so my friends keep talking about the boycotting of taco bell by the umc. prior conversations have centered on other social justice issues. general conference as i saw it centered on homosexuality (i do know more happened & some i was really excited about) with the battle of conservatives and liberals.
now i am throwing this out there, feel free to rationalize this with me. do we as a church have to many people that worship idols of culture?
here's my thinking. Jesus says to love your neighbor as yourself and there are many other references to give creedence to acts in the name of justice and mercy ministries. however, i don't know if Jesus says to become devisive, deceitful, angry, abrasive, intolerant, paranoid, etc. in order that you may love your persecuted neighbor without still loving your not-so persecuted neighbor who disagrees with you.
humor me on this one: as a early childhood person, and many of you psych majors would know what i am taking about, eric erikson has his levels of social development.. around your teen years you develop "identity." i see some parallels, a new Christian who is "born again" goes thru the similar stages "industry" "inferiority" just the language might change.. but when you get to the ugly teens years of your spiritual life you try to find your "identity." as with teens of today, identities so often get wrapped around an idol, albeit entertainer, sports star, rocker, goth etc. when we as Christians get to this stage do we find those idols that are easily recognizable (hip, if you will) and identify with them.. problem being, if these idols are gone or compromised we loose our "identity." it's a great fear to not know who you are, so we fight passionatly without regard to hold graspingly onto what we need.. hmmm..
so what's with the idols talk? it just brings me to the realization that there is need for the Christians to loose the politics of justice cause the politics just might be the idols.
