Rebecca:

This concluding sentence from you blew me away:

“We have no models of Jesus scolding anyone for being too generous in their sacrifice, their love, or their hospitality—and plenty of models of grand and often dangerous gestures of generosity.”

Well said. Quite right! A mission statement, even!

And it was that particular turn of phrase — “often dangerous gestures” — that turned my mind to a bit of Scripture. Let’s pick up the words of Paul in 1 Corinthians:

“Where is the wise man? Where is the scribe? Where is the philosopher of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? For since in the wisdom of God, the world through its wisdom did not know Him, God was pleased through the foolishness of what was preached to save those who believe.”

These verses don’t get talked a lot about in public these days, yet I suspect they do incredible damage to our discourse and politics.

See, I read Paul’s words as suggesting that the path of God can be counterintuitive — requiring your “often dangerous gestures” of generosity. But I think many Christians have interpreted this passage as … allowing them to embrace real, actual foolishness.

I’m thinking here of conservative attitudes on climate change. While it’s true that there’s a subset who take a faith-based foundation to defending the environment, the sad truth is that many American Christians (evangelicals, at least) have decided to accept Republican teaching on the matter, which amounts to: “Ignore all that science and scientists who tell you that human-made climate change is real and poses risks. It isn’t and doesn’t.” Why do American Christians buy into this? Well, many of them regard environmentalists as (literally) idolatrous nature lovers; some are just binding themselves to GOP tribalism — and a few figure the End Times are just around the corner, so screw it.

But: The Republican teaching is … foolish. There are lots of people — lots and lots of scientists — who say so. And I suspect this makes some conservative Christians cleave ever more closely to these ideas, because the “wise men” of the age are calling them foolish. That’s proof that they’ve taken the right position!

That’s obviously self-reinforcing. I’m not sure how one argues against that kind of logic. And it’s a logic that gets applied to all kinds of issues.

So. How to decide what’s really foolish? And what’s wisely foolish? How do we not end up chasing our tails on this whole damn thing?

Oh dear. I think I just went full Obi-Wan:

Rebecca, you offered a pretty good measuring stick the other day when you wrote this: “We can actually measure who Christianity is for by looking at who benefits from American Christianity. And that answer is pretty clear:  the same people who have always had power. American Christianity protects the status quo.”

I suspect that asking that question would help clarify the effort to distinguish real foolishness from God’s (wise) foolishness, assuming one isn’t trying to get to a predetermined conclusion.

Wait. How does this relate back to your “often dangerous gestures” comment?

Only this: I’m not so sure it’s God’s foolishness to believe and act the way that oil companies, as well as the politicians and think tanks they buy, want you to. If a senator says exactly what you believe on C-SPAN, there’s probably not much divinely counterintuitive going on.

I don’t think God’s foolishness requires believers to ignore mounds of evidence in favor of a proposition — that makes God a trickster, and every day a sort of “Opposite Day.” Instead, I think God’s foolishness requires one to consider and discard conventional wisdom, and that is much, much more difficult than merely taking the side of everybody else in your political party.

I think living God’s foolishness is legitimately, terrifyingly difficult.

Giving your coat when asked for it. That’s hard. Turning the other cheek when you’ve already been struck. That’s hard. Loving your enemies and praying for those who persecute you. That’s damn near impossible. Acting in God’s foolishness often requires putting something on the line — your life, maybe, or your reputation.

It requires “often dangerous gestures” of generosity.

— Joel

P.S. We’ve started off with some heavy questions and thinking, haven’t we? I promise, Rebecca, that we’ll do some lighter stuff. I want to talk about books and movies with you. And I want to elicit some thoughts from you, in the near future, about how to raise “aware” kids. We’ve got a lot of time and ground to cover. We’ll get to it all eventually!