What???

"Didn't you get the memo?"
Wiliam Earle - Batman Begins

"Didn't you get the memo?"
Lucius Fox - Batman Begins

"The saying is trustworthy and deserving of full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners".

Apparently, Paul didn't get the memo - not according to the popular theology doing the rounds. To summarize the trend in one comment I read yesterday,"We have already rejected the Evangelical Gospel with its Redemptive Violence, relentless fear-mongering and intellectually primitive Devil as the CEO of Evil . Yet we sense something in the broader arcs of scripture. As metaphor it is engaging. As history it is inane".

The latest popular notions - of "Christ" without (or not exclusively ascribed to) Jesus - are not actually that new. Numerous pseudo-christian movements and cults throughout the centuries have claimed a 'unique' insight into this issue at the expense of demoting the Gospel and it's particular affirmation of God manifest in the flesh in favour of a more 'universal', dualistic approach to both divinity and redemption. This negation of essential Christianity is vital because if God truly revealed Himself in flesh, in particular revelation as the sole way whereby creatures such as ourselves can be restored, then you cannot have some other "universal" truth that does the job just as well without such history. The reverse is also equally as true - why would God act in the manner the scriptures state if all we required is some fine-tuning to the 'revelation' that makes us genuinely whole? Why bother with all this business of Incarnation, Crucifixion and Resurrection if all that's required is some moment of enlightenment?

If all Christianity gives us is a collection of stories that actually do little than perhaps suggest at points a gateway to some manner of higher enlightenment, then it most certainly can be viewed, at best, as useful as any other 'pathway' to be employed in seeking truth (the likes of teachers such as Teilhard De Chardin would say that's what genuine spirituality is all about), but if the faith is actually the unique story of how God acts in this world to bring about its rescue, then we entirely miss- represent its unique value and revelation if we make it less than the perfect jewel it proclaims to be, and neither Jesus or His Apostles leave us in any doubt that is exactly what happens if we fail to hear what they are saying.

We must always seek to identify the folly in popular notions that because something is 'likable' it is therefore good and true. Evil often comes in the guise of what appears to be well reasoned - the serpent in the garden appealed to a sense of worth within his venom-laced allure! - but taking away pain doesn't deal with cancer... something much deeper is required.

The message of Christianity isn't seeking to reconcile us all in our present state of existence - that estate is in deep trouble. It wants to redeem creation into something much better. The good news is the Cross does bring reconciliation, the empty tomb does mean we are rescued from sin and death, so the tables have been turned. We deeply need to see God in Christ, however, to appreciate and appropriate these marvels to our lives.