Jesus is a four letter word

What happens to Christianity if you delete 2000 years of baggage?

If you like my stuff, take a second to click ❤️ or 🔁 to help other people find it on Substack.

🙏 (that means merci in French)

---

It’s time to talk about Jesus.

Wait! Please don’t take this as an invitation to the nearest exit.

I understand that for most people (myself included), the fastest way to ruin Christmas is to start saying things like “the reason for the season.”

But if I am anything, I am an anti-dogmatist. So, while a bunch of you might be thinking Yay Jesus! and the rest of you might be thinking Haha no f***ing way! I’m saying HANG ON, PLEASE.

Let’s all observe how, at the very mention of “Jesus,” our brains fill right up with all kinds of thoughts and feelings that will, on their own, automatically and entirely dictate the conversation. This word is what we call loaded — attached to very large, very complicated cultural histories and artifacts. In other words, Jesus, as a word, as a social incantation, carries an enormous weight of baggage.

We can all understand (I hope) that loaded words inspire Very Strong Opinions that are hard to see or talk around.

I’m calling all of this out to give you an opportunity to judge whether what I have to say today lines up with your expectations or subverts them. My aim is not to persuade you to carry my set of baggage instead of your own. Instead, I’m hoping we can both set it all aside for a few minutes, and find some truth on common ground.

The Christian Problem

Christianity has endured perhaps the biggest smear campaign in all of human history, perpetuated by … well, Christians, for the most part.

I should know. I’ve been one my whole life, which is a birthright that has both clarified and obscured what it actually means to be Christian.

You might say, “Christians themselves define what it means to be Christian.”

But I don’t think that’s true, unless you semantically detach the person of Christ from the label. To do that, though, would pretty well defeat the purpose of the label altogether, and I think most so-called Christians would agree. This means we must look to Christ, specifically and exclusively, in any effort to define Christianity.

But first, how did we possibly get here? Where “Christian” has become culturally synonymous with bigotry, close-mindedness, self-righteousness, intolerance, and conservative extremism? And how have so many so-called Christian religions over the last two thousand years managed to perpetrate such violence and horror against both those on the inside and those on the outside of their institutional walls?

I have neither the time nor the inclination to try to examine all the possible explanations, but it is, in sum, an astonishing tragedy. Because if we dig down into not only what Christ taught, but who he was, and all of the mythology and prophecy and doctrine surrounding his birth, his death, and all of his claims, what emerges is a stunning and simple assertion:

Love is all you need.

Which, I believe, was independently verified by the Beatles.
(Along with every other spiritual leader in human history.)

So what do we need a whole Bible for? Or any other so-called sacred texts, or churches, or prophets or priests or rabbis? Because it turns out the particulars about what Love is, and isn’t, how it works, how to show it, and who it’s for (everyone, everywhere, all the time, always) is hard to understand, harder to remember, and hardest of all to practice.

The case for and against Love as “all you need” will get its very own post in the near future. For now, though, let’s agree for the sake of argument that Love is pretty groovy. And that, at minimum, we can vibe with Jesus on that level.

The Christian Solution

At the beginning, I asked you to do your best to set aside all the thoughts and feelings (all the baggage) you have already attached to the Jesus words (including “Christ” and “Christian”), regardless of whether they are positive or negative, or a gnarled mix of both.

I asked you to do this because it is what I have had to do, over and over again, in order to slowly discover, like so many before me, the binding force of all existence, that which animates the very fabric of reality.

One of the things I did, in my effort to uncover the ideologies associated with the religion I was born into, was to research the actual definition of Jesus Christ. Names are not arbitrary. They all have meaning. So I guessed that however Jesus Christ got named, the name itself probably had a specific, accessible meaning.

Here’s the shortest summary of what I discovered:

Jesus - “God is Salvation” or “God rescues”

Christ - “Anointed One” or “Chosen One”

And so…

Jesus Christ - “The one who God chose to save us.”

But wait, who is God? I thought Jesus was God? Oh no, we’re about to start arguing, aren’t we.

No, we don’t need to worry about all that. All we need is to go back and look, once again, at what Jesus said. He said if we knew him, we’d know God. He said that over and over and over.

So let’s give him the benefit of doubt and restrain ourselves to the relevant question:

Who was Jesus?

He was a man who talked a lot about love. He was a man who demonstrated love. He was a man, in the end, whose every word and action were calibrated to communicate Love.

Pure, divine, perfect love.

Who was Jesus Christ?

The one who God sent to save us...with Love.

His mission and purpose was to fully and completely embody Love, so that the true nature of Love, of God, would no longer be a mystery.

God is Love

To be semantically, authentically Christian, you must concede that, fundamentally, wholly, indisputably, and eternally: God is Love.

If this sounds trite, or naive, or overly simplistic to you, then you have not fully understood or appreciated the weight of the claim.

The central idea of Christianity, as Christ taught it, is that “love is all you need.” When asked what the greatest commandment in the law was, Christ said there were two:

1. Love God, and

2. Love your neighbor.

Wait, didn’t we just establish that God is Love? How can you love Love?

By embracing it as the fundamental virtue of reality.

By committing to show and practice it at every opportunity.

By becoming willing to fully embody it the way Christ did.

By loving your neighbor.

Everything else is details. The how of loving. It’s not easy. In fact it takes everything we’ve got. So, if we’re going to become willing to give Love everything we’ve got, then we’re going to need to accept that it really is all we need.

But we resist this.

Why do we resist? We can all agree it is beautiful. What could be more beautiful? What could be more hopeful and sublime, than a God of Love, whose only law is Love?

We resist because it truly is so hard to believe. We are wounded and cynical. We are suffering and afraid. Life is painful. How can love, no matter how sublime, possibly be enough? By turns, we judge it insufficient and unattainable.

It is not enough.

It is too much.

We fear that Love will give us too little of what we want and need, and also demand much more than we are willing or even able to give.

And so, in our resistance, we construct other gods after more manageable images.

Money.

Social justice.

Influence.

Mastery.

Beauty.

Pleasure.

All of these things are good, but none of them are God. Truth and life does not flow from them. They cannot save us.

Only Love can do that.

Only God.

Only Christ.

But still, even now, after all this exploration of its true origins, the word triggers all manner of images and impressions that have nothing to do with Love. Baggage.

A Divine Semantic Exercise

Over the past few years, I’ve slowly adopted a practice that helps me put down the baggage. Every time the name or person of Jesus Christ is invoked, I perform a semantic substitution.

It is through Christ we are saved.

becomes

It is through Love we are saved.

Christ is the way, the truth, and the life.

becomes

Love is the way, the truth, and the life.

Whenever we speak of Christ, we speak of Love. Whatever claims we make about Christ, we make about Love. If a thing cannot be said of Love, it must not be said of Christ, or, by extension, God.

So:

Does God punish people?

Does Love punish people?

No.

Does God allow people to suffer?

Does Love allow people to suffer?

It depends, doesn’t it? Does a parent let a child learn some things the hard way?

Is God pleased when we inflict pain on one another, or ourselves?

Is there any version of Love that delights in pain and suffering of any kind?

Radical Christianity

The radical position of authentic Christianity is that everyone deserves love at all times, and at all times owes it to everyone else.

Everyone.

Victims and abusers, oppressors and oppressed, saints and sinners, all.

No wonder most so-called Christians have been botching it up for two thousand years. And no wonder all the non-Christians have failed to be persuaded.

I’m not here to convince you to wear a label so heavy with socio-cultural failure and abuse.

But I will die on the hill of what Christianity actually does mean, at its very heart. To be Christian, to be an authentic disciple of Christ, is to worship Love. It is to commit oneself wholly to the study and practice of loving everyone, everywhere, always.

And so, as an earnest and faltering follower of Jesus, I wish you all the love you deserve, which is all the love I have, and all the love there is. No strings.

Today, tomorrow, and forever.

Merry Christmas.