I recently got into hot water with my brother over an article I linked to about the recent Glen Beck rally at the Lincoln Memorial a little over a week ago. My brief description of the article before the link was to say that what was broadcast at the Lincoln Memorial was a false gospel. This is the statement that got me into hot water because my brother made the fair accusation that I was not there and I did not listen to any broadcast of it, he had made the journey to D.C. to attend.
My brother witnessed many praying, people witnessing to others, and I am sure some people came to know Christ through the rally. In this I am thrilled, however, I am reminded of a couple verses from the Apostle Paul’s letter to the Phillipians:
Some, to be sure, are preaching Christ even from envy and strife, but some also from good will; the latter do it out of love, knowing that I am appointed for the defense of the gospel; the former proclaim Christ out of selfish ambition rather than from pure motives, thinking to cause me distress in my imprisonment. What then? Only that in every way, whether in pretense or in truth, Christ is proclaimed; and in this I rejoice. (Philippians 1:15-18, NASB)
In quoting these verses I am not in any way judging the motives of anyone who went to the rally or the speakers at the rally, only God can judge people’s motives. My main point in quoting these verses is that motives are often hidden and to keep in mind that they may not always be pure.
I have since watched a little bit of Beck’s performance through the C-SPAN website and I will take issue with the overall theme of the rally. It amounted to a worship service in the Church of the National Mall for the United States’ civil religion.
What do I mean by civil religion? There are other names for it, such as patriotism or nationalism. In the United States version there is a blend of church, history, and patriotism. There are appeals to the faith of the pilgrims, of the founding fathers, and to later prominent figures in American history. These people are held up, we are compared to them, we have fallen short, and in order to restore America we need to return to the olden days and to a “God” of a very general nature. In civil religion, faith and patriotism can at times seem indistinguishable and more often than not patriotism overwhelms faith.
I have recently been reading Letters and Papers From Prison by Dietrich Bonhoeffer and it has made me more sensitive to the role of civil religion and how patriotism can overwhelm faith. Bonhoeffer was a Lutheran pastor leading up to and throughout the rule of Hitler in Nazi Germany. He helped to form and lead a breakaway group of Christians known as the Confessing Church. They broke away because the Nazi party succeeded in taking over influential positions within the German Church. Animated by a fierce nationalism, many members within the church came to believe in the civil religion propagandized by the Nazi party and the redemption that it promised instead of in the redeeming power of Christ. Civil religion is a subtle form of idolatry, it often uses the language of faith to place the nation above the only person deserving of worship, Jesus Christ.
This is why I called what was broadcast at the Lincoln memorial a false gospel. The rally was not about preaching Christ, it was about how the United States has lost its way and needs to turn back to the “holy scriptures” of the Constitution, the Declaration of Independence, and the Gettysburg Address. Can we build a more just society or make improvements by returning to those documents? Sure we can, but even if we were to achieve that it would not provide salvation from the core problem of the human condition, the problem that was solved by the cross and the resurrection, rebellion against God.
America will not be restored by electing new leaders, by piety to a god in order to receive a special blessing so that we can defeat our “enemies”, or by fidelity to political documents. It will be restored when the Church, the people that call themselves followers of Christ, walk humbly, love mercy, and do justice towards others. In simple acts of kindness and faith, acting upon the words of Christ, people’s hearts will change. They will see the Church not as a group of people known for the things they are against, but as a group of people who have been changed by Christ and who demonstrate love and justice to all people equally.
This post had me thinking about something I read last night. I hate to go sci-fi on you, but Dune had something nice in it about this.
” All organized religions face a common problem, a tender spot through which we may enter and shift them to our designs: How do they distinguish hubris from revelation?”
Faith traditions of all stripes are of course made up of human beings. Part of human nature is to desire and wield power. You combine that with the power that is built up in organized systems of religion and it will not take long for someone to take advantage of that.
Does this invalidate faith, no, it just makes all the more clear the specifically Christian message that human nature is broken, that there is a solution, and that it required a tremendous sacrifice.