Poser Christians and Radical Christians

I apologize ahead of time if I offend anyone with this post.

I cannot sit here and act like I am some sort of knowledgeable expert with Christianity. But I have been raised Christian and still consider myself Christian by default as I openly explore my personal spirituality. With 9 years of Catholic school and over 18 years of regularly attending church (often more than once a week), I feel like I have a legitimate amount experience to justify my opinion.

Many times I have openly questioned the Bible and Christianity. In my mind, I have felt like this has been part of my self-examination and personal exploration more than an attack on Christianity itself.

Where most of my frustration stems from is not so much the belief system, but many of the people that take part. There are two groups that annoy me the most. I call them Posers and Radical Bible Thumpers.

The Posers are like those fans that claim to be "die hard" or "true" when the team is winning and everybody loves them but are no where to be found when this team they claim to be fans of is losing or unpopular. They love to deck themselves out in the team's gear when everybody else is and they sport the jerseys of the most popular player like Grady Sizemore or LeBron James, but when the team stinks, all you hear is little dig after dig about how the team stinks, even if the team is just mediocre.

Some call them fair weather fans or bandwagon fans. I just call them annoying.

When this behavior is connected to the Church, I get just as annoyed. The Poser Christians love to loudly exclaim what they want to believe and throw the Bible out as their justification. They wear their Christianity on their sleeve and quickly slam people who critique it. Anyone who isn't Christian is wrong in their mind. They feel like everyone who questions the Church is hating the church.

But as they look down upon the rest of us, they never read the Bible themselves. They do not attend church. They definitely do not examine their beliefs and reflect on why they believe what they believe, which sometimes means challenging the traditional beliefs. They blindly follow what others tell them. Many times they refer to the Old Testament to support their outdated views while ignoring New Testament writings from Jesus (an important component of Christianity) that contradict the Old Testament.

The Radical Bible Thumpers do attend church regularly. They do read scriptures. They are devoted to their Christianity. So devoted that they go to the extreme. They may examine their beliefs but not in a critical manner. They take what they read and hear literally and are often, in my mind, misled. They are very rigid in their beliefs and refuse to see any other point of view or perspective, especially ones that counter what they want to believe. Like the posers they throw the Bible out as their shield.

Like radical Muslims, they are harmful. Their harm is more like the mental, emotional harm of a cult than the physical, violent harm of the stereotypical terrorism we are used to seeing and hearing about on television regarding the radical Muslims.

If you haven't read between the lines, I put a good bit of value on self-examination and reflection. I believe most Christians incorporate this practice in their worship. Prayer involves reflection and self-examination. It is an important component of Christianity. But many times prayer and reflection seem to be separated. These two groups lose sight of the importance of this intimate practice that truly connects you with God.

I do not believe practicing your religion is about following some rigid dogma as much as your relationship with your higher power. Questioning what your are told is part of this relationship. I believe it is an important and critical part of practicing your religion. By questioning and critiquing what is passed to you, you become part of this belief and you develop your own point of view. One that brings you closer to your higher power.

Whatever God you choose to believe in is much greater than anything we can fathom in our human experience. I highly doubt God concerns itself with whether you are following the rules set forth by the Pope or other religious leaders. It is more meaningful and practical for us to transcend this and use the different religions out there to seek the greater good.

Peter Rollins touches on this point of a God greater than our understanding in his book about the emerging Christianity entitled, "How (Not) To Speak of God:"

"If we fail to recognize that the term 'God' always falls short of that towards which the word is suppoed to point, we will end up bowing down before our own conceptual creations forged from the raw materials of our self-image, rather than bowing before the one who stands over and above that creation...'God rid me of God,' a prayer that acknowledges how the God we are in relationship with is bigger, better and different than our understanding of that God." (Rollins, "How (Not) to Speak of God" pg.19)

Fortunately, most Christians I know do this. It's the other two groups that Ia m skeptical about.