Child's Play & Christianity
Sunday, March 20, 2011 at 11:30AM | by Otter From the Mailbag:
Dude, give it a rest. We get it already. You don't like Christianity.
On the contrary, I love Christianity.
I just think it's incredibly shy about its virtues and insufferably bold about its vices.
On a semi-related note, I was grading at my favorite café today: a loud happy family sat near me in the courtyard, having apparently come from church. The mother asked the young child, "Did you hear a story about Jesus today?"
She seemed annoyed when the child responded with startling earnestness, "I sat down."
It was what mattered most to the child, who is apparently filled with wonder and a sense of his place in the world because he wandered in, found a seat, was told to sit, and sat.
I bet that kid loves church more than most adults do, and for better reasons.
There's a god one can get behind... One with an underdeveloped sense of reverence for the distant and abstract and an exaggerated sense of reverence for the real, for the immediate.
Rather like Jesus, in some ways, which gets to the business of the difference between apocalyptic realism and "heaven" as it's generally imagined.
More on that another time.
Christianity in Religion 
Reader Comments (1)
I can't wait for "another time". I love your perspective on Christianity. You are able to put into clear focus the inchoate thoughts I've had about Christianity since growing up fundy and leaving it for heathenism. Since I've come back to Christianity and faced my fundy demons, I've struggled to articulate what Christianity IS for me as well as what it ISN'T, as the IS is really more important, but it has been a definite struggle. Thank you for sharing your thoughts and your questions. They help me to focus my own ideas.