"Father, there are many who want to destroy us from outside this nation," Broun said. "Folks like al-Qaeda and the radical Islamists. But there are folks that want to destroy us from inside, the progressives and the socialists, who want to make this nation a nation that's no longer under you, under God, but a nation that's ruled by man."
Rep. Paul Broun (R-GA)
This was part of Representative Broun's 4th of July prayer delivered to the Cobb County GOP at a holiday barbeque. Progressives are lumped in with terrorists as forces arrayed to destroy the American way of life.
In order to be the better equipped progressive in these highly polarized times, we can't write this kind of rhetoric off as merely hate and use it to justify a broader division between the ideologies that make up our country. That kind of thinking offers the tempting yet destructive justification to answer in kind; to get nastier and up the ante of our fighting. This, in turn, risks further damage to our national political discourse, and fuel the growing rage in the battle between conservatives and progressives that ultimately serves neither. It acts as a distraction while forces far more level headed and opportunistic hijack our economy and government.
Instead we need to understand, adapt, and overcome. My goal in this article is to describe how a follower of Jesus gets twisted into someone capable of praying to God to save him and his country from those who would dare to disagree with him.
Hubris (play /ˈhjuːbrɪs/), also hybris, means extreme haughtiness, pride or arrogance. Hubris often indicates a loss of contact with reality and an overestimation of one's own competence or capabilities, especially when the person exhibiting it is in a position of power.
Striving to be a good Christian has a dark side. That darkness is pride run amok – hubris. Its a darkness that Broun's Christianity is very aware of and which Jesus spoke. As a person focuses more and more on morality, they become more aware of the differences between their faith based moral conclusions and the wider opinions and positions held by the community at large. The danger is that this awareness can turn into a feeling of superiority that then becomes justification for judgment. This pitfall is not sudden. It is a series of steps that Christian conservatives pass through that can be observed easily in today's political environment.
Belief v. Fact
The healthy moralist understands the difference. They understand that conclusion of right and wrong are matters of belief, not fact. They are conclusions with foundations in faith or derived from aggregate facts, but are by no means absolute. To use a Christian example, a healthy Christian mind understands that anything that has to do with God or what God says is a matter of faith and belief. These things cannot be called facts, and therefore are not self evident beyond the believers who have adopted a similar stance. These Christians use their morality to guide their individual choices, but are careful not to impose those beliefs on the behavior of those not yet converted. Christian morality is understood as the second step taken after each individual accepts Jesus - the cart cannot be placed in front of the horse and Christian morality has no place governing the life of a non-believer.
The unhealthy Christian mind blends faith and fact. They take their own personal conviction concerning God's will and determine it to be just as factually accurate as any other measurable foundational truth. From this perspective, people denying their moral conclusions are not just wrong but delusional – denying the reality of the facts that surround them. That conclusion is a judgment - the first of many. It imposes the conclusions and will of a single person or community about right and wrong on the world at large. The statement 'Jesus is God' is absolutely judgmental and destructive if it is made as a point of fact instead of as a personal conviction. Once belief and fact become synonymous, the group of believers is not just a community of faith but is a front against a growing external failing that denies the very obvious 'fact' of the community's moral code.
The paragons of the Christian religion, from Jesus to Mother Teresa, have always understood the difference between the individual relationship with and faith in God. They have understood the responsibility that having a close relationship and understanding of that belief system creates in regards to 'the world'. Christians are extolled to live in the world, but not be 'of' the world. In this way the most remembered and revered of Christianity's leaders have done so via example: Living the Christian life and letting others admire and follow in their footsteps, never imposing that belief on those who did not walk that path.
The Cult of Orthodoxy
Once the misguided moral community has managed to blend the lines of faith and fact, they are on a heady road towards self righteousness. This intoxicating path has an allure that is hard to overstate. There is a basic human desire to be special or different. Being a part of a community that has 'the answer' or is objectively 'Right' against a world that is denying the moral Truth immediately makes the believer special. It gives a sense of purpose and mission to people who can point all around them to threats that are no longer just different points of view, but are evil, destructive, degenerate, and simply outright wrong.
This gives the afflicted moralist a deep sense of community and belonging. They can worship and rest warm in the womb of their own confusion, believing their growing self righteous pride to be religious dedication. They see themselves as staying true to the religion while everyone else is failing, falling further and further from the Truth.
What's most dangerous here is that the mindset shifts slowly from a focus on faith and individual improvement to a deep suspicion of outsiders and external points of view. Their minds close as any input from the outside is seen not as alternative or educational perspectives but as attacks on the holy few still true to God. This feeling of being champions of the truth is a form of emotional drug. It encourages the community to adopt more and more codes of orthodoxy that define who is on the inside and who is among the sinners. This cult of orthodoxy finds more and more fault with the world creating enemies everywhere and among anyone who does not share the now narrow viewpoint involved.
Cultural Crusaders - The New Holy War
The now developed cult of orthodoxy, comfortable in their self righteousness and unable to discern faith from fact or belief from judgment, begins to act out against their enemies. The holy war isn't always physically violent, but it does carry familiar overtones of what progressives have been seeing: Attacks on abortion clinics, efforts to legislate moral behavior on unbelievers, cruel protests against the funerals of fallen soldiers, and bitter fights with loved ones who become fed up with the constant judgment of their former friends and family. The community of faith that reaches this stage has no qualm about judging other religions as evil, judging political opponents as treasonous, and judging family members as lost sheep.
What is often not understood by progressives is that the community at this stage actually seeks out the conflict. The very fact that groups oppose or argue with the crusaders reinforces their belief that they hold a special place under God and are the under dogs of a sinful and corrupt world that must be held at bay. By this point, Christianity is no longer a faith, it is a weapon and a psychological crutch. This stage is the full realization of the damning danger of hubris. Instead of a religion of love and compassion, Christianity has been transformed into a dark parody of Jesus teaching that uses fear of everyone not part of the community to motivate action, their emotions kept high and engaged by fervent prayer as they watch the windows and door for the encroaching horde they are certain is persecuting their faith and forcing them to huddle together, eyes upward, and hearts fully filled with the spirit of their own superiority.
By this point, the community bears little resemblance to the Church conceived of in teachings of the Christian faith. It has become a cult of fear that thrives on its own perceived persecution and justifies its existence by pointing to all the people outraged by its behavior. With eyes and ears closed, singing desperate hymns to a God that hates everyone except a small fragment of people supplicant to very tight code of acceptable behavior, these 'Christians' rage against the world in a way that seeks not to convert or convince or bring about peace but to revel in the conflict it creates.
It is this dark place that spawns prayers like the one we saw on the 4th. It is here where Christianity gets its worst representatives and comes closest to becoming the jihadists from which Mr. Broun prays for deliverance. While we cannot end this misguided parody of Christianity, we can be aware of it and understand that a vast majority of believers do not share this understanding of the Christian faith. But for those who do, my topic title reflect what could only be true if their behavior towards the world were seen today.
Jesus Wept.
Rep. Paul Broun (R-GA)
This was part of Representative Broun's 4th of July prayer delivered to the Cobb County GOP at a holiday barbeque. Progressives are lumped in with terrorists as forces arrayed to destroy the American way of life.
In order to be the better equipped progressive in these highly polarized times, we can't write this kind of rhetoric off as merely hate and use it to justify a broader division between the ideologies that make up our country. That kind of thinking offers the tempting yet destructive justification to answer in kind; to get nastier and up the ante of our fighting. This, in turn, risks further damage to our national political discourse, and fuel the growing rage in the battle between conservatives and progressives that ultimately serves neither. It acts as a distraction while forces far more level headed and opportunistic hijack our economy and government.
Instead we need to understand, adapt, and overcome. My goal in this article is to describe how a follower of Jesus gets twisted into someone capable of praying to God to save him and his country from those who would dare to disagree with him.
Hubris (play /ˈhjuːbrɪs/), also hybris, means extreme haughtiness, pride or arrogance. Hubris often indicates a loss of contact with reality and an overestimation of one's own competence or capabilities, especially when the person exhibiting it is in a position of power.
Striving to be a good Christian has a dark side. That darkness is pride run amok – hubris. Its a darkness that Broun's Christianity is very aware of and which Jesus spoke. As a person focuses more and more on morality, they become more aware of the differences between their faith based moral conclusions and the wider opinions and positions held by the community at large. The danger is that this awareness can turn into a feeling of superiority that then becomes justification for judgment. This pitfall is not sudden. It is a series of steps that Christian conservatives pass through that can be observed easily in today's political environment.
Belief v. Fact
The healthy moralist understands the difference. They understand that conclusion of right and wrong are matters of belief, not fact. They are conclusions with foundations in faith or derived from aggregate facts, but are by no means absolute. To use a Christian example, a healthy Christian mind understands that anything that has to do with God or what God says is a matter of faith and belief. These things cannot be called facts, and therefore are not self evident beyond the believers who have adopted a similar stance. These Christians use their morality to guide their individual choices, but are careful not to impose those beliefs on the behavior of those not yet converted. Christian morality is understood as the second step taken after each individual accepts Jesus - the cart cannot be placed in front of the horse and Christian morality has no place governing the life of a non-believer.
The unhealthy Christian mind blends faith and fact. They take their own personal conviction concerning God's will and determine it to be just as factually accurate as any other measurable foundational truth. From this perspective, people denying their moral conclusions are not just wrong but delusional – denying the reality of the facts that surround them. That conclusion is a judgment - the first of many. It imposes the conclusions and will of a single person or community about right and wrong on the world at large. The statement 'Jesus is God' is absolutely judgmental and destructive if it is made as a point of fact instead of as a personal conviction. Once belief and fact become synonymous, the group of believers is not just a community of faith but is a front against a growing external failing that denies the very obvious 'fact' of the community's moral code.
The paragons of the Christian religion, from Jesus to Mother Teresa, have always understood the difference between the individual relationship with and faith in God. They have understood the responsibility that having a close relationship and understanding of that belief system creates in regards to 'the world'. Christians are extolled to live in the world, but not be 'of' the world. In this way the most remembered and revered of Christianity's leaders have done so via example: Living the Christian life and letting others admire and follow in their footsteps, never imposing that belief on those who did not walk that path.
The Cult of Orthodoxy
Once the misguided moral community has managed to blend the lines of faith and fact, they are on a heady road towards self righteousness. This intoxicating path has an allure that is hard to overstate. There is a basic human desire to be special or different. Being a part of a community that has 'the answer' or is objectively 'Right' against a world that is denying the moral Truth immediately makes the believer special. It gives a sense of purpose and mission to people who can point all around them to threats that are no longer just different points of view, but are evil, destructive, degenerate, and simply outright wrong.
This gives the afflicted moralist a deep sense of community and belonging. They can worship and rest warm in the womb of their own confusion, believing their growing self righteous pride to be religious dedication. They see themselves as staying true to the religion while everyone else is failing, falling further and further from the Truth.
What's most dangerous here is that the mindset shifts slowly from a focus on faith and individual improvement to a deep suspicion of outsiders and external points of view. Their minds close as any input from the outside is seen not as alternative or educational perspectives but as attacks on the holy few still true to God. This feeling of being champions of the truth is a form of emotional drug. It encourages the community to adopt more and more codes of orthodoxy that define who is on the inside and who is among the sinners. This cult of orthodoxy finds more and more fault with the world creating enemies everywhere and among anyone who does not share the now narrow viewpoint involved.
Cultural Crusaders - The New Holy War
The now developed cult of orthodoxy, comfortable in their self righteousness and unable to discern faith from fact or belief from judgment, begins to act out against their enemies. The holy war isn't always physically violent, but it does carry familiar overtones of what progressives have been seeing: Attacks on abortion clinics, efforts to legislate moral behavior on unbelievers, cruel protests against the funerals of fallen soldiers, and bitter fights with loved ones who become fed up with the constant judgment of their former friends and family. The community of faith that reaches this stage has no qualm about judging other religions as evil, judging political opponents as treasonous, and judging family members as lost sheep.
What is often not understood by progressives is that the community at this stage actually seeks out the conflict. The very fact that groups oppose or argue with the crusaders reinforces their belief that they hold a special place under God and are the under dogs of a sinful and corrupt world that must be held at bay. By this point, Christianity is no longer a faith, it is a weapon and a psychological crutch. This stage is the full realization of the damning danger of hubris. Instead of a religion of love and compassion, Christianity has been transformed into a dark parody of Jesus teaching that uses fear of everyone not part of the community to motivate action, their emotions kept high and engaged by fervent prayer as they watch the windows and door for the encroaching horde they are certain is persecuting their faith and forcing them to huddle together, eyes upward, and hearts fully filled with the spirit of their own superiority.
By this point, the community bears little resemblance to the Church conceived of in teachings of the Christian faith. It has become a cult of fear that thrives on its own perceived persecution and justifies its existence by pointing to all the people outraged by its behavior. With eyes and ears closed, singing desperate hymns to a God that hates everyone except a small fragment of people supplicant to very tight code of acceptable behavior, these 'Christians' rage against the world in a way that seeks not to convert or convince or bring about peace but to revel in the conflict it creates.
It is this dark place that spawns prayers like the one we saw on the 4th. It is here where Christianity gets its worst representatives and comes closest to becoming the jihadists from which Mr. Broun prays for deliverance. While we cannot end this misguided parody of Christianity, we can be aware of it and understand that a vast majority of believers do not share this understanding of the Christian faith. But for those who do, my topic title reflect what could only be true if their behavior towards the world were seen today.
Jesus Wept.
Andre, I continue to marvel at your ability to write so clearly about such complicated topics that demonstrates respect for your audience.
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