ConnorEl
Well-known member
The subset of conservative white evangelicals that are Christian seems to be shrinking in an accelerating fashion.
The subset of conservative white evangelicals that are Christian seems to be shrinking in an accelerating fashion.
Yep. The real Christians I grew up with would bend over backwards to help others no matter where they came from or what they looked like.
That's a foreign concept to modern evangelicals.
“For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.” - Jesus
Then he will say to those at his left hand, ‘You that are accursed, depart from me into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels; for I was hungry and you gave me no food, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, I was a stranger and you did not welcome me, naked and you did not give me clothing, sick and in prison and you did not visit me.’ Then they also will answer, ‘Lord, when was it that we saw you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison, and did not take care of you?’ Then he will answer them, ‘Truly I tell you, just as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to me.’ And these will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.”
“The idea of a social gospel was hatched in hell,”
Oh, a variety of things.
All, supposedly, “biblical”.
Because, you see, they “believe” the Bible—as opposed to “world” and them librul so-called Christians that “compromise” “biblical” truth with non-biblical sources of truth and authority.
Of course they can’t agree on what is truly “biblical”—or how to (necessarily) interpret the scriptures.
But the diversely and often miserably-grasped notion of being “bible believing” is enough to feel some common cause vs the secularist, etc.
Great post. This allowance for individual interpretarion of scripture is what has led to the prosperity, self-help, anti-gospel sermons that fill evangelical churches.
Apparently, the good reverend has never heard of the Social Gospel, which was practiced by a great many Protestant Christians around the turn of the 20th Century. Among its adherents were people like Theodore Roosevelt and Jane Addams. Ironically, he sounds much more like a devotee of Social Darwinism, as does Franklin Graham, who on a recent campaign swing through California also equated progressive politics with godless Marxism. These guys might as well join the Prosperity Gospel movement, because they clearly believe that wealth is a sign of godliness, and poverty is a sign that God has turned His back on you, and therefore you were meant to suffer. I strongly suspect that many Evangelicals privately believe this crap, the teachings and sermons of Jesus notwithstanding.
ETA: I just read at the bottom of the article that Richard Land, a rather notorious figure in Southern Baptist history, did say that the "idea of a social gospel was hatched in hell...There is only one gospel...a whole gospel for whole people that brings society under the sway of Jesus’ principles and righteousness.” Actually, the idea of the Social Gospel was "hatched" in the teachings and sermons of Jesus. Has Richard ever read the Sermon on the Mount? Somehow, Jesus' principles don't include helping the poor, the needy, and yes, the victims of our society. There's only the need to be "righteous", which is what fundamentalists are really all about.
Jesus was born in a feed trough. His parents paid the smallest possible offering at the temple, because they were the poorest of the poor. He spent his adult life homeless. He never knew where his next meal was coming from. He hung out with the dregs of society. He rode a borrowed donkey. He ate his last meal in a borrowed room. And before He died, his clothes (his only possession) were taken from him. He literally died owning nothing of this world. Poverty is not a sign of God's neglect.