Yet another dumb Christian article left me shaking my head this morning in self-incrimination for still feeling surprised by the lack of critical thought Christian’s exhibit. Seeing someone hopelessly lost in mindlessness brings no comfort in being correct. Today’s article focused on why people shouldn’t judge Christianity by Christians. This assertion conveyed the asinine thinking of Christians to everyone except them, proving Christianity is a philosophic disease.
Christianity isn’t some abstract notion scrawled in a textbook; it is an active theology supposedly guiding behavior and morality. To suggest not judging Christianity by Christians is to negate the parts that comprise the whole. Specifically, Christians embody Christianity the way healthcare workers embody the healthcare system’s ethics and practices. If large numbers of people experience issues obtaining ethical or proper care, then clearly, something is wrong with the healthcare system. Similarly, people judge companies by products, employees, policies, etc. Keeping strictly with theology, claiming “you shouldn’t judge Christianity by Christians” renders the entire religion arbitrary since the followers do not represent the beliefs. Only a philosophic disease could inflict such irrational thinking and sanctimonious talk.
The Bad Apple Fallacy
Perhaps this Christian author meant to write, “don’t judge Christianity by a few bad Christians.” This argument might hold weight if the writer didn’t start the article claiming she sees articles bashing Christians and usually ignores them. Referring to every criticism of Christianity as an isolated incident or using the “bad apple in the bunch” adage forms a fallacy when the bad apples start overflowing the basket, but how would the author know since she ignores the criticism? She doesn’t, and only someone suffering the philosophic disease could think this way.
The Teachings of Christ Can’t be Followed
The author’s philosophic disease doesn’t end with a rationalization of why you shouldn’t judge Christianity based on Christians but goes on to claim you should judge Christianity by what Jesus said. She explains bad Christian behavior as an inability to match Jesus’ perfection. Christians love claiming their fallibility. Yet another argument that might hold weight if not for the fact that Christians maintain an abundance of sin and a desire to legally codify the religion they admittedly cannot follow.
Christians have such a bad problem with child sexual abuse that entire studies commit to researching the issue. Not only do Christians have this abundance of child sexual abuse, but the religion worsens the problem by hiding it for long periods. Christians love pointing the finger at atheists, but there has been only one scandal of atheist sexual misconduct, not with a child, that I could find. More importantly, this case was not part of an ongoing or overarching pattern of behavior as Christian sexual abuse cases form.
Not only do Christians ignore the criticism and evidence that their religion is a little more than fallible, but they also want to make laws to enforce this way of life on everyone. Overturning Roe vs. Wade provides the most relevant example, but the willingness to violate church and state with things like prayer in school and teaching creationism shows Christians don’t consider their religious conviction fallibility a serious drawback. Only people suffering a philosophic disease would believe the moral correctness of enforcing their impossible-to-follow, dangerous religion.
Blind Christian Arrogance
More insulting than anything else is the author’s arrogant claim that critics of Christians are narrow-minded. As Christians stand wide-eyed with indignation over people bashing their religion, perhaps they should actually read some of the criticism rather than blindly blocking and ignoring writers. Perhaps if they did this, they would stop sounding like idiots, but even more importantly, they might fix rather than hide the brokenness of their religion.
Even better, perhaps they’ll discard Christianity and stop living in a fantasy world.
Photo by Giorgio Encinas on Unsplash
