Jesus’ resurrection—does it matter if it happened?

I vowed that I would think positively all day on Easter, even about right-wing Christian fundamentalists who want to shove their chosen religion down everybody’s throat. But my vow ended when I chanced to hear a few minutes of the Jeff Kropf talk show on Portland’s KXL.

Kropf, a conservative Oregon state representative, started off by extolling the glory of Easter and the celebration of Jesus’ resurrection. That was fine with me. He was expressing his personal religious beliefs positively and passionately. Nothing wrong with that.

But then he got rolling on the Terri Schiavo case. He said that it was an outrage for Schiavo to be starved to death on Easter weekend. He called her devoted husband, Michael, a scumbag. So much for his expression of Christian love.

During the past week I’ve watched a lot of television interviews with the Schindlers, Terri Schiavo’s parents, and with Michael Schiavo. I’ve never heard Michael make a single negative comment about the Schindlers, while they and their children say horrible untrue things about him.

Go figure. The people who are claiming to be the most godly act the most hatefully. Michael Schiavo doesn’t broadcast his faith through a bullhorn; he simply acts out with dignity and compassion his love for Terri. Which gets me to the title of this post: Jesus’ resurrection—does it matter if it happened?

This was the question that a caller to Kropf’s show asked when Kropf took a break from his ranting about Michael Schiavo and taking back America from judicial activists, and talked to a listener. The man, whose name was Steve, I believe, said that he was a history major. He had spent a lot of time reading books on both sides of the “Was Jesus for real?” debate.

His considered conclusion was that it doesn’t matter. What mattered, said Steve, was Jesus’ message, not the man.

This made great good sense to me, but Kropf went bananas. “What do you mean, it doesn’t matter?! If Jesus wasn’t resurrected from the dead, then there is no Christianity!” Steve respectfully disagreed.

“Let’s suppose for the sake of argument,” said Steve, “that Jesus was a charming con man. He was a great talker who could persuade people that he was the son of God. He said all the right things, convincingly. When he died, his followers missed him so much they imagined that he had come back to life. So what? What is important is Jesus’ message, not the man. He taught love. If people learn from him the importance of love, then it doesn’t matter whether Jesus was resurrected, for his teachings live on.”

Steve clearly had thought much more about the essence of Christianity than most fundamentalist Christians have. It was obvious that Kropf didn’t have a clue what Steve was talking about. So Kropf thanked him for phoning in and went on, I assume, to speak with less challenging callers (I turned the radio off to preserve what was left of my Easter spirit).

I wonder if holier-than-thou Christians like Kropf really listen to themselves. Do they ever wonder about the incongruity between their purported beliefs and their evident actions? When they call Michael Schiavo a scumbag, a murderer, a wife abuser, do they ever think, “What would Jesus say?”

It doesn’t matter if Jesus actually lived if Christians can’t live out the loving teachings that he left them. It doesn’t matter if Jesus really rose from the dead if Christians can’t rise above hate, egotism, and sanctimoniousness.

Plus, ritualism. Kropf was all over Michael Schiavo because he didn’t give permission for his wife to receive communion today. So what? She received communion when her feeding tube was removed. And does Kropf believe that God is going to love Terri any less because a few drops of wine, or whatever, failed to enter her body?

Isn’t the soul more important than the body? Kropf called America a “culture of death” because in this country we allow people like Terri Schiavo to die with dignity. I call this a culture of life.

Every authentic spiritual tradition recognizes that the body is a shell for the spirit. Soul can exist apart from the physical frame. Each of us should take good care of our God-given body for as long as it is habitable, but when it is worn out, there is more divinity in letting go than in clinging.

Here’s a quote from a “pagan” Greek mystic philosopher, Porphyry. To me he sounds much more Christian than a lot of Christians.

Nature releases what nature has bound. The soul releases what the soul has bound. Nature binds the body to the soul, but it is the soul herself that has bound herself to the body. It, therefore, belongs to nature to detach the body from the soul, while it is the soul herself that detaches herself from the body.

…Likewise to receive life and to lose it, to feel passions that are its consequence, can refer only to the composite of soul and body. Nothing similar could happen to the soul, for she is not something compounded out of life and lifelessness; she is life itself…Let then your mind follow after God, and let the soul follow the mind, and let the body be subservient to the soul as far as may be, the pure body serving the pure soul

…Now the divine law cries aloud in the pure region of the mind: “Unless you consider that your body is joined to you as the outer covering to the child in the womb and the stalk to the sprouting corn, you can not know yourself!” Nor can anyone know himself who does not hold this opinion. As the outer covering grows with the child, and the stalk with the corn, yet, when they come to maturity, both are cast away, thus too the body which is fastened to the soul at birth is not a part of the man.

…Often men cast off certain parts of the body; be ready for the soul’s safety to cast away the whole body. Hesitate not to die for whose sake you are willing to live.

Comments

[Lelo]

I don't know about you, but if I lived in Linn or Marion counties, where Kropf is in his 6th year representing Oregon House District 17, I'd question why my representative is going off on his radio show about Christ and Christianity and this specific religion instead of working to create better conditions for the people who live there. There are people of many religions in his House District, surprise!, and I just count myself as darn lucky for not being represented by the likes of him.

[Ryan]

Truly, what a person believes is what a man lives. If God is love, and if Jesus lived a life of love, and these people do not, then they are nothing more than posers trying to act like they have some connection to Him.

The problem is not their beliefs, because what they believe is exactly how they live. If they are hateful, then as you have already noticed and mentioned, "how can they be of Jesus, whose whole life and message was love?" Well the answer, they are not.

How do I know, I was one of them. I was raised a conservative "Christian," went to the Christian College, got the "BS" degree (literally BS) and then worked in their church systems for a while. My wife and I will never go back, and we have found more love in people who do not even desire to have anything to do with Jesus than those who "claim" to be His representative. I am sure He would not choose them as His representatives, which actually makes them self appointed.

Anyway, I love Jesus Christ. His message, His life, and the life he truly offered and has given me. Which is not what is offered through religious systems that desire to have your money, and power over you, and I simply say I am sorry for the bullshit that you are being shown about the man who never lived or acted the way these people do.

[Trey]

As always, Brian, great post.

From my perspective, the reason that the belief that JC did indeed rise from the cross is interwined with the fundamentalist interpretation of the bible. From this myopic perspective, everything written in the bible is verbatim what was said and what happened.

To entertain the notion that JC was NOT resurrected would be to question "the word of God". If a fundamentalist was forced to question this singular fact, then they would feel obligated to question EVERYTHING in the bible, including Jesus' message (which most of them don't understand anyway).

So I can understand why a fundamentalist HAS TO believe the way they do. For them, it's like a house of cards. If one card is removed or even moved, the whole thing is likely to fall down. If you've given your life to believe something, that would be the worst thing you could ever imagine. Therefore, you must cling to every word in AT LEAST an academic sense.

[pat]

I loved your post. you shine the spotlight on those that scream how "christian" they are (key word- scream), but they show us nothing but how much of an ass they can be. look at the way many christian's treat homosexuals. we hold marches against them, yell at them, call them names, and tell the world how the homo's are going to hell. that's funny (but not humorous), because Jesus ate meals and hung out with the prostitutes and tax collectors, and that group was the bottom of the barrell of society in their time. so what would Jesus do toda? he would hang out and party with prostitutes, homosexuals, and even the 'survivor' contestants who were the first ones voted off their shows.
my wife and i sold our home and a car last year so that we could move to london for 6 months to serve as missionaries, and will be returning to london for good next year. we serve as missionaries by living life with people, not by bashing them over the head and spewing rhetoric down their throats. we try to bring friendship to the the lonely people we came across, food to those that were hungry, share our hope and faith with those that do not know any type of hope or faith. of course, we are still human and screwed up as well as everyone else, but we aren't out there screaming, just living.
the good news for you is that the conservative christian church as we know it is dying. they are killing themselves.
what is rising in their place is people like myself who may never be heard from, because no one wants a sound bite from someone who doesn't have a political agenda, and is not trying to start fights and arguments.
we're further from perfect as anyone, but have found hope and love, from Jesus, to be transforming and powerful. if someone says that it doesn't matter if Jesus was ressurected from the dead or not, but truly begins to understand what he lived, died, and lived again for, then that is a starting point... not someone trying to destroy the christian faith. besides, I think Jesus can handle the criticism and defend himself in a much better way than I can.
keep writing, I enjoy checking out your site.