Anthony McIntyre ☠ The other day a post crossed my feed.
It had been uploaded by a Christian pastor. I like him because he enjoys the craic and is not a lemon sucker in our interpersonal relationship. He can bring a certain irreverence to discussions and is not afraid to stick his hand in his pocket when it comes to paying the breakfast bill! He even insists on it.
It looked to me as if the post was some sort of justification, or at least an excuse for prosperity theology. It sought to downplay a Jesus of the poor, opening the door for the theology favoured by the rich to spread its virus of unrelenting greed.
The post was an image of a quote from the right wing evangelical Christian Francis Schaeffer who died in 1984.
The post was an image of a quote from the right wing evangelical Christian Francis Schaeffer who died in 1984.
I read Schaeffer some years ago. I did not anticipate finding him persuasive. And I didn't. My purpose in reading him was to better acquaint myself with the type of illogic that bible bashers not only cling to but seek to inflict on the rest of us while screaming 'sinner.' A vigorous critic of pluralist secularism and secular humanism, he was a dogged opponent of a woman's right to determine the course of her own pregnancy, believing he, not she, had the right to choose. A your body, my choice type of guy.
His son Frank depicted his father in quite a negative light, accusing him of being physically and and psychologically abusive towards his wife Edith. Which might help his explain his misogynistic theology.
Schaeffer believed that Jesus did not come to save people from poverty or to raise their educational standards. Jesus came to save them from their sins. A god of the rich rather than the poor.
At its simplest and bluntest, Jesus came down to earth to stop people wanking but not to stop them starving. A Jesus that comes just to stop everybody else coming.
 |
| ⏩Follow on Twitter @AnthonyMcIntyre. |
No comments