The news headline read “Anne Rice leaves Christianity”; it piqued my interest.
After all, just a couple years back her conversion from staunch atheism turned heads when the author; most well known for “Interview with a Vampire”, professed Jesus Christ as her savior. Christians around the world rejoiced, the kingdom of darkness has been plundered once again and a new child (this time a celebrity-scribe) is brought into God’s Kingdom. Score one more for cultural relevance, we seem to need as many as we can get in this fallen world.
So what went wrong for Rice’s faith? The headline itself is slightly erroneous; leading us to believe she gave up on God; here is what she said:
“My faith in Christ is central to my life. My conversion from a pessimistic atheist lost in a world I didn’t understand, to an optimistic believer in a universe created and sustained by a loving God is crucial to me. But following Christ does not mean following His followers. Christ is infinitely more important than Christianity and always will be, no matter what Christianity is, has been or might become.”
So from here we do understand that when she mentioned “Christianity” probably meant the institution or movement that embodies Jesus’ believers here on earth, not Christ Himself; her belief in Him has not been shaken.
So what left her so jaded as to “leave Christianity”? In the same article its cites political-beliefs, opinion on sexual-inclination, feminism and even science as a qualifier to be a “Christian”, she’s had it with “these people”; a “quarrelsome,hostile, disputatious, and deservedly infamous group.”
I don’t think many believers or ex-believers would be foreign to the situation; after belonging to a church group, they would tell you to change certain views and beliefs about the world at large (some valid notwithstanding). That is in effect, to “shoe-horn” your beliefs to their frame of thought: to be “like-minded” and “sharing the same vision”.
What becomes push-to-shove is when they include some of the opinions above-stated and conduct a social-blackmail of sorts.
Comply with our beliefs or face ostracization.
Most notorious of these beliefs are socio-political in nature; support this political candidate because he is a “Bible-believing Christian”; as if being a Christian can give you administrative and governmental talent overnight!
Another of these is to incite homo-phobia; suddenly if a person’s sexual-inclination is questionable, they aren’t worth it to be engaged or “saved” because according to the Westboro Baptists: God hates them.
So what does the Bible say in all this?
First of all: the Jesus I know preaches an inclusive Gospel, not an exclusive one.
The Bible illustrates it by showing Him fellow-shipping with the outcasts of society: the tax-collectors, prostitutes and the lepers. He could have as easily just engaged the rich and influential, but He chose to do His work among the needy.
This part speaks volumes of His tolerance for opinion, this gutter-level of society would probably constitute a lot of the deviant ideologies and lifestyles. The upper-class influentials would probably hold what is socially-acceptable during that era.
So did having a different set of beliefs exclude these people from being touched by Jesus and receiving salvation? I don’t think so.
I think the next step into analyzing the problem is to delve into the root of it: Man.
It’s no question that a lot of these qualifiers are man-made constructs; either to further selfish ambition or a sense of “spiritual” superiority over others. Many of these don’t stem from the Bible, but instead are often “gnostic-revelations” or “special anointings”. If they do originate from the Bible, it is most probably verses quoted out-of-context and amplified for selfish agendas.
Here is what the Apostle Paul has to say about man-made laws:
“What actually took place is this: I tried keeping rules and working my head off to please God, and it didn’t work. So I quit being a “law man” so that I could be God’s man. Christ’s life showed me how, and enabled me to do it. I identified myself completely with him. Indeed, I have been crucified with Christ. My ego is no longer central. It is no longer important that I appear righteous before you or have your good opinion, and I am no longer driven to impress God. Christ lives in me. The life you see me living is not “mine,” but it is lived by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. I am not going to go back on that.
Is it not clear to you that to go back to that old rule-keeping, peer-pleasing religion would be an abandonment of everything personal and free in my relationship with God? I refuse to do that, to repudiate God’s grace. If a living relationship with God could come by rule-keeping, then Christ died unnecessarily.”
Gal 2:19-21 (MSG)
In the context of Galatians; Paul had just rebuked Simon Peter for caving in to the Jewish elders and adhering to their traditions and customs. Apostle Paul had reasoned that Christ had already pulled us out of this vicious and weary cycle of pleasing people and their ridiculous qualifiers, there was no point in going back to that after being saved!
So bringing back closer to home, we can still be trying to please people by their qualifiers under the guise of Christianity. Some common and minor “qualifiers” we do see in the modern church are things like offering amounts, attendance to certain events and prayer times. When you do fail to meet these requirements, they’ll tack on an unworthy label on you or start drawing their groups of people away from you.
Make no mistake, I’m all for Godly consecration and the like, but if its a man-made checklist of requirements to be a member in the body of Christ, I don’t think its from God at all. We are all members by the blood of Christ and belief that He saved us. We don’t have to earn salvation.
Instead, the above checklist is going to wear down other-wise good intent members and make them feel not worthy enough to be called His children. We are not saved by works, but saved to do good works!
How then do we identify what is and whats not from God?
- Commune and stick close with God; 1 John 4 explains that if we are close to God, we can discern between the Spirit of Truth and the spirit of falsehood.
- Read the Bible; equip yourself with God’s irrefutable Truth
- Verify what is told to you; Act 17 describes the Bereans as of “more noble faith” as they verified what ever had been told to them. I think the lesson here is not take everything at face-value and counter-check with what you read in the Bible.
Regarding the last point; I think a good Christian teacher/elder would gladly entertain questions you have pertaining to the faith. A bad one would try to suppress questions, side-step or at worse; demand a no-questions policy while under them. Any questions would be seen as dissent and a threat to undermine their authority.
So why is religiosity is so dangerous? I think at it’s core, it’s an attempt to paint a much prettier picture of a person or corporate entity’s spiritual life than it actually is. A carnal expression of Man’s innate desire to live up to his own expectation of spirituality.
Jesus warns us though, to avoid ending up as white-washed tombs (Matt 23), nice looking on the outside (physical) but dead on the inside (spiritual). Co-incidentally, I just watched a video of a sermon from AR Bernard (here), which towards the end he elaborates on how we are so obsessive to clean up on the outside that we forget to clean up on the inside.
I think that sums up religiosity for me, it’s dangerous because it strays believers away from the focus of Christ into something carnal; working for their salvation and relevance in God’s eyes.
I guess if we can identify and stop religiosity, we can avoid having people in Anne Rice’s position; jaded and weary of the man-made laws and requirements that choke the Power of God in their lives.
Soli Deo Gloria.
*note the above commentary is solely the author’s opinion based upon his 12 year walk with God*
well written… bravo..