Theologian Says ‘Love’ Is the New Cultural Apologetic Affirming Immoral Activities – Theology of Hurt Feelings – Why Christians Are Reluctant To Call Out Sexual Sin
(Before I get to the link proper, here is a long introduction by me.)
I agree with this guy’s editorial (linked to farther below). I’ve written of this phenomenon before on my own blog, going back a year or maybe as long as three years ago (see links at the bottom of this post under the “Related Posts” section).
I do not like legalistic jerks. I don’t think Christians should be rude, mean, hateful jerks to other people, even when condemning certain behaviors as being sinful.
However. HOWEVER.
I can’t say as though I’m a whole-scale supporter of legalism’s opposite characteristics, either – which amounts to extreme leniency and “watering down of standards” in the name of Love and Tolerance.
I have seen some Christians so very afraid of hurting the feelings of Non-Christians (or even that of fellow Christians) who are in sin, or in confronting Christians who are openly supportive of behaviors the Bible condemns, they tip toe around the sin in question to an absurd degree – where they end up practically supporting, condoning, or excusing said sin (whatever it may be).
These Christians are hyper-sensitive to other people’s feelings, and it is a huge annoyance to me.
This tendency to treat other people’s feelings with kid gloves has gotten so bad in Christendom (particularly in regards to sexual sin), that some preachers have admitted they are afraid to speak out against sin in public, in their blogs, TV shows, books, or from the pulpit.
It’s also very common among Christian lay persons, or by ex-Christians or liberal Christians, who confuse God’s propensity to love and forgive with the notion that God (and Jesus Christ) are hunky-dory with behavior the Bible thoroughly condemns, such as hetero pre-marital sex or homosexual sex acts, for example.
(Transgenderism is a sexual state which has become the new liberal Christian, moderate Christian, Theology of Hurt Feelings Christian, ex-Christian, and left wing secular Sacred Cow that you may not criticize at all.)
It’s also intriguing to me that on the spiritual abuse blogs I have visited, whose owners and members champion the downtrodden (i.e., adults who have been mistreated by churches, or victims of sexual abuse whose abuse was swept under the rug by their fellow church members),
have forum or blog participants, who will, on one hand, quite understandably call for the heads of such abusive church members on a platter,
rightly call out Christians as being naive fools about abuse in churches, but – many of these same people are also very dismissive of, or blind to, abuses by Muslim militants and homosexual militants.
They are very naive of abuses by Muslims and homosexuals. They seem to have a huge blind spot in those areas.
How they can so easily spot and repudiate Christian and church bungling of spiritual and child sexual abuse, or of preachers who exploit their church members,
but fail to recognize the dangers of Muslim and homosexual militancy in American society and other regions of the world, I will never understand.
The blindness and naive nature by folks on those sorts of forums and blogs also extends to Roman Catholicism.
I have had a few Roman Catholic friends in the past, and they are fine people, but their church? No.
The Roman Catholic Church used to burn people at the stake, but one Roman Catholic individual recently thanked a (Protestant) blogger for bringing to everyone’s attention the anti-Roman Catholic commentary expressed by yet another blog (a Protestant one which was critical of perceived sinful RC behavior).
I mean, really? Some Protestant writing a critical comment about Roman Catholic behavior in general on a blog is thought somehow worse than the Roman Catholic Church in years past doing things such as:
-Covering up priest sexual abuse of children, or….
-Burning people to death for refusing to convert to Roman Catholicism, or for (Link to Wiki page): translating the Bible into English, or….
-The same Roman Catholic Church that historically has held the position that the Gospel (which includes sola fide) is anathema (to be damned)?
Off site link for more on that:
Roman Catholic Church condemns the Gospel itself
Seriously?
But you can’t easily point these issues of the Roman Catholic Church out at some forums or blogs – the ones who are into The Theology of Hurt Feelings – as it might offend a Roman Catholic somewhere.
The Roman Catholic Church historically persecuted a lot of people (see again: burning people to death at the stake for things like not converting to Catholicism), but criticism on the internet of their church is considered by some of them to be the height of persecution against Roman Catholics.
At any rate, I agree with the gentlemen quoted below.
There is most certainly a Theology of Hurt Feelings, where-in some Christians are so incredibly concerned with not offending various classes of sinners (e.g., hetero fornicators or active homosexuals), they think Christians speaking out publicly (on blogs, radio shows, in church services, etc) is “unloving” and therefore Christ would object to it.
The mind boggles at this. Jesus Christ died on the cross to pay for hetero fornication and homosexual sex acts, among other sins of humanity.
But these “lovey dovey” types want other Christians to pipe down about all this and act as though God is totaly fine with, and accepting of, all manner of sin.
The Bible presents a God who is not only loving, forgiving, and gracious, but also one who is Holy, just, and who does not tolerate sin, he does not like sin, and he won’t put up with sin indefinitely. God is not fine and dandy with sin.
And the Bible does in fact call out hetero pre-marital sex, and all homosexual sex acts, as sin.
I suspect that this well-meaning, yet wrong-headed, tendency to want to be Very Loving, Very Accepting,
and To Spare People’s Feelings, is partially responsible for what gave rise several years ago to the ridiculous,
non-sensical, un-Biblical habit of referring to fornicators as “Born Again Virgins,” “Spiritual Virgins,” and similar monikers (see links below, this post, for more about that).
(Link): Theologian Says ‘Love’ Is the New Cultural Apologetic Affirming Immoral Activities
Excerpts.
-
- BY ALEX MURASHKO , CHRISTIAN POST REPORTER
- July 25, 2014|8:33 am
Advocates for behavior considered immoral by Christians who believe the Bible is God’s inerrant word, have successfully used the idea of “love” to affirm homoerotic behavior, to redefine marriage and family, to justify pedophilia, and as theologian and pastor James Emery White recently pointed out, to justify assisted suicide.
The problem, White writes in his blog, Church & Culture, is that the “love” described to normalize these behaviors is “not the biblical idea of love.”
“There is a new cultural apologetic that is fast becoming the go-to argument to ensure affirmation and approval of previously immoral activities,” he writes. “And it is an argument taken straight from the Bible: Love.”
White, the founding and senior pastor at Mecklenburg Community Church in Charlotte, North Carolina, explains that love is the ultimate ethic and that everyone knows that the greatest commandment is to love (Deuteronomy 6), “and when asked, Jesus agreed it was the greatest of all commandments (Mark 12).”
“By now we are all familiar with how homosexuality and gay marriage shifted the entire cultural debate by making it about the affirmation of loving relationships,” he states. In one of White’s previous blogs, he details the argument made by pedophiles in favor of pedophilia, namely that it was a “loving” act.
“Now enter assisted suicide,” White writes. He used the headline and accompanying story from National Public Radio,”How a Woman’s Plan to Kill Herself Helped Her Family Grieve,” to help illustrate his point.
… White writes that the Christian idea of love is not simply an emotional state or feeling. “It is the turning of a heart away from self and toward another in a way that is filled with empathy and affection, grace and truth, selflessness and sacrifice,” he said.
Love for others is rooted in love for God, White states. “We love God with all of our hearts, souls, mind and strength, and from that, our neighbor. But if we ‘love’ our neighbor in a way that is antithetical to a love for God and His commands, then it is no love we show,” he writes. “Such love is mere sentimentality, adrift from truth, driven by the uncertain and often deceptive waves of emotion. In the end, it is simply whatever we ‘feel.'”
He concludes, “So applaud the new cultural apologetic in that it is talking about love. But then add to the conversation by defining it.”
Related posts:
(Link): Christian Preacher Admits He Won’t Preach About Sexuality For Fear It May Offend Sexual Sinners
(Link): Article: Our Born-Again Virgin Bachelor – Secondary or Spiritual Virginity
(Link): “The Family Sex” Show – Nude Sex Show For Children (as Young as Five) at Theater
(Link): Scripture vs. the Sexual Deviancy Zeitgeist by M. P. Orsi
(Link): Religious Dating Sites: More than Half of Users Surveyed Are OK with Premarital Sex
(Link): Hypocrisy of Left Wingers and Atheists and the #NotAll Hash Tag or Rhetoric
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