‘Stuart’ wrote asking me about something I’d said on my about page:
“I was reading your “about” page, and wondered how you came to the conclusion that if Jesus existed then God would love white people more than other
ethnic races?”
This unnerving assumption may sound like I’m just being wicked and picking fights. Not true! The problem of Jesus’ historicity excluding certain races and areas of the world through accidental historical developments is the main reason I gave up being Christian. It is an unresolvable dilemma. I spent years seeking the answer, in an attempt to save my faith. In the end, I chose a personal belief in a god that wouldn’t punish certain races to hell over a God who would – the Christian God.
Celsus said it first, and best. To paraphrase, ‘why send the son of god, salvation, to the Jews at one point in history, instead of making him easily accessible to all?’ Christianity started in Jerusalem and Alexandria before spreading to Rome. As it was incapable of coexisting with other religions, it soon wiped out all others. It came to the Americas via the European expansion. Specifically – the Christian idea that the world was made for Christians and that the Indians were wicked savages who would have to die before the ‘chosen race’ could inherit. (Just as the Jews first practices mass-extermination and genocide of the people that they found living in the land God promised them.) Millions of native Americans were also killed by the European viruses; the rest were easily slaved or converted to Christianity. Although much of America is now Christian, including S. America, that legacy is based on insidious, inglorious historical developments that are very ungodly.
Meanwhile, much of the world has never and continues not to be included in God’s plan of saving grace: does God hate the Chinese? They have absolutely never had the same opportunity to know and accept Jesus Christ. Access to him even today is through Westernized Chinese or Westerners, who have Western ideas and lifestyles. Jesus is a white male; a symbol of white culture. The Chinese who turn to him do so to the exclusion of their own culture and history – and it is a tiny fraction of the general population.
In other countries such as S. Korea, the introduction of Christianity has been successful. In the last 50 years, S. Korea has gone from having virtually no Christians to almost 50% or more. Is this country suddenly more deserving of heaven – unlike its ancestors? This increase is do to 20th century political maneuvering and warfare, which aligned S. Korea and the USA. Is this God’s plan? Does God love S. Korea more than Taiwan – which is also closely tied to the USA but in which Christianity has not taken as firm a root?
If Jesus is historical ‘and’ the true son of god – the fullest/best revelation of god and best/only path to Him, then it is problematic that through historical developments Christianity has taken hold in specific cultures. If Jesus is God’s plan to save – why did he only appear at that fixed geographic location – and why has God not seen fit to push the spread of Christianity? Is salvation just ‘luck’ ? Does God not care about Asia?
These are serious questions, which much be explained theologically before Christianity can be accepted.
June 16, 2010
I don’t believe that God was a racist. If you think about it, Jesus was originally a JEWISH rabbi, a teacher of the Mosaic Law (which consists of an education based on the first 5 books of the bible – the Pentateuch, Torah). As the spread of mankind and sin goes on, there are a lot of different races that come about (I think the way it goes is that the “tribes” or “peoples” came about naming themselves from their forefathers).
The message that Jesus taught was based on His ideas that God loved all of mankind, the Jewish people being the “promised children” who were supposed to be the original inheritors of a great kingdom, to be the first ones to be given the message of salvation. Then Jesus was to give the message (to start through Himself, then through his Desciples) to the Gentiles (people of non-Jewish desent(sp?)). White people were not and are not the “chosen people” as you put it. Though Jews had once spoken Hebrew as their primary language, this changed when Israel was overthrown, first by the Assyrians in the eight-century B.C. and then by the Babylonians in the sixth-century B.C. By the time of Jesus Aramaic was so common among Jews that the reading of the Hebrew Scripture in the synagogue was accompanied by translation into Aramaic. So the area where Jesus preached/ministered was a multicultural area. Many scholars can prove that (check out http://markdroberts.com/ the part where he discusses the languages that Jesus did or may have spoken in His time – where I’ve gotten some of my information).
Anyway, I’m going to rush the rest of this because it’s almost time for me to go home.
You said that ministry in the Americas was done so in a violent manner. Well, you can’t forget the fact that we as humans are violent. I believe that this came as a byproduct of orignal sin (take Cain and Abel for instance – you can look it up because you said you “used to be a Christian”). If you look over the pages of history, you will see that to convert others from one religion to another, you WILL find that those “pages” are soaked in blood. Christians, despite the fact that they seek after a loving God, are still human and are not infallible. The peoples of other religions also have bloodstained histories. It’s our nature as a broken people.
By the way, God does love the people of Asia, and all people elsewhere. The unfortunate thing is that WE are supposed to be the hands and feet of Jesus, going out and ministering to other countries. WE, those who say they want to follow hard after Christ and his wonderous love, are the ones that aren’t getting off our tushies to GO AND MINISTER to the people that we feel aren’t getting the message. I’m not going to lie to you and say that I’m fully doing my part to minister to other countries and peoples the way I should. If you really felt that others weren’t ministering to people that you had on your heart in the first place, then you should have taken the initiative to go do the ministry yourself. I think that was God calling to you and Satan screwing with your head telling you that God doesn’t love them enough. If you still feel a need and a love for people that you think aren’t getting reached, do your own outreach program, and you can still do that either as a Christian or an atheist. Whether you believe in God or not, you can still show love and kindness to your fellow man by doing what you said God wasn’t doing. You just might find that you found your lost track for the very something you needed in your life.
If this sounds kinda blech and jumbled, sorry. I’ll see what I can do about coming back here to fix or repost the idea I really wanted to come across.
September 20, 2010
Thanks for your post. I understand this is a difficult claim to grasp.
First of all, yes Jesus may have been multilingual – although actually it is Paul who first approached the gentiles and we may wonder whether, without Paul’s efforts, Christianity may have remained a Jewish cult, which didn’t want to accept foreigners.
America was brutally overtaken by Europe, aiding the spread of Christianity. Yes, humans are violent creatures. We are ‘broken people’. BUT Christianity is God’s vessel on earth, right? Either A) Christianity was accidentally spread through various historical motivations – the quest for more land, gold, etc., and God doesn’t really care whether Christianity succeeds or not, or B) God’s hand is behind every ‘incidental’ criteria which helped Christianity to grow. If not for certain, very bloody wars, Christianity would not be where it was today. If it wasn’t where it was today – ie if it had been peaceful but remained extremely small, and probably died out – then it would be much harder to argue that it is ‘The Truth’.
Does God want everybody to be Christians or not? Does he NEED them to be? Do we need to be Christians for salvation?
Let’s pretend there’s an area in Africa facing severe plague. People are dying. The United Nations airships in a crate of vaccine – big enough to save everybody. Where will they drop it? The responsible thing to do would be set up a clinic, make a role call/census, post fliers everywhere or go door to door to make sure people now about the vaccine, and save enough viles to save everybody, personally. The irresponsible way to do it would be to drop it somewhere in the middle and wash our hands of it. Some people will get their first and hoard it, they will take it all. They might sell it or share it with their friends. They might share it with people who speak the same language only, or they might decide to keep it away from neighboring countries, whose people are also suffering. Is it fair to say “Not my problem, I did my part by making it available”. Can’t we expect God to be MORE responsible than we can imagine?
Apparently, NO. God gave the gift of salvation to certain people in a certain area at a certain time period. That ‘we are the hands and feet of Christ’ is about as disturbing as saying “We are the chosen people – God CHOSE us to safeguard, protect, spread the message of his love.” Seriously – what makes you think you are that special; that God would place in your hands the salvation of all of those other races that he can’t be bothered about. That he saved Europe, the Americas and then just sat back to watch TV while billions of Asians, Africans etc get sent to Hell because he didn’t finish the job. How is this not racist?
No – I don’t really believe that “God is Racist” – what I’m saying is that your limited, Christian idea of God is TOO SMALL to be True – if God is Real, then he absolutely MUST be a better ‘person’ than you give him credit for.
February 1, 2012
On one hand, you complain “why did he [God] only appear at that fixed geographic location”. On the other hand, you condem Christianity because “was incapable of coexisting with other religions, it soon wiped out all others”. Christianity itself did not wipe out other religions. A religion is per definitionem incapable of wiping out other religions. What you mean is that people were converted into Christians by other people preaching the Gospel. But of course, this has not the negative connotation which you’d like to tag Christianity with.
So, what do you want? You want God to be everywhere (according to you, it is not right that God only appears at fixed geographic locations), or you want people to bring God around the world (which is bad as well according to you because it would “wipe out other religions)?