The Unrecognizable Face of My Own Religion
by Austin Lack
When I was in college, we had a guest speaker for our Religious Studies class come to speak with us. He was an incredibly kind man with three Ph.D. degrees. He spoke so low it was hard to hear. All I remember from that day is that he circled back to the same idea over and over. “Religion is as religion does,” he said.
He must have repeated that ten times or more, but at the time, this nuanced idea didn’t quite click for me. I was a senior juggling school, sports, internships, and volunteer work, and I was just trying not to drop them all at once. But throughout the COVID-19 pandemic and 2020, over three years later, I found his words playing over and over in my head. Here’s why.
As Christians, we tend to be ‘by the book’ (or better said by the Book). We often define the substance of something by the rules or written definitions that are connected to it alone, and yet God calls us sons, daughters, and ambassadors. These are roles and titles with both privileges and responsibilities. They are roles that can shift, change, and even distort. An ambassador can screw up a diplomatic relationship, or misrepresent their country. Children can reflect their parents poorly; they can disobey them. Similarly, those who call themselves Christians can misrepresent and disobey Jesus. They can taint His name to those around them.
While this is always the case, it seemed that in 2020 it was only the case. As the political drama of the year unfolded, white evangelicals, in particular, became the focal point and the defining idea of American Christianity as they sought to save a Christian nation that never actually was. As the now-former President Trump awkwardly held a bible in front of a church after violently clearing protesters from LaFayette Square, it felt like the “salt and light” of the American church had become pepper spray and flashbangs “in Jesus name”.
As someone who regards his faith as central to his identity, I learned how ingrained and powerful this idea truly is. When something is central to your identity, it defines you. It becomes you, and you become it.
So it hurts when something, or someone, reflects your faith in a way that you don’t agree with. It’s infuriating when someone represents your identity in a way you believe is wrong, irresponsible, or insensitive. Did I also mention evil?
Throughout most of my adult life (but 2020 especially) it has felt as though Christians have taken the part of me I hold most dear and burned it on fire. I know who I am “in Christ,” and I know what I stand for and why, but when conspiracy theories and racism are called out within American Christianity and the response from the church is to double down on conspiracy theories and racism it’s hard to remain convinced that those things aren’t part of your identity too.
Why is that? Because religion is as religion does.
There has been a lot of outrage from the church this year, and it’s hard not to associate that outrage with God. Many Christians are angry that I (and many other Christians) marched with BLM or worked with a local church to create signs for protests; that I didn’t vote for Trump and do not identify with the Republican party (or any for that matter); and that I am anti-war, anti-police brutality, and pro-immigrant. These are stances that, while prevalent within the Christian faith, are not centered in many white American Christian traditions.
It’s hard for me not to be angry, because “white evangelicals” aren’t just a voting category. They are part of what has shaped me, and that’s not a fun thing to have to say. It’s hard seeing Trump on the screen of churches I once volunteered at during high school, or to read that your former pastor is being lambasted by his congregants on Instagram for (finally) saying that Black lives matter. It’s hard to hear my wife recount the stories of how she was told not to speak, or pray, or make certain facial expressions when she led worship. It’s equally hard to reconcile the types of political protests and short-term “missions” work we were encouraged to attend growing up in a non-denominational church in Orange County, California. I can still remember the face of a man in angry tears as he walked past me holding a “Yes On 8” sign as a kid, a phrase that showcased the contentious proposition over marriage rights. I don’t know if he identified as gay. I don’t know his story at all. All I know is that I was there with my church holding a sign for Jesus and he was in tears because of it.
What makes it hard is living with the pain that your religion has caused to others you thought you were helping, or the pain that comes in your relationship with God, and the realization that you must re-examine your entire spiritual upbringing because it was a gospel cloaked in whiteness, patriotism, and empire. It’s a lot easier to just give up, or throw the whole thing aside than to try and untangle the web. And unfortunately, I have seen that happen with many friends. As a white Christian male, you’re then faced with the question of belonging.
If I want to see race equity in America, how do I join the fight? If I want to love my neighbor by stopping displacement and gentrification, how do I do that when I’m part of the problem? How do I not be part of the problem? How do I love the people that I no longer agree with? These are the sorts of questions I’ve been asking God lately.
C.S. Lewis wrote a small book called A Grief Observed, which is full of journal entries he wrote as he processed the death of his wife. In this book, he showcases his despair through beautifully desperate writing. As he starts to work through the process of grief, he says, “My idea of God is not a divine idea. It has to be shattered time after time. He shatters it Himself” (Lewis, 76).
I have not experienced such pain as Lewis did, and I realize that I have come from a place of immense privilege to have learned about sexism, racism, and other realities in a classroom or over dinner, rather than to experience the overt consequences of these things in my daily life.
Though I’ve held my “wayward” views on many issues, theologically and politically, for quite some time now, in a way it feels as though I am processing the death of an old faith in 2020. I think a lot of Christians must feel this way, but it’s also the reason I think those simple words from the guest speaker of my Religious Studies class in college are starting to not be so despairing anymore. God has scattered my old ideas about Him all over the floor, but what sort of mosaic is He making with the pieces? Maybe war, empire, and political power will be exchanged for the Holy Spirit as the Church’s primary catalyst for change. Maybe the Holy Spirit can work in us and through us as he shatters old ideas about himself, turns swords into plowshares, and empowers us to serve others through our daily actions as a reflection of our love for Jesus.
For the past few years, I’ve worked and volunteered with youth in Los Angeles, overseeing a free after-school arts program in order to live into the vision that God has cast for the future.
Today, during the pandemic, the program is canceled, and following Jesus looks different. I aim to reflect the love of Christ while donating my time at local food drives, or by simply being present when I speak to my neighbors as they water their plants. It looks like spending my money in the places that have held the community of Cypress Park, Los Angeles together long before my wife and I came to call it home. But to be honest, as I read Scripture through the lens of my convictions, that’s the easy stuff, and usually, the fun stuff!
The real challenge is refusing to use God or the Bible as a weapon for my own ideas. In many ways, I see Christians doing this, and it turns into a “live by the sword, die by the sword” scenario. Oftentimes, instead of “speaking truth to power” I know that I’m called to love those who disagree with me. I know that I ought to display meekness, humility, and to speak in a way that “turns away wrath” (Prov. 15:1). I want to have less angry rants about the way “those” people are because, well, that’s how the problem started in the first place: self-righteous people becoming jaded towards those they saw as “other,” something which Jesus himself refused to do. In fact, Jesus shows us that the way to create change is by giving up power, not taking it, a radical idea in our current climate where power is king. But in our story, Jesus is king. And he showed his royalty by shedding his power and dying in a humbling way.
Hopefully, the result will be more art programs in Jesus’ name, more peace-building in Jesus’ name, more racial equity in Jesus’ name, more life done in Jesus’ name. Through the guidance of the Holy Spirit and the example of the church, I want to be proud to say that religion is as religion does.
Austin Lack is a writer, non-profit director, and husband. He spends his time walking his neighborhood in Northeast LA with his wife Madison and musing over the cultural impact of verbal and non-verbal rhetoric in our postmodern context, especially concerning evangelicalism, racism, and gentrification. You can follow him on Instagram @austin_lack.
