The other thing that gets me is the objection to Jim saying God is non-binary. He didn’t say Jesus is non-binary (as far as I could tell). Maybe I’m wrong, but I’m assuming he’s talking about the Creator part of the Trinity.
My personal belief is this: No genome. No gender.
Actually, if you read Neil Douglas-Klotz’s NT translations from Aramaic, Jesus used feminine words in talking about the Creator.
Thanks for reading and engaging with my article! It means a lot. I hope to leave a lengthier comment soon, but just in case I don’t get around to it, I wanted to still say thank you for continuing the conversation.
Hey Tim! Appreciate the thoughtful comment. Obviously you and I feel differently about some things, and that's okay. I appreciated reading your article and ideas.
An honest question here … how is your definition of ‘being Christian’ distinct from ‘being Buddhist’ or ‘being a good human’. What is distinctively ‘Christian’ about this?
I don’t know anyone who would disagree with the behavior, regardless of religious affiliation. Atheists can and do exhibit good moral behavior.
Excellent question, Scott. One which I'm not sure I have a great response for, but here's what's coming up for me.
The first Christians would have been originally seen, understood as, as identified as, well, Jews. They were Jews, following the religion of their family and culture, but with a few tweaks here and there--things distinctively in response to their efforts to follow the Way of Jesus. As best as we can tell, they didn't start calling themselves anything/something (aka, we are "Christians"), as much as OTHER people started calling them something: Followers of the Way. In other words, for the first Jesus Followers, they would've probably still identified as (if they even thought that way) "Jewish," but were described as "Christian" because of how they lived. (I should say, primarily because of how they lived.. certainly the substance of their beliefs in Jesus as Messiah ALSO created divides between them and their fellow Jews).
But I think we can safely say that these first Christians were not setting out to create a new religion or new identity marker as such. Jesus certainly didn't seem interested in starting a new religion, as much as he wanted to reform the broken parts of his own religion.
To your question... if all one could do was observe how three people lived (a Christian, a buddhist, and a humanist), and they all lived the kind of loving, compassionate, respectful, kind, merciful etc etc lifestyle as I outlined above, then it's very possilbe--to your point--that the person observing would see so many similarities as to render all three people as the Same. Put another way, it's not unreasonable to suggest that Jesus showed us what truly being human ought look like--insofar as it means we are fully living out being people made in God's image. If "being fully human" is the North Star, then surely the best of all religious an secular ethical paths point in that direction to some degree--usually with substantive overlap.
So then.. as you put it... what makes "a Christian?"
Which brings us back to, "beliefs." As I said in the article, this is usually how people try and divide people into various categories, based on beliefs.
And there are certainly times, places, and reasons why such an endeavor has merit.
However, my point was (and is), that being "a Christian" is not only less interesting to me, but it also seems less relevant to the teachings of Jesus.
Put simply: My suspicion is that Jesus would (and therefore doesn't) care as much whether or not we are A Christian; but is very much invested in whether or not we are BEING Christian in how we live.
I like your new way of looking at things ..."Being Christian" is different from claiming you are a Christian. We have to live like a believer in Jesus and what he asks us to do, mostly to love others, and maybe ourselves as we are because we can't change that - gay or heterosexual, and that is not easy especially because of our Christian traditions. An example: I can think of is, the story of Sodom and Gomorrah; God destroyed those cities because of homosexuality. They/we believed that because that's what most Christians heard from our churches when growing up. I'm not saying that gay people are free to live a sinful life. It takes a lot of FAITH to believe that Jesus loves us as we are. We must leave our sexuality in God's hands and give up trying to figure it out ourselves. That's my input.
Yes! Orthopraxy over orthodoxy always.
The other thing that gets me is the objection to Jim saying God is non-binary. He didn’t say Jesus is non-binary (as far as I could tell). Maybe I’m wrong, but I’m assuming he’s talking about the Creator part of the Trinity.
My personal belief is this: No genome. No gender.
Actually, if you read Neil Douglas-Klotz’s NT translations from Aramaic, Jesus used feminine words in talking about the Creator.
Thanks for reading and engaging with my article! It means a lot. I hope to leave a lengthier comment soon, but just in case I don’t get around to it, I wanted to still say thank you for continuing the conversation.
Hey Tim! Appreciate the thoughtful comment. Obviously you and I feel differently about some things, and that's okay. I appreciated reading your article and ideas.
An honest question here … how is your definition of ‘being Christian’ distinct from ‘being Buddhist’ or ‘being a good human’. What is distinctively ‘Christian’ about this?
I don’t know anyone who would disagree with the behavior, regardless of religious affiliation. Atheists can and do exhibit good moral behavior.
In short, what makes a Christian? Behavior alone?
Excellent question, Scott. One which I'm not sure I have a great response for, but here's what's coming up for me.
The first Christians would have been originally seen, understood as, as identified as, well, Jews. They were Jews, following the religion of their family and culture, but with a few tweaks here and there--things distinctively in response to their efforts to follow the Way of Jesus. As best as we can tell, they didn't start calling themselves anything/something (aka, we are "Christians"), as much as OTHER people started calling them something: Followers of the Way. In other words, for the first Jesus Followers, they would've probably still identified as (if they even thought that way) "Jewish," but were described as "Christian" because of how they lived. (I should say, primarily because of how they lived.. certainly the substance of their beliefs in Jesus as Messiah ALSO created divides between them and their fellow Jews).
But I think we can safely say that these first Christians were not setting out to create a new religion or new identity marker as such. Jesus certainly didn't seem interested in starting a new religion, as much as he wanted to reform the broken parts of his own religion.
To your question... if all one could do was observe how three people lived (a Christian, a buddhist, and a humanist), and they all lived the kind of loving, compassionate, respectful, kind, merciful etc etc lifestyle as I outlined above, then it's very possilbe--to your point--that the person observing would see so many similarities as to render all three people as the Same. Put another way, it's not unreasonable to suggest that Jesus showed us what truly being human ought look like--insofar as it means we are fully living out being people made in God's image. If "being fully human" is the North Star, then surely the best of all religious an secular ethical paths point in that direction to some degree--usually with substantive overlap.
So then.. as you put it... what makes "a Christian?"
Which brings us back to, "beliefs." As I said in the article, this is usually how people try and divide people into various categories, based on beliefs.
And there are certainly times, places, and reasons why such an endeavor has merit.
However, my point was (and is), that being "a Christian" is not only less interesting to me, but it also seems less relevant to the teachings of Jesus.
Put simply: My suspicion is that Jesus would (and therefore doesn't) care as much whether or not we are A Christian; but is very much invested in whether or not we are BEING Christian in how we live.
I like your new way of looking at things ..."Being Christian" is different from claiming you are a Christian. We have to live like a believer in Jesus and what he asks us to do, mostly to love others, and maybe ourselves as we are because we can't change that - gay or heterosexual, and that is not easy especially because of our Christian traditions. An example: I can think of is, the story of Sodom and Gomorrah; God destroyed those cities because of homosexuality. They/we believed that because that's what most Christians heard from our churches when growing up. I'm not saying that gay people are free to live a sinful life. It takes a lot of FAITH to believe that Jesus loves us as we are. We must leave our sexuality in God's hands and give up trying to figure it out ourselves. That's my input.
Thanks Paul. Always appreciate your input!
Amen!
Go for it Colby. Love your way of saying it.
Nailed it! Whoop whoop! [[not the big kind - the genuine cheer kind ] 😊
bwhahah. Thanks, friend.
I'm glad that God (rather than Tim Courtney) is the judge of who is or isn't a Christian.