2008 Woodie Awards
Being non-Christian does not mean being "lost"
Erika Prins, Staff Writer
Issue date: 2/27/07
Last Updated: 8/9/07
As an International Studies major, I have looked at how Christianity influences politics and society throughout history, as it relates to many different cultures, and how it has contributed (positively or negatively) to conflicts in the world. In the majority of instances I have studied, the Church has served to pit groups against each other, and prop up corrupt leaders and facilitate their agendas of racism, sexism, and economic oppression. In each circumstance, the agenda of the church has been twisted to fit someone else's (and by someone else's I mean a wealthy male constituency's) political goals.
For example, in parts of Latin America, the church has historically held a lot of property and political power and fought (violently) to defend them. In WWII Russia, the otherwise secular Socialist government that viewed religion as the opiate of the masses suddenly encouraged people to go to church in order to keep morale up during the war. A Christian world view was the backbone of imperialism as European countries claimed lands that were already occupied by "barbaric" pagans. As an Afrikaans my favorite is that Apartheid in South Africa (and segregation in the United States, by the way) was carefully defended with Biblical passages.
In my classes, I continue to be frustrated at the disconnectedness in our discussions between Christianity in history and the Christianity we practice. The Church in the United States and around the world continues to lag behind the rest of society in its concern for social issues like poverty, disease, racism, sexism and much more. Yet, we seem to see ourselves as set apart from the heinous actions of the Church of the past or in other countries because we take sandwiches to poor people downtown and go on mission trips. We refuse to carefully examine our contributions to the root of each problem and radically change our habits as a Christian body. I believe this starts with our unwillingness to connect the Church that burned "witches" in the Middle Ages and the Church that has, for centuries and all over the world, forcefully converted or murdered entire ethnic groups with the Church that we are a part of.
For example, in parts of Latin America, the church has historically held a lot of property and political power and fought (violently) to defend them. In WWII Russia, the otherwise secular Socialist government that viewed religion as the opiate of the masses suddenly encouraged people to go to church in order to keep morale up during the war. A Christian world view was the backbone of imperialism as European countries claimed lands that were already occupied by "barbaric" pagans. As an Afrikaans my favorite is that Apartheid in South Africa (and segregation in the United States, by the way) was carefully defended with Biblical passages.
In my classes, I continue to be frustrated at the disconnectedness in our discussions between Christianity in history and the Christianity we practice. The Church in the United States and around the world continues to lag behind the rest of society in its concern for social issues like poverty, disease, racism, sexism and much more. Yet, we seem to see ourselves as set apart from the heinous actions of the Church of the past or in other countries because we take sandwiches to poor people downtown and go on mission trips. We refuse to carefully examine our contributions to the root of each problem and radically change our habits as a Christian body. I believe this starts with our unwillingness to connect the Church that burned "witches" in the Middle Ages and the Church that has, for centuries and all over the world, forcefully converted or murdered entire ethnic groups with the Church that we are a part of.
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