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Comment by gboone | Hacker News Reader

If it were truly Christianity it could not be forced. I would propose you are referring to something more accurately described as politically selfish dogmatism made possible by the current state of the culture's biblical illiteracy mixed with people's general need to resolve their identity crisis.

I'm an American Christ-follower with a degree in biblical theology. In my view, there is a "brand of Christianity" that has nothing to do with following Christ. It's borrowed the name but not much else.

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Well the people who are extremist are representing your views and none of these 'real' Christians seem to be speaking out against them

It's only reasonable to assume that due to inaction, the ideas are supported

You are missing the point that they are not. It is more reasonable to assume that one has heard what one has listened to.

Yes, I must have missed all the Christian leaders coming out against the extremists in the media and in online communities

I can't hear what isn't there. The extremists have been taking over the political parties and nobody has said or done anything. If you claim otherwise, perhaps you can inform me with citations

It doesn't matter if you think they don't represent your views. The extremists are the ones in media constantly, they're the ones in the public eye. They're representing Christianity to the public at large. That is the important point

There is no thing as Christian leaders. God is one.

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew%2023&ve...

We're dealing with earthly matters, here, not heavenly ones. God may be in charge in the metaphysical sense, but particular individuals are in charge in the physical sense.

Heads of churches, pastors, the pope, directors of Christian schools, all sound to me like Christian leaders. They all have an incredible amount of influence over the laymen.

Many of them have been, and continue to be actively involved in bringing us to the current state of affairs. Many others are deafeningly silent on the matter. Some of that silence is principled (in the apolitical sense), but much of it is also opportunistic.

I happen to disagree with this. The only real Christian leaders are those who are following Christ. In all authority, authority is granted. Leadership is essential, and Christians are warned to be on the lookout for wolves among the sheep.

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Acts%2020%3A28%...

English is not my native language but to me a Christian is a _follower_ of Christ. Christ is the leader.

Edit: > “But you are not to be called ‘Rabbi,’ for you have one Teacher, and you are all brothers. 9 And do not call anyone on earth ‘father,’ for you have one Father, and he is in heaven. 10 Nor are you to be called instructors, for you have one Instructor, the Messiah.

I know a few people like the Pope, or any of the ~15 Patriarchs who might disagree with this.

I can understand your view on it. My hope is to broaden your understanding of what Christian means so that you might ultimately say "so-called Christians".

The difficulty in your argument is you are suggesting that those who are NOT like these so-called Christians who are extreme and incendiary, be LIKE those and oppose/crush their efforts.

As we say in America, it's a free country. There is freedom of speech and it is the responsibility of the listener to work to make sure they are not being duped. Assuming you are a thinking person, allow me to share my view more.

I am a Christ-follower. I follow Christ. I don't follow Christians, organizations or politicians. A life of following Christ is a life of submission to Christ. I therefore will not be expected to do something contrary to what he has said to do. He has said to love my enemies and do good to those who persecute me or give him a bad name. I have been told to expect that there will be those who pretend to be real Christians but are not and are only doing things for their selfish gain. I have been told to expect that there will be times when I am criticized or ridiculed for simply identifying as a Christian.

So, as a Christian, I understand your point of view of them, but you might be misunderstanding me.

See, I think I understand what it means to actually follow the ideals of Christ. I think it's a pretty good way to be. But that isn't my point here.

My point is that the image of Christianity is being twisted and used in the public eye and I haven't seen any actual Christians come out and condemn the behavior.

We have all these self proclaimed Christians in government, claiming to have God on their side. They keep getting voted in. Why do we still have homeless people? Why are there billionaires who take advantage of the poor? Why are they trying to control who can marry and how much control people have over their own bodies? Why do we have people going hungry while corporations throw away food to protect their profits? If these self proclaimed Christians in government really were, would they be writing and voting for legislation that help to enable the state of society that seems to be antithetical to what Christ taught?

I hear no actual Christians saying anything about it, but they keep voting. The result is people actively being harmed with Christ's name being thrown on top

> If these self proclaimed Christians in government really were, would they be writing and voting for legislation that help to enable the state of society that seems to be antithetical to what Christ taught

Maybe you should befriend some right-wing Christians and discuss this with them instead of complaining about them in this left-wing echo chamber? I suspect you don't really understand their perspective, and I don't think you truly care to. But, if you did want to actually understand, that would be my recommendation.

The purpose of a system is what it does.

Ideals don't matter when you vote for politicians that enact harmful policies.

You mention many of the ideals valued in contemporary society, especially by people who identify as liberal/progressive-and you seem to think they are “ideals of Christ”-but how likely do you think it really is that a 1st century CE founder of a Jewish apocalyptic sect would have actually agreed with those contemporary ideals? Even if you are convinced that they are entailed by his (reputed) teachings - how likely would he have been to agree with that entailment if it had been presented to him? And do you approach any other pre-modern religious leader in the same way?

There was the whole eye of a needle thing about rich people, loving thy neighbor, feeding the poor...

But what did they see as the answer to social problems? Changes to government policies, or divine judgement in the afterlife and at the end of the world?

Rather than being a religion of the poor and downtrodden, early Christianity spread primarily among the middle and upper classes - and while it encouraged charity, and personal decisions to voluntarily renounce wealth, it never presented that as mandatory for its followers - if it had, it would never had succeeded as it did.

So why are there people who call themselves Christians who want to make the US a theocracy? The people that those vote for enact incredibly harmful policies in the name of religious morality

A theocracy is a political system in which religious leaders have formal control over the state, and the state directly favours the doctrines of a particular established religious sect–it is standard in a theocracy for the head of state to be a cleric (bishop, mullah, ayatollah, lama, etc). Among internationally recognised sovereign states, there are only three contemporary examples of theocracies – Afghanistan (whose de facto head of state is the Supreme Leader of the Taliban, Hibatullah Akhundzada, an Islamic scholar); Iran (whose head of state is its Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei); and Vatican City (whose head of state is, of course, the Pope). I'm not aware of any significant movement advocating the adoption of such a political system in the United States.

Amen. Reminded me about the Regensburg lecture:

> The emperor, after having expressed himself so forcefully, goes on to explain in detail the reasons why spreading the faith through violence is something unreasonable. Violence is incompatible with the nature of God and the nature of the soul. "God", he says, "is not pleased by blood - and not acting reasonably (σὺν λόγω) is contrary to God's nature. Faith is born of the soul, not the body. Whoever would lead someone to faith needs the ability to speak well and to reason properly, without violence and threats... To convince a reasonable soul, one does not need a strong arm, or weapons of any kind, or any other means of threatening a person with death..."

Preacher, some of us have tried reading the fascist piece of fiction known as the old testament.

There's is no christianity brand that is not compromised exclusively of hypocrites. You follow a book that literally tells us certain people should rule us all.

I’m an atheist but this argument is weak: Christianity explicitly breaks with the Old Testament and Christians of the non-fascist persuasion would non-unreasonably say that the problem is the people who are trying to make laws based on their religion (which Jesus explicitly told his followers not to do) and especially based on the superseded Israelite law.

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