1) Keep it away from bright light, 2) Don't get any water on it, and 3) Never, never ever feed it after midnight. He disobeys with disastrous consequences. The cute little pet becomes an out of control gremlin.Jesus came to earth to "show us the Father". The legacy he left was to serve to the point of giving His own life. He didn't build any buildings, or create an institution. He didn't write anything down. He spoke in stories. He left all control to others, mainly the twelve disciples. He talked about loving enemies and doing good to those who hate you. And then he left.
So why does the church have a legacy of violence? The only violence that Jesus was reported to do was to take after those who exploited the poor.
I think it starts when a church organization is given power. It starts out looking so right, so noble. This church can make lives better if we just were able to control the environment in order to do the good we want to do. And soon it spirals down into needing more control.
Because a church isn't a business it doesn't have the "normal" leverages that a business has. A business looks at production and cost and then motivates its workforce to carry it out. What does a religious organization produce? It is completely intangible. The church can't point to profits and seeks to make tangibles out of intangibles. It is left to devise what it wants its members to do. Once identified, the goal is to motivate. Because profits and losses are not a part of the church, there have to be other means. Those means then become guilt, shame, and fear.This extends all the way from killing heretics in the name of God, to shoveling fear and shame at someone who believes differently.
If you have faith, never, never, ever feed it power.
3 comments:
Got Furby?
Since the Medieval Ages, the Church has been a place of safety and survival -- sanctuary from marauders and the forces of Mother Nature. The Church creates a sense of community based on conditional acceptance (presented as unconditional acceptance [Agape])... When an individual feels isolated, lost, alone, bereft, and unaccepted by "others," the Church is there to "tend to the weak."
The HRC is patterned after the political structure of Roman city-states. In other words, a religious organization that parallels government, not business. If there is absolute human power within, then Machiavelli is proved correct; it corrupts and the shephards become predators who feed on the flock.
Ponder the "trickle down" effect (I called it "the economics of emotion") and how superiority and dominance and control leach into interpersonal relationships... co-dependency is co-created... It is a far cry from the inter-dependency of Jesus's stories.
The "trick" is to find those within the system who are like Jesus.
Watch: The History of Christianity -- the first 1000 years (A&E/History Channel DVD)
Nah, I'm more of a Gizmo man myself.
Maybe I was speaking about the evangelical conservative organizations involved in the political process today. That might fit. :-)
As always Marcia, you keep me on the strait and narrow. Excellent points.
As I was reading your comment I realized that in our country rare is the church that is at the center of the neighborhood community. And communities these days are far less about geographical positions and more about similar issues. Because of that, the church may be in a different mode here than in the past.
While some churches have been structured around government rather than business, many of the evangelical churches these days are definitely structured more around the business model than the government model.
McChurches.
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