Never Walked In High Heels

Everybody knows about the American church in the UK. The second I mention a concept like the separation between church and state, my entire class rolls their eyes. They don’t believe there is such a thing. The irony is of course that the Founding Fathers left the Old World in hopes that there could be a place in the new world where government and religion never mixed. Clearly, that place is not America.

The American Church prefers to throw up its hands and say we’re not responsible for where modern government takes us. How could we ever hope to accomplish our goals with this sort of distrust? The truth is, I think that the American Church, despite its own opinion(s) of itself will prove to be under as much judgment as any other institution, should we ever be fortunate enough to meet the face of God someday. The following is a list of three simple shortcomings, or to use more dramatic language “sins” that the American church will have to answer for someday.

Number 1: A lack of access- The story about Jesus healing the paralytic after he was lowered down through a hole in the roof has particular significance to any church. Despite commercials saying that in churches, sitting congregations have their door “open to all,” a shocking number of churches have no physical access for those of us with disabilities. Many of them hide behind the idea that their building has “historical significance” and therefore is so old that they cannot be made accessible; this of course, given my physical disability, angers me to no end. It’s not even that the building itself is inaccessible, which does irritate me, but the fact that God’s house is suddenly not open to all. Many buildings all over the world are inaccessible to those of us with physical limitations. But if the church is reflective of God’s love and is supposed to be a model of morality, how can they ever justify their existence when they refuse to build a simple ramp to get into their sanctuary?

Number 2: Lack of Compassion- There is a genuine sentiment that suggests that all sinners who have not come to God are somehow inhuman and thus unworthy of value. The way that the American Church has handled the issue of homosexuality is appalling. Forgetting that Christ died for us while we were yet sinners, they then expect non-believers to uphold the morality, which we are only given when we willingly accept and follow Christ. To expect anyone to act like a Christian before he knows the face of God is like expecting a slave to behave as a free man while his ankles are still in shackles. There is an unreasonable expectation that people—all sinners—should be able to clean themselves up for the sake of not being repulsive when they first set foot in church. Thus, whenever people of certain lifestyles first try to come to God, God’s own people shun them.

Number 3: A Lack of Initiative- Here is the church’s biggest fault. Routinely we expect the government to behave like the Church and solve issues that should be of heart and mind with the law. The aforementioned debate on homosexuality is a prime example as are other issues such as the legality of marriage and abortion. The American Church has somehow fooled itself into believing that it is Washington’s role to make laws according to what is moral or immoral, rather than the church attempting to impact lives on a personal level. The influence of day-to-day morality through a higher government surely will never sit well with God. As Christ said, “Pay to Caesar what is Caesar’s” So too did he understand the difference between church and state. The two would never be a substitute for each other. Why then have we fooled ourselves into thinking otherwise?

I don’t know where this idea of the Founding Fathers ever being “Christian” came from, but their Christianity was certainly not of the same ilk as ours is today. If you look at the Constitution it is not a moral document, it is not the Ten Commandments, and it leaves individuals the freedom to behave (both socially and privately) as they wish. The American Church seems to have forgotten that we are a nation made from people who believed that there is a God, a God who gives us the freedom to behave as we wish, in conjunction with those Constitutional liberties. In assuming that America is a Christian nation, the Church has given up its own powers to understand morality, and act compassionately towards others with the hope that the government will take care of it all for them, and in this way the church has aimed for government dependency as much as the America population has.