Critiquing American Christianity

What disturbs me about America and we who are Christians within its borders is the way we swallow capitalism without ever having questioned it from a biblical perspective. In not questioning capitalism and critiquing it according to a biblical standard, both capitalism and the American economic system has become an idol of our time.

Time Magazine recently had a whole section of its magazine concerning how “faith” and religion are selling in the market place. Reader’s Digest had a similar discussion last month. Featuring entrepreneurs who are using their religious conviction and placing them in neat catchy phrases on t-shirts, pencils and a host of other items, both Time and Reader’s Digest describe how they have become so successful. But by whose standards?

How many of the items sold in Christian book stores are made in distant lands with an underpaid work force who have succumb to a form of slave labor that would shame us if we weren’t so happy with their products and our profits?

Or how about the names of certain products? There is a jewelry line called The Shield of Faith. The biblical metaphor is lost on the equivalent to Mickey Mouse Jewelry making faith something you can purchase for $10 and place around your neck. There are even Christian Dog Tags (like those in the army) that help associate military might with Christian belief. However, the military and Christianity, though wedded in the US, in the bible are enemies to their very core (see my blog At Arms Length).

It is in the relationship between Christianity and America’s Military that I find the real source of our failure to question America and American Christianity. Our President has used fear to justify a preemptive strike on another country. We are to fear terrorists. We are to fear nuclear bombs. Not to the extent where we change our every day lives but to the extent we allow our government to disregard the rights of human beings for the sake of national security. We hold them without trial. We abuse them. We even allow torture (to a point, though that point is quite blurred as recent reports show) in order to get information that may keep us “safe.”

In essence, by allowing these things to happen, Christians have failed to live lives according to the gospel. God is in control and we live without fear for that simple reason. But we have failed because American Christianity has become the guardian of the status quo, protector of our wealth (a supposed blessing from God) and a new economic ideology gaining power in the public sphere.

These three, guardian of the status quo, protector of our wealth, and a new economic ideology gaining power in the public sphere, will be discussed in the next three posts.