Why Christ wasn’t really a “Christian” after all…
This is something that sounds so astounding to anyone…
However, I’ve come to this opinion quite logically. And after working in churches, and writing about religion and spirituality, I have become even more convinced. Christ was the reason we practice Christianity. But the form that it has evolved into within the confines of Christian Nationalism is not something Christ would have wanted to be associated with.
I love the teachings of Christ. I wrote a book about Jesus’ teachings called Life Coach/Christ Coach. I worked in churches and in Christian Education for over ten years.
I love the man that Christ was. I do believe he was a spiritual being who was sent to bring hope to all people, and a message of love to mankind. And I believe in the teachings of Jesus Christ.
What I do not believe in is the Christian Nationalist theory of the religion that is at times thrown out cavalierly as one of the reasons that extremists do the things they do. Their understanding of the Gospels is limited. And they cannot grasp the ideas of forgiveness and the simplest one that Jesus taught: Love.
My uncle wrote a book some years back entitled, “Against the Prostestant Gnostics. The people he described that were even then becoming more close-minded and radical were the subjects of the book. These are now the White Nationalists. They are holier than thou in their outlook, and they are also one of the greatest problems facing the Christian religion. It is, as they say, “giving Christianity a bad name.” Because their extremist rhetoric and violent tendencies do not play any part in the Christian religion that is found in the Gospels.
After watching the series From Jesus to Christ, on PBS, and reading the book, (which I highly recommend), I am even more convinced that Christ and his teachings evolved over centuries. And Christianity was seen as a better way to understand how to treat one another here on Earth. Therefore, the people who were persecuted in Rome were a threat because they did understand the principles of non-violence as well as the concept of loving one another and extending hospitality to all. They began their beliefs within the Jewish religion, because that was what they knew. Jesus was a practicing Jew. He was not a practicing Christian.
Yet his ideas were so revolutionary, that he became a threat to the Roman State. Therefore, he had to be killed. But it’s still crucial to remember that Judaism was the central religion that Christ would have followed. It covered the Ten Commandments and all the things we know to be in the Old Testament. But he was the Revolutionary who told us to “Love our neighbors and treat them as we would ask to be treated.” The story of the Good Samaritan is probably the best known of all the parables Jesus taught. And this is not what we see in the practice of Christianity in wide swathes of America.
In the end, people will believe what they will. And I am convinced that if Christ is a being who does live in the multiverse, then he would be crucified in each manifestation of his life story. Human nature would not accept a perfect being who would come to tell the world the truth about its imperfect state of mind.
And you may substitute any autocratic regime or Empire for the Roman State that killed Christ. Christ did not live and die within the Christian Religion. We may want to remember that the next time someone speaks of Christian Nationalism. This is not the religion that He spoke of. But it is the world He knew all too well.
