Jim: Sidenote: Evolving Christianity

In 1776, there was this idea in the United States that people were equal. Just because your father was a monarch did not mean that you could take my property away, or tell me to be quiet, or tax me whatever you wanted. The fact is, the power of the monarch, of the whole government, came from the people. All people are created equal; and all people have certain rights that no government can take away from them.

What those ideas mean now, is very different from what they meant in 1776. For one thing, property and government are very different. For another thing, we've taken the next logical step in some of those ideas.

America is where we are right now in this experiment in democracy.

In the first century A.D. there was this idea that the law was not enough. It was not enough to live into God's hope for humanity to simply follow the rules in the book. There needed to be a spiritual transformation, and without that transformation, you were lost.

The practice of Christianity has changed since then. When it was a cult, there were certain requirements, such as giving away all of your money to the group, that were not practiced with it was the imperial religion. It has changed and evolved with the science and sociology of the times.

Christianity is where we are right now in the experiment to find a connection with God.

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I've just started Sam Harris's book, "The End of Faith." (Or Regligion, not sure.) And what he wants to do, is claim that religion, unlike everything else is stagnant and not evolving. That is simply wrong.

It does not demean religion to say that it has been transformed by broad social trends. Religion is to bring people to God, and to do that it must be different now than it was in 1450 C.E., or 2000 B.C.E.

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While speaking to fellow Jews, where the choices of religions were following the Jewish law or making offerings to pagan temples seeking the intervention of disinterested Hellenistic deities, Jesus said for the people to follow him. He said that he was the way to his Father's home.

Jesus was right. It was not enough to follow the law, that was an empty existance. There was more than the painful and oppressed world before them. And, to realize that truth was to be reborn into a new existence unlike what was left behind. It does not mean that I have to view the current manifestation of Judahism as less than the current manifestation of Christianity.

Jesus was a real person addressing real problems. He was talking to people who were suffering and bringing them relief. He was trying to transform their lives to allow them to live on this planet in greater harmony with the rest of creation. You cannot take his words and use them like mathematical equations. It just doesn't work that way. They have specific meaning in specific context.

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What's become of that tradition? Is it lost, is it no longer of value to individuals and society? That's the main conversation we're having. But Christianity, is different now than it was then. There are very, very few things that were essential then that are essential now.

My goodness, in only just over two centuries our democracy has completely changed. We've radically expanded suffrage, but dramatically expanded federal power. New challenges, new understandings, and so on.

Surely, the human organization designed to bring us to God would have to change similarly. In Harris's book he makes the absurd claim that man from the 1400's would be at ease in our churches today. That is simply not so. The church has changed, as has science and politics. They are related, and that's okay.

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Just to reconnect, I think that Christianity was a valuable influence in creating the values of equality and tolerance in Western Culture.