The Hypersensitive Evangelical Disease

A Confession from a former Evangelical and Collapsed Catholic.....

Why is it that so much of the time when you know that you're around people who seriously confess their faith as Evangelical Christians - you find yourself watching what you say or do - so as not to offend them? Doesn't this fly flat in the face of what a Christian is supposed to be like: i.e. Counting it ALL JOY when people persecute or ridicule them in Jesus' name, or loving their enemies, praying for those who hurt or despise them? Rather, the tendency is just the opposite.

Having been a former Evangelical and now "collapsed" Catholic, I think I might be overly sensitive to the issue. Like someone who quits smoking who makes the loudest complaint at the first sign of a "light-up!"

The other day, a group of us were planning a business call on a company that openly declares that "Jesus Christ is the C.E.O. of their company." The first reaction of everyone was to warn each other to make sure that we all watched our words and expressions so that we would not offend these people. Isn't it ironic - we're behaving better so that we don't offend Christians??

It seems that most Christians are better known by what they won't do, or tolerate, than by being accepting, open and forgiving. Fifteen minutes in the presence of an Evangelical Evangelist or Apologist (I know because I used to be one) and you become aware that their actions may have other motives - the compassionate face of understanding often soon passes away when you say something that they don't like or don't happen to agree with - i.e. that their view of the world may be wrong!!!!

I've been to so many seeker-friendly services where the message is love - then when the "service" is over, and the hard questions come out - the attitude of love transforms into "concern for your salvation" which means that the attitude will display varying degrees of condemnation or judgement on the continuum of hate.

God forbid that you should accept a bag of food or help from an Evangelical ministry - the servant evangelism quickly turns into a sales pitch for the transforming power of their church services, which will reveal to you in painful detail what a great sinner you are and how far from God you are - unless you accept the "free" gift of Jesus' forgiveness!!!

YES - BUT

"Jesus loves you - and so do I."

Good.

But, are you implying that if Jesus wasn't involved in the equation that you'd hate my guts??? Can't you love me without Jesus prompting you?

"Jesus' love is unconditional"

Good.

So how come I have to believe that in order to receive it?

"God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son...."

Good.

That's very nice of him, but isn't He the one who made the rules that made that necessary in the first place?

"If you believe you will be saved."

Good.

....... and if I don't believe I won't? Isn't that forcing the issue? What choice do I have?

So much for unconditional love.... and all that stuff about loving your enemies.

God, according to Christianity, apparently only loves his friends.

Now, as a post-Christian I feel as if I have woken up from a bad dream - where the world was imperfect; I see that possibly the only thing wrong with the world may be our perception of it.

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Post-Script: I realize that I risk offending some Christians among my friends and family by posting this - but understand that I write this from the perspective of someone who used to suffer from this Hypersensitive Disease - it is indeed a painful condition. - Where you hold concern for everyone you meet, because their eternity is in the balance.

Finding a way to convince them that Jesus died for their sins and getting them to accept that belief becomes all that matters in that moment.

I do not want you to deny your beliefs, I just want you to relax in them and understand that if God is as loving as you believe him to be, he will take care of everything