While centuries of religious tradition have skewed and blunted Christ's testimony, many Christians are left with the idea that Church is a place, that a building is God's house (a literally Pharisaical teaching), the Church is all around us. You see, human beings were designed to be together.
God made Adam, and then he made Eve. The first Church. "When two or more are gathered in my name," God said, "I am there." They had perfect communion with each other and with God, and since they ate of that tree, the last supper, all of Christianity is trying to arrive back to the Garden of Eden. Even Christ's message was to pursue what Adam and Eve had; he said "Love God, and love each other." Communion with God, and communion with others.
Unfortunately, pride has poisoned the Church. Even people who are aware of the problem are sometimes at fault, myself included. We try so hard to create the illusion of the perfectly loving church that we forget to love. We try so hard to be the image of the Body, that we forget to fill our roles as Body Parts.
So much can be learned from unbelievers though. Why? Because they don't have the temptation of religious pride; they don't have the social status based on outward righteousness. They are free to love whomever they please, and often they do a better job at it too. They don't have the temptation to try to "fix" others, or to change a lifestyle to match their own. They are free to meet the lost where they are, and are free to love them, no matter what.
I recently met a group of eleven strangers - none of us knew each other. Within a week, we were a close-knit clan of literary geeks. We had bonded over our poetry, and this bond surpassed social status, class, religious affiliation, political viewpoints, and diametrically different lifestyles. We sat around a great table, enjoying one another and each's individual uniqueness. Each one of us brought something different to the table.
I thought to myself, this is what the Church should be like. Sure, there were lesbians, there were bisexuals, there were atheists, home-schoolers, Jews, Christians, and Catholics. There were Republicans, Democrats, and Independents. There were those who loved Tarot cards, fortune telling, and there were alcoholics. But it didn't stand between us, or our love for one another.
Why is it that an expression of beauty (poetry) can unite people better than the beauty itself? Why is it that we who have found Grace and Great Love cannot be brought together as well as though who write from a place of pain?
The answer, I suspect, is because we - followers of Christ - too often attempt to be Christ himself. We try to cast the first stone, while we hide our depravity from our neighbors. We lay upon our brothers and sisters the guilt we have been saved from, and judge without forgiveness under the shadow of the cross of Christ, who died to atone.
We are supposed to be a model for others to see His goodness and glory. Instead, we ought to look out upon the lost, and open our eyes. Many of the people we judge are closer to living like Jesus than we. We must cast aside what divides us and gather, in his name.
If we cannot recognize the Christ in others, who are we even trying to emulate? Who do we even worship? The answer is our religion. The answer is Christianity.
