Parakalein

I was walking down the street the day of a July 4th parade and everyone was sporting t shirts that stated on exposition or another on one thing or another.  One your boy was wearing a t shirt that was black with a white cross in the center of a black circle outlined in red with a line slashing through it.  Above was the phrase "BAD RELIGION".  My first thought was not a defensive thought though in the past this kind of thing would have triggered a justifying and defensive if not attacking part.  One persons judgment does not over rule another persons judgment.  My first thought was how sad.  I had a part that wondered what had happened in his life at the hand of a "Christian" that would drive him to this conclusion.  Another part of me wonders if this was not the position of his parents that he had adopted. No different than that of a Christian family adopting the position of Christian parents.

I had a part that wanted to stop and dialogue with him but I was meeting family to watch the July 4th parade.  Did I miss an opportunity not to set this young boy straight but to listen to his story with the compassion of the founder of faith that sees more not less when someone is angry and sees less not more when with compassion the soul in me sees the soul in another.

Perhaps this is the point.  When we see others and have an agenda to counter, contradict, or correct we allow a grace error inside our own heart, mind and spirit.  True Christianity is not about a dogma, a doctrine or a declaration of any kind.  True Christianity is about seeing everyone and everything with love from place of peace.  This creates a palace of love in peace in which all can live and from which none are excluded.

There is no such thing in my mind as a bad religion but there is such a thing a religion gone bad.  Religion goes bad, any religion, goes bad when the religious teachings or principles become codified cooped and misused to promote religious experience with a self serving agenda and at the expense of serving the person by offering in love and peace the ears that hear the story of hurt and pain and offers fresh breath of peace and love into that hurt hear.

When religion is agenda focused it losses the essence of true religion.  The essence of true religion is to care for the fatherless, the widow, the orphan (those who have not) by showing them love and peace through self-sacrifice and humble care regardless of anything.