rest is my answer.
"Christianity has the hallmark of a doctrine meant to control people, that is get them to act ethically and morally as they see correct, not as a group of people 'making up a deity.' It is making up a social construct over hundreds or even thousands of years to get people to do what you want them to do."
This is so far removed from the teachings of every great Christian that I can only imagine you get this notion from the stereotypical (and unfortunately, not altogether untrue) image of the church. I'm sadly aware that most people's view of Christianity consists something of nuns with rulebooks and rulers, church (and political) leaders shouting out what is sin and what isn't and demanding everyone follow, and thousands if not millions of church-goers giving lip-service to those rules and then bad-mouthing or snub-nosing anyone who doesn't.
Christianity as taught in the New Testament is not a controlling doctrine at all. Let me clarify that statement before I am completely jumped on.
First off, yes, the Bible does call for certain moral standards of living. It also says that "all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God," and that getting to Heaven is "not by works" but through the "gift of God's grace." The Bible is clear that no one can live up to the moral standard proposed therein. Jesus came to say that it doesn't matter how good of a person you are, how often you help the poor and needy, or how many times you go to church: we all have vices, which we may regard as insignificant next to our virtues or other vices, but which separate us from the absolute holiness of God. We all deserve death. Christians believe that God became a man, suffered as a man to death as payment for our sins (since we deserve death), and in rising from the dead made it possible for us to change. The point is that salvation then comes not through anything you do, but through faith in Christ. No amount of morality on your own part will save anyone; a Christian believes Jesus works through us to make us moral despite our selfish selves.
Peter, Paul, Luke, and John expound on this following the Gospels, talking about how Christ frees them from the Law. The servitude to God which is so often expressed in the Bible is clearly written of as an offering of gratitude. It isn't necessary for salvation, but to "be saved" means to have Jesus working in your life, and that means a birthed desire to change and be more like Him. The basic idea is, "Since Jesus Christ has given me everything and enabled my freedom when I did not deserve anything but death, I will show my love by doing everything I can to follow His commands and trust to His mercy for my inevitable shortcomings." But the Bible is clear that this CANNOT be forced on others.
This is all personal revelation and change stuff, though. If you want to look at the actual teachings of Christ, they discourage a controlling method as well. Christ warned, "Do not judge others, lest you be judged." He instructed us to act towards others as we would like others to act towards us (not how others DO act towards us, or based on what we feel they "deserve"). When He told Peter that he would have to suffer and die for the ministry, Peter's response was to point to John and say, "Lord, what about him? What will he have to do?" Jesus's response was, "...what is that to you? You must follow Me." The point of all of these things is that Christianity is a personal religion in that all of the "control" is between you and God; no Christian is to cast judgment on anyone who doesn't "live up to" the same standards he feels obligated to follow, especially if the other isn't a fellow Christian.
I'd like to give a quote that sums up the true Christian perspective on controlling others: "One of the marks of a certain type of bad man is that he cannot give up a thing himself without wanting every one else to give it up. That is not the Christian way. An individual Christian may see fit to give up all sorts of things for special reasons - marriage, or meat, or beer, or the cinema; but the moment he starts saying the things are bad in themselves, or looking down his nose at other people who do use them, he has taken the wrong turning" (C. S Lewis, Mere Christianity).
At the end of the day, Christianity is about a personal relationship with God, not a list of moral rules to be followed to "earn" your way into heaven or out of hell. That is what heaven and hell are: one is getting to forever enjoy a relationship with your Creator, while the other is being forever separated from that relationship. It was never about punishment, but choice: if you choose God, He accepts and brings you to Him, and if you reject God, He accepts and puts you where you will never be bothered by Him again. We are halfway in-between now, dependent on God but able to choose whether to go to Him or to reject Him. Eventually God will cut the strings of dependance, and those who clung to Him will get to stay with Him while those who followed their own way will get their own way.
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Please note that I am not denying that "Christianity" can be and has been used by people to gain or keep power and control. The church throughout history has been rather good at this. But you can say the same thing about capitalism, democracy, socialism, communism, education, welfare, and any other program designed for good but ran by people. There are always bad apples, and they will inevitably spoil the affair through greed, selfishness, and other vices. That is the key to history. Terrific energy is expended - civilizations are built up - excellent institutions devised; but each time something goes wrong. Some fatal flaw always brings the selfish and cruel people to the top and it all slides back into misery and ruin. In fact, the machine conks. It seems to start up all right and runs a few yards, and then it breaks down. They are trying to run it on the wrong juice. God has designed the human machine to run on Himself. This applies to Christianity as well, in the sense that at any point the church (or churchgoers) attempt to run the show without directly relying on God, the machine begins to conk. Since every Christian is an imperfect person, the machine has little hope of running perfectly.
And now we come to morality. Morality, especially Christian morality, raises in a good many people's minds: something that interferes, something that stops you having a good time. In reality, moral rules are directions for running the human machine. Every moral rule is there to prevent a breakdown, or a strain, or a friction, in the running of that machine. That is why these rules at first seem to be constantly interfering with our natural inclinations. When you are being taught how to use any machine, the instructor keeps on saying, "No, don't do it like that," because, of course, there are all sorts of things that look all right and seem to you the natural way of treating the machine, but do not really work.
Micah 6:8
ReplyDeleteI often agree with much of what you say in your posts, but on this particular post I disagree entirely. I think the most pervasive problem with your consideration of the issue is a very limited consideration of what control is and how people can be controlled.
ReplyDeleteI think the control you have in mind is well illustrated by your comic- the puppeteer pulling the strings as the puppet dances beneath. This type of control is aggressive and dominating, it's easily defined and can be clearly felt. It is oppressive and generally brings about some type of revolt.
As you said, this is a type of control used by a number of church leaders and churches throughout history; it has been used in pretty much every major faith, and has generally brought about the aformentioned revolt after time, thus weakening the influence of the church that perpetrated it.
It, however, is not the only type of control, nor is it even close to the best type. The type of control used by modern churches can best be thought of as a type of peaceful cultural assimilation.
It doesn't go out and threaten your loved ones and burn you at the stake; rather, it is a pervasive, surrounding force which constantly suggests to you that you are out of line socially and religiously, and that there will be consequences to come. It empathizes with you and pities you for the horrors that it assures you will be perpetrated on you in the very near future, but could so easily be avoided if you would only turn your faith to God.
Perhaps the truest interpretation of the Bible is indeed that your earthly actions do not matter so long as you have faith in Jesus. I do not necessarily agree with this, but perhaps it is so. Nonetheless, virtually every church and most Christians would agree that one should try to live one's life as close to God's teachings as possible, even though perfect adherence is impossible and it is only through God's mercy that you can be saved from your imperfections.
This means that within Christianity there is a pressure to act as a 'good' Christian and adhere to biblical doctrine as closely as possible.
So, in summary, Christianity's control has become more subtle and uses social and psychological controls over physical aggression, but the end result is still control. While not a Christian in a predominantly Christian land, there is a strong social pressure to become Christian so as to a) fit in and b) evade eternal damnation. The former is largely due to base human psychology (any group looks ore favorably upon group members), but the latter is most definitely doctrine. Once within Christianity, there is an overwhelming pressure to 'act Christian,' which entails following biblical doctrine as closely as possible.