movement, movement

Yet another response to the conversation here and here.

To call revolutionary method “anger motivated” is not an accurate representation. Anger is and should be involved, but its not the emotional source of all that is questioned in a well understood culture. If the presented opposition sounds harsh or overkill, I can understand the concern but this isn’t about throwing out an initial response of aggression. Pushed to limits, while understood with proper analysis leads me to act with intentional aggression and impact – a particular “wow-factor” is beneficial.

The questioning of conventional wisdom happens in the way it does, (with offensive action) because it is the nature of conventional wisdom to suppress the opposing ideas. To convince those who would think otherwise to go along with the crowd.

I intentionally question the entire premise and the conventional wisdom that accepts the use of the God quotes billboards with this in mind. I know how Christians think, and I know they believe that God can and will do anything with whatever crap they throw out there, however quality it is or isn’t. Just because we believe, however, that God will do with it what he will, doesn’t mean it will improve lives. Maybe we should think about our approach to life? Its like sitting on your ass and doing nothing because you have the excuse that God’s “will” will be done whether I sit on my ass or not.

Some of the conventional wisdom I question, particularly with this conversation includes what God’s will is. I’ll be writing more about the abstractness of that idea in the future, but for now I should say that I think its a generic escape from reality that most Christians suffer from. It provides an unquestionable structure to hide behind (“God wills it”) from which you can do or say anything if you claim that God told you to. What I question is how people discern God’s voice and what they interpret God’s will to be. What I hope to accomplish is to encourage Christians to be more responsible with “The God Card”, as it is often called in relationship settings. Like I said, more on this in a post some day in the future, but in the meantime, I wrote some about it here.

One more small point – I don’t question Christian leaders’ willingness to do what God tells them to do. What I question is whether it was really God and how much human interpretation has gone into that leadership. Just as the church is flawed for being human, so are individual humans. As much as we wish we had direct, absolute, and specific orders from on High, we don’t. It just doesn’t work that way. At least not for the vast vast vast majority of us.

In summary, I we agree on many points. The difference on some, however, is the interpretation of what God wants, and as Jen said, “what God is doing”. Thats what it all comes down to. We have different interpretations and notice different effects of practices in the world. The main point of difference is the degree to which I see the church accepting its conventional wisdom. Just because its conventional wisdom doesn’t mean its true.