And here's another quote used by the acolytes of "social justice".
“Christmas is built upon a beautiful and international paradox; that the birth of the homeless should be celebrated in every home.”
-G.K. Chetsterson
I have great respect for G. K. Chetsterson and find much I can agree with in another statement of his in particular.
"The whole modern world has divided itself into Conservatives and Progressives. The business of Progressives is to go on making mistakes. The business of the Conservatives is to prevent the mistakes from being corrected."
The fact that he made this statement about British politics around the turn of the 20th century only shows how very little we have moved from the same general nonsense today.
I wont attempt to argue with the late Chetsterson here. I want to make that clear before some student of his life and writings chooses to come after me and tell me I don't know near as much about him as they do,
Instead I want to address the intuitive implications of his quote on Christmas. What I do actually know about Chetsterson is enough to be fairly sure that the intuitive conclusions are the wrong ones to draw, not what Chetsterson meant at all, but unfortunately what many of the acolytes of social justice will think it means.
Jesus Christ was not born homeless. If being born somewhere other than in your parent's house means you were born homeless then anyone born in a hospital was born homeless.
He was born in humble circumstances and it is there that we see "a beautiful and international paradox". The king of the universe and then some was born like someone in lowly circumstances. He doesn't care about the kind of power and social status that most of us do. Just as much as this may be seem as a "shout out" to the poor it can with equal validity of thought be seen as a sort of spitting on our human understanding of power and status.
But for the acolytes of social justice it is another opportunity to feed the flames of class warfare. Almost assuredly not what Chetsterson was getting at. Though if it was, I draw the same conclusion with still equal strength.
In order for "social justice" to be anything other than a set of nonsense syllables that happen to make out two recognizable words, groups of people, classes of people must be the focus of Christ's ministry through us. We must persue political power to achieve this brand of justice since whole classes of people cannot be directed without it. This therefore means we end up pursuing the very thing the implications of His birth reject, the kind of power and social status most humans cared about before His first coming.
Contrary to many popular teachings, Jesus was never a poor man. His earthly parents were middle class and even during the travels of His ministry He had enough resources that a treasury was maintained to manage them and the garment He wore was so fine that the soldiers cast lots for it instead of just tearing it up and dividing its materials evenly, as was the more common practice of the time.
The point of this fact is not that Jesus was middle class or rich, but rather and with far more powerful implications, He transcended our fallen class system. He was one of us but not a part of our pursuit of power and wealth. He benefited from our resources and our economics but He had no use and still has no use for our politics.
Christianity has influenced many great social transformations without ever laying hold of political power. And in those cases where Christians have attempted to grow "the kingdom" through political power it has failed.
Social justice is a false concept that encourages us, to quote Chetsterson, "to go on making mistakes". And these mistakes are costly. Only heaven can give us a full account of just how costly.
I can now only hope that my conservative Christian friends will bring themselves to see just where and why social justice has gone wrong so we don't just end up opposing social justice in the name of some current status quo that social justice helped create and thus, "prevent the mistakes from being corrected".
“Christmas is built upon a beautiful and international paradox; that the birth of the homeless should be celebrated in every home.”
-G.K. Chetsterson
I have great respect for G. K. Chetsterson and find much I can agree with in another statement of his in particular.
"The whole modern world has divided itself into Conservatives and Progressives. The business of Progressives is to go on making mistakes. The business of the Conservatives is to prevent the mistakes from being corrected."
The fact that he made this statement about British politics around the turn of the 20th century only shows how very little we have moved from the same general nonsense today.
I wont attempt to argue with the late Chetsterson here. I want to make that clear before some student of his life and writings chooses to come after me and tell me I don't know near as much about him as they do,
Instead I want to address the intuitive implications of his quote on Christmas. What I do actually know about Chetsterson is enough to be fairly sure that the intuitive conclusions are the wrong ones to draw, not what Chetsterson meant at all, but unfortunately what many of the acolytes of social justice will think it means.
Jesus Christ was not born homeless. If being born somewhere other than in your parent's house means you were born homeless then anyone born in a hospital was born homeless.
He was born in humble circumstances and it is there that we see "a beautiful and international paradox". The king of the universe and then some was born like someone in lowly circumstances. He doesn't care about the kind of power and social status that most of us do. Just as much as this may be seem as a "shout out" to the poor it can with equal validity of thought be seen as a sort of spitting on our human understanding of power and status.
But for the acolytes of social justice it is another opportunity to feed the flames of class warfare. Almost assuredly not what Chetsterson was getting at. Though if it was, I draw the same conclusion with still equal strength.
In order for "social justice" to be anything other than a set of nonsense syllables that happen to make out two recognizable words, groups of people, classes of people must be the focus of Christ's ministry through us. We must persue political power to achieve this brand of justice since whole classes of people cannot be directed without it. This therefore means we end up pursuing the very thing the implications of His birth reject, the kind of power and social status most humans cared about before His first coming.
Contrary to many popular teachings, Jesus was never a poor man. His earthly parents were middle class and even during the travels of His ministry He had enough resources that a treasury was maintained to manage them and the garment He wore was so fine that the soldiers cast lots for it instead of just tearing it up and dividing its materials evenly, as was the more common practice of the time.
The point of this fact is not that Jesus was middle class or rich, but rather and with far more powerful implications, He transcended our fallen class system. He was one of us but not a part of our pursuit of power and wealth. He benefited from our resources and our economics but He had no use and still has no use for our politics.
Christianity has influenced many great social transformations without ever laying hold of political power. And in those cases where Christians have attempted to grow "the kingdom" through political power it has failed.
Social justice is a false concept that encourages us, to quote Chetsterson, "to go on making mistakes". And these mistakes are costly. Only heaven can give us a full account of just how costly.
I can now only hope that my conservative Christian friends will bring themselves to see just where and why social justice has gone wrong so we don't just end up opposing social justice in the name of some current status quo that social justice helped create and thus, "prevent the mistakes from being corrected".
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