This is the message you heard from
the beginning: We should love one another. Do not be like Cain, who belonged to
the evil one and murdered his brother. And why did he murder him? Because his
own actions were evil and his brother’s were righteous. Do not be surprised, my
brothers, if the world hates you. We know that we have passed from death to
life, because we love our brothers. Anyone who does not love remains in death. Anyone
who hates his brother is a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal
life in him. (I John 3:11-15)
There
is a letter to the editor in the Erie paper this morning about how religion
doesn’t have to be divisive. We can all
get along as long as we see all religions as just being different flavors of
religion. “Flavor” – my word, not his, but I heard “Imagine” playing in the
background as I read the editorial. My kool aid doesn’t taste the same as
yours, but it’s all just kool aid. Not surprisingly, I disagree with the
editorial. I’m still undecided whether or not I’ll respond there.
There is a sense in which all religions are different flavors of the same thing. All religions, and all philosophies, address essential questions about the nature of the universe and its god (including the lack thereof,) and how humans should relate to it and to each other. That is, at its most basic, what a religion is. The problem is that those things are at the core of what it means to be human, so the answers are not merely insignificant things that can and should be overlooked by everyone else. The answers are claims about what is true and what is not true – and when those answers are not the same, there is a division made - a real division and not just a minor personal preference.
The universe came to be because of the act of one god, or ten, or two hundred million, or none. Does it make a difference? Yes. Who set the rules by which the universe operates? What are the consequences of disobeying those rules? In some religions, there are real consequences – it matters. In other religions, it doesn’t really matter. You might not get to heaven, but you’re recycled and given another chance. Which is true? Does it matter? Yes. If the real consequences truth claims are true, it matters a lot.
My point is that, contrary to what the editorial writer said, religion is divisive, and that’s a good thing when you’re dealing with truth claims because all truth-claims cannot be true at the same time, in the same way. I’m not saying we should be unkind to those who don’t believe as we do, but the reality is that they are not all the same.
This is why Jesus and John both tell us that we should not be surprised when the world hates us. We should be surprised if it doesn’t. The claims of Christianity are unique. There are other religions that show some similarities, but they miss the key point – and more often than not, the key point has to do with laws. If the Roman religion was correct, it didn’t matter which god you served, as long as you paid lip-service to the Roman emperor as a god, and this is basically what the writer is calling us to do: to claim it doesn’t matter and then to pay lip-service to whatever god happens to be worshipped locally. Christianity rejected the idea that it doesn’t matter, and it rejected the idea that the emperor was a god. It rejected the practices of the Romans. It rejected the practices of the Barbarians. It now rejects the new Roman practice that all religions are the same and therefore must be hated by the new Rome.
Jesus and the men who wrote the New Testament agree – we are to love our brothers. That mean that former Roman and former Jew, former enemies, must lay aside their enmity. That didn’t mean laying aside their truth claims. It meant both of them laying aside their old divisions, united by their new truth claim.
There is a sense in which all religions are different flavors of the same thing. All religions, and all philosophies, address essential questions about the nature of the universe and its god (including the lack thereof,) and how humans should relate to it and to each other. That is, at its most basic, what a religion is. The problem is that those things are at the core of what it means to be human, so the answers are not merely insignificant things that can and should be overlooked by everyone else. The answers are claims about what is true and what is not true – and when those answers are not the same, there is a division made - a real division and not just a minor personal preference.
The universe came to be because of the act of one god, or ten, or two hundred million, or none. Does it make a difference? Yes. Who set the rules by which the universe operates? What are the consequences of disobeying those rules? In some religions, there are real consequences – it matters. In other religions, it doesn’t really matter. You might not get to heaven, but you’re recycled and given another chance. Which is true? Does it matter? Yes. If the real consequences truth claims are true, it matters a lot.
My point is that, contrary to what the editorial writer said, religion is divisive, and that’s a good thing when you’re dealing with truth claims because all truth-claims cannot be true at the same time, in the same way. I’m not saying we should be unkind to those who don’t believe as we do, but the reality is that they are not all the same.
This is why Jesus and John both tell us that we should not be surprised when the world hates us. We should be surprised if it doesn’t. The claims of Christianity are unique. There are other religions that show some similarities, but they miss the key point – and more often than not, the key point has to do with laws. If the Roman religion was correct, it didn’t matter which god you served, as long as you paid lip-service to the Roman emperor as a god, and this is basically what the writer is calling us to do: to claim it doesn’t matter and then to pay lip-service to whatever god happens to be worshipped locally. Christianity rejected the idea that it doesn’t matter, and it rejected the idea that the emperor was a god. It rejected the practices of the Romans. It rejected the practices of the Barbarians. It now rejects the new Roman practice that all religions are the same and therefore must be hated by the new Rome.
Jesus and the men who wrote the New Testament agree – we are to love our brothers. That mean that former Roman and former Jew, former enemies, must lay aside their enmity. That didn’t mean laying aside their truth claims. It meant both of them laying aside their old divisions, united by their new truth claim.
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