Not too many years ago, many folks were searching for the “authentic Jesus.” They turned to “lost” gospels, found hidden meanings in Jesus’ recorded words, tried to find the Jesus behind the Jesus of the Gospels, and so on. For various reasons, some folks wanted more than the Jesus that the Church had known and preached for many centuries. They were looking--sometimes genuinely--for something deeper, yet still credible.
These days, that search for the genuine Jesus has morphed into something much different. We now look to re-make Jesus into our own image. He’s not just my personal Jesus. He is actually fully me, only in a robe and sandals. He believes whatever I believe. His words in the Gospels don’t match my beliefs? I can choose to ignore them. I mean, I know my own personal Jesus better than someone writing 2,000 years ago.
As for Jesus’ teachings, well, those need to evolve. Keep the love, keep the social activities, keep the wise teacher. Drop all the hard stuff.
- I need time to pursue my own interests and fun activities, so let’s lay off any references to daily bearing the cross, giving up riches, and suffering persecution.
- We’ll keep Jesus’ command to “judge not,” but forget the rest of the chapter telling us to remove the speck from our brother’s eye and not to allow the pigs of the world to trample holy things.
- God wants me to be nothing but happy and prosperous, so quit telling me about a narrow gate and hard path to life.
- Hell is an ugly concept, so let’s agree that all roads lead to heaven.
Yep, we turn imago Dei upside down and make God in our own image. Because following the real Jesus is just too hard.
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