by Nance
I explained that I started this study in high school, and continue it to this day, because Christianity has so powerfully influenced our culture. I've long since given up trying to convert or convince anyone to my way of thinking. I was raised in Protestant churches and chose a women's college that allowed me to make an historical-critical study of the Christian Bible and of other religions. I stay fascinated because Christianity plays such a huge role in the conflicts of our time, and because scholars continue to present new perspectives and deeper understandings. I want to understand what philosophies drive American actions and inform America's short history. If I seek to understand, rather than to be understood, then I have to seriously ask, "What the hell are those people thinking?!"
As luck would have it, I found Mike Lux's article, Why Are So Many Christians Conservative?, on AlterNet. Lux does a really good job of explaining, with Biblical references, why the philosophy Jesus taught as revealed in the gospels is at odds with the stated philosophy of Conservatives. To give a taste:
Conservatives believe that the rich and powerful got that way because they deserve to be, that society owes its prosperity to the prosperous, and that government's job when they have to make choices is to side with those businesspeople who are doing well, because all good things trickle down from them. Progressives, on the other hand, believe it is the poor and those who are ill-treated who need the most help from their government, and that prosperity comes from all of us -- the worker as well as the employer, the consumer as well as the seller, the struggling entrepreneur trying to make it as well as the wealthy who already have.And,
The Jesus of the New Testament spent his public career preaching about the nature of God and our relationship to God, but also about how we should deal with each other. He repeatedly blessed mercy, gentleness, peacemaking, community, and taking care of each other. He lifted up the poor and oppressed, and spoke poorly of the wealthy and powerful. If anyone in modern society talked like he did, you can bet your bottom dollar that conservatives would condemn that person as a class warrior, a socialist.The article is too long to have tattooed on my arm, although I briefly considered trying. You'll have to read it for yourself and get back to me.
When you've done with that, perhaps you can help me understand another mongrel miscreation that keeps me awake at night: The Feminist Conservative.
Addendum: I should add that my own leanings are toward a mix of Reform Evangelical Druidism and Free Range Addlism.
Nance,
ReplyDeleteA few quick replies to your fine post:
I don't think most people who call themselves Christians ever bother to read the Bible. They use the words "Bible" and "Christian" as a kind of get-into-the-club-free badge, or a talisman. There are plenty of disturbing things in the Bible, to be sure, but there are a lot of things that would lead a person towards humility and decency towards others. They never bother reading the Bible, so they have no idea what's in it. Many of them are so illiterate that there would be little point in their reading it anyhow, I suspect, but I leave that aside.
As for "conservative feminists," that is indeed an odd concatenation. One thing that begins to make sense of it is the tendency on the part of mild-mannered academics to mistake their tame contrarian aspirations for genuine radicalism. I can't count how many times I've heard obviously liberal teachers boldly declare that they're no knee-jerk liberals; no, not them -- they keep their distance from those bespectacled sheeple in the academy! This charade is consonant with the college-teacherly tendency to proclaim oneself genuinely transgressive and radical on the basis of absolutely nothing one has ever done or even, most likely, thought. I find this posture particularly silly because most of the academics I know wouldn't cross the street against the Don't Walk sign even if they were certain nobody was watching, so they can drop the uber-transgressive act right now. From that perspective, sure, I guess "feminist conservative" makes perfect sense....
I should add something Bill Maher-ish like, "But of course I kid my fellow academics, I kid them with love...." In truth, I don't mean any of this as harshly as it probably sounds -- I like my fellow teachers. They're usually very nice, intelligent, decent people, and we all have our silly pretensions and our failings. I'm no exception. So long as you understand that I'm a dinosaur, of course....
Nance, I saw that article awhile back. Good catch.
ReplyDeleteYesterday I saw another that asked this question of conservatives:
Why is it that you never see a conservative arguing for the Sermon on the Mount to be posted in courthouses, or for that matter, any other words of Jesus?
It is a great question and one I find few people willing to answer, much less consider in the many churches I annually visit as part of my Christian journey...
Aww, not the conservative feminists! This always gives me a headache, Nance. It's like contemplating the Escher's drawings: they look coherent at first, but their sly and utter illogic drills into your brain with every passing second, causing a painful meltdown, from which it is hard to recover. I swore off giving any attention to conservative feminists after several such disturbing espisodes where I really, really tried, not knowing any better. Ouch.
ReplyDeleteBut the forced marriage of Christianity and capitalism is not much easier to think about. I mean, really: what stocks would Jesus buy? Who would Jesus scam, fleece, use and abuse? Really?
I don't get it, and never will. And I think I'm better off not trying anymore.
Free Range Addlism sounds increasingly tempting. (To think of it, I may be already practicing it, and just don't know that this is what it's called.)
Nance, I share your perspective, have studied Christianity for years for the same reasons, and enjoyed the same article.
ReplyDeleteIn Jesus' day, the Pharisees and Sadducees took advantage of their power to control their followers through enforcing piety codes. They demonstrated none of the love, compassion and mercy that Jesus taught. They were intolerant and judgmental. They are the only group that Jesus treated with scorn.
Today, the religious right has assumed the role that the Pharisees and Sadducees played back then. So opposing them is a completely Christian attitude.
"In Jesus' day, the Pharisees and Sadducees took advantage of their power to control their followers through enforcing piety codes."
ReplyDeleteActually I don't consider the gospel accounts to be unbiased summaries as they were written a generation or more after the destruction of the temple and all that went with it, by people in another country who spoke Greek and weren't well acquainted with the Judean politics of 40-70 years earlier.
It's clear from the parable, that the man who helped his fellow man was a Samaritan and wasn't being so pious that he'd let someone die because the Samaritans were much like the Jews in their beliefs, but weren't into the Temple and it's ritual slaughters and all the other things he thought were corrupt and standing in the way of the restoration of God's blessings -- and then there was the table turning. . .
Like Nance, I've read everything I can about the origins and history of Christianity, but Adam Gopnik has a really nice and open minded article about it in the current New Yorker which, as usual, is well worth buying a copy.
Thank you, Capt., for the reading suggestion. I'll get right on it!
ReplyDeleteI'm going to pretend you didn't straighten us all out on the Pharisees and Sadducees; Tom Cat gave us such a great snarky talking point, I might be reduced to having to use it someday.
So much of what we think of as Christianity might be better labeled as Paulism. As I understand it, we can't really attribute any of the gospels to the men whose names they bear. These were oral traditions that came to be called Mark's story, Luke's story, etc. Perhaps we could think of the gospels much as we think of the detailed oral histories of Australia's aborigines--surprisingly accurate due to a pre-literate culture's reliance on oral history, but also naturally subject to some distortions and interpretations. The stories would never do for our modern devotion to accuracy (in which we take umbrage for every quote taken out of context), but they functioned well enough for the cultures that gave rise to them...state of the art for their time.
I am a long time deist having become very suspicious of the conflicting themes seen in the Bible. It is difficult to draw a straight line from Jesus' respect and elevation of women (ie Lydia) and later writings "putting women in their place."
ReplyDeleteIt's not so much what is included in the Bible as what is not included and the political and power struggles involved in assembling the product that would be known as "The Bible" leaves it's infallibility somewhat suspect.
And from personal experience I can say I have more knowledge of biblical content than many "Christians."
The conservative feminists make me want to scream! I read somewhere how Palin fleetingly considered abortion upon learning her son's condition but then "Chose" to continue the prenancy. She really does not see the hypocritical irony of exercising her right to choose and then supporting taking away that same right from other women!
Everywhere I go, I see stupid people...
Captain-
ReplyDeleteThe article in the New Yorker is most excellent. Read it this morning before heading off to the salt mines.
Raised a Congregationalist we didn't have a lot to do with Jesus back in the late 50's - late 60's. Social action was what our particular congregation was all about. Open Housing. Civil Rights Act. Etc.
What Jesus we focused on was the Jesus of the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew.
My parents had a terrific illustrated old testament in several volumes with engravings. As a little boy the gruesomeness was most appealing. Fire and brimstone lost their appeal for me at roughly age 9.
A non-believer as an adult I still draw on the lessons of social justice and equality I first learned in the United Church of Christ.
And I am always grateful we didn't deal with transubstantiation, celibate priests and other in the endless roadblocks religion places on the road to a spiritual life.
Having a more than passing familiarity with the Christian Bible, I share Lux's dismay with the disconnect between Christian tenets and conservative beliefs. The worship of free market enterprise that characterizes the conservative right is the antithesis of the teachings of Christianity. It is a matter of personal choice whether you believe in God and such a belief is not a prerequisite to being a person of good character. However, I think that it is important to understand that what attracts many of us to Christianity are its core belief that we are our each other's keepers with a responsibility to work towards the good of all humankind; Jesus was a socialist not a conservative.
ReplyDeleteAs with any philosphy, Christianity represents the interpretations of its recorders and the impact of the mores and social conventions prevalent during the lives of those recorders. To believe or to not believe in the divine inspiration of the Bible I leave as a personal matter with which the individual must wrestle; however, I think that as a philosophical text the Bible is of significance in its own right.
Of course, the down side to any philosophical view is that it may be usurped and manipulated to support any number of views, even those that appear to be totally contrary to the intent of the philosophy. Christianity has been co-opted to support slavery, the subjugation of women, the rise of capitalism, declarations of war, colonization, child abuse etc. There really is nothing new under the sun and this current use of Christianity by the right is sadly consistent with past rejections of social responsibility attributed to adhering to Christian principles.
Thanks Nance for such provocative material.
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteNance and all,
ReplyDeleteI think Max Weber's thesis in The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism still holds several gallons of water: basically, they substitute activity centered upon worldly success for elusive signs of spiritual rightness with the Lord.
Elizabeth, I think that if Jesus wants to participate in today's stocks and derivatives scams, he's going to have to dress better and get himself a good haircut. He looks too much like a danged hippie in all those portraits. And when it comes to the people we'll allow to scam us with impunity and abandon, we have our standards.
Religion? The Truth is already revealed lo these millions of years: make your peace with the Dinosaur Gods who Dwell in Distant Ease on Mount Gondwana, or ye are lost. Amen.