Question for Evangelicals
Posted: Tue Apr 06, 2021 11:28 pm
For Huckleberry, Ms. Jack, Jersey Girl, AS, Tim, MSnobody; anybody who considers themselves an established evangelical Christian or simply "Christian" without qualification, I have a question for you.
My right-wing friend caught me totally off guard yesterday. I can google for this, but I'd really like to hear what practicing Christians say for themselves, and for the broader community of Christians before I do so.
As a background: My friend is a dyed-in-the wool right-wing Trump supporter and born-again Christian. He's a good guy but a total moron. To give you an idea, the first time I met him, the mere mention that I'd lived in Utah, and he was scratching his head trying to remember everything he'd learned from some book on cults he'd read thirty years ago. No self-awareness whatsoever. I've had to correct him many times in the past on what he believes as a Christian, or help him with Bible passages he's trying to remember to go against Mormonism.
So anyway, yesterday he was explaining that some random person he knows got a tattoo across his chest of Jesus on a cross. He then went on as an aside, that Catholics and Mormons are guilty of idolatry because when representing the Crucifixion, they put Jesus on the cross, rather than use the symbol of the cross without Jesus on it. And in a moment of sudden realization (or misremembering?) I had to say to myself, you know, it seems true that I seem to recall Christians just wearing a cross as a neckless, that's just a cross, and when there is a cross and Jesus is on it, it's in a Catholic context. Further, we had a lot of religious art in our home, and everything with Jesus in it is either Mormon or Catholic. Sitting here without googling, I can't bring to mind a single image of a protestant version of Jesus.
Further, he went on to explain that we Mormons and Catholics, cults, you know, in our idolatry, portray Jesus as white with blonde hair and blue eyes, but most likely he was dark, if not considered 'black'. Now, this guy who is getting all anthropological on me is the same guy who believes the earth is 6,000 years old. But he insists that "Christians" don't know what Jesus looks like and generally believe he was dark.
From the little I've heard him talk about his congregation, they don't seem to be all about politics. I know they take Covid seriously, didn't have services for nearly a year, and now have heavy social distancing measures. It's possible that he's one the one hand, a run-of-the-mill Fox-news republican, but on the other, just happened to have found a congregation that is more progressive than most. He doesn't see any conflicts but logic isn't his strength. Well, I'm at a loss here, because as I think about it, I've always assumed that Christians like Mormons believe in a Nordic-like Jesus, but just going by memory, I can't recall any conversation I've ever had with an Evangelical on my mission, or any materials I've encountered that establish Jesus as white. I can't imagine that white nationalist Christians believe in a dark Jesus, but I'm thinking more about traditional Baptists, or Pentecostals, do traditional Christians believe Jesus was white? Portray him as white? Is portraying Jesus idolatry? Is portraying him specifically on a cross idolatry?
My right-wing friend caught me totally off guard yesterday. I can google for this, but I'd really like to hear what practicing Christians say for themselves, and for the broader community of Christians before I do so.
As a background: My friend is a dyed-in-the wool right-wing Trump supporter and born-again Christian. He's a good guy but a total moron. To give you an idea, the first time I met him, the mere mention that I'd lived in Utah, and he was scratching his head trying to remember everything he'd learned from some book on cults he'd read thirty years ago. No self-awareness whatsoever. I've had to correct him many times in the past on what he believes as a Christian, or help him with Bible passages he's trying to remember to go against Mormonism.
So anyway, yesterday he was explaining that some random person he knows got a tattoo across his chest of Jesus on a cross. He then went on as an aside, that Catholics and Mormons are guilty of idolatry because when representing the Crucifixion, they put Jesus on the cross, rather than use the symbol of the cross without Jesus on it. And in a moment of sudden realization (or misremembering?) I had to say to myself, you know, it seems true that I seem to recall Christians just wearing a cross as a neckless, that's just a cross, and when there is a cross and Jesus is on it, it's in a Catholic context. Further, we had a lot of religious art in our home, and everything with Jesus in it is either Mormon or Catholic. Sitting here without googling, I can't bring to mind a single image of a protestant version of Jesus.
Further, he went on to explain that we Mormons and Catholics, cults, you know, in our idolatry, portray Jesus as white with blonde hair and blue eyes, but most likely he was dark, if not considered 'black'. Now, this guy who is getting all anthropological on me is the same guy who believes the earth is 6,000 years old. But he insists that "Christians" don't know what Jesus looks like and generally believe he was dark.
From the little I've heard him talk about his congregation, they don't seem to be all about politics. I know they take Covid seriously, didn't have services for nearly a year, and now have heavy social distancing measures. It's possible that he's one the one hand, a run-of-the-mill Fox-news republican, but on the other, just happened to have found a congregation that is more progressive than most. He doesn't see any conflicts but logic isn't his strength. Well, I'm at a loss here, because as I think about it, I've always assumed that Christians like Mormons believe in a Nordic-like Jesus, but just going by memory, I can't recall any conversation I've ever had with an Evangelical on my mission, or any materials I've encountered that establish Jesus as white. I can't imagine that white nationalist Christians believe in a dark Jesus, but I'm thinking more about traditional Baptists, or Pentecostals, do traditional Christians believe Jesus was white? Portray him as white? Is portraying Jesus idolatry? Is portraying him specifically on a cross idolatry?