Christianity and Cash

[Bravus]

Read it there, discuss it here (if you like).

[Nan]

It is something that has been around for more than 20 years. (Stormy O'Martian was the first one I ever came across. Leaving aside what "the world" will think of the marriage with Christianity and commercialism, I am not sure I really enjoyed all those sweaty moves to a "Christian" beat. And the workout was a good one. But to each their own.

[Nicodema]

Bravus, I have tended to favor the concerns you reflect in your blog entry. However I have heard it argued that such products also fill a need, that of the Christian consumer who wants them -- the Christian uncomfortable with secular music, for example, or in the case of video games, the Christian family uncomfortable with references to sorcery or the amount of violence in those games.

I'm not talking about just "supply and demand" though that is certainly part of it. I'm talking about -- well, about catering to a niche, to a group of people who share some common consumer demands that the current market would not fill otherwise. Think of Hot Topic for example. When it sprung up, Hot Topic originally catered fairly strictly to the Goth crowd and later wove in more Hip-hop and cross-over styles. The demand for those kinds of clothes (Goth) was around long before anyone bothered to make them, distribute them and sell them through a chain. Goths had to haunt Goodwills and Salvation Armies and even antique shops hoping for that ultimate find that made hours of fruitless searching all worthwhile ... or attempt to learn enough sewing skills to stitch together their own pieces.

The Christian book market is no different. It used to just be devotionals, Bible-centered stuff; now it has spread into its own mini-mall of bookishness with Christian self-help books, Christian recovery books, Christian parenting books, Christian historic romance novels and Christian apocalyptic fiction (emphasis on the FICTION part there). Why? Because Christians want to read fiction too -- they just don't want to read the "dirty" fiction "out there in the world". Or perhaps more to the point: like other folks, they want to encounter characters in their fiction that reflect people like themselves and values like the ones they hold, and conflicts like the ones they encounter in life.

I'm NOT saying this "consumer niche market" take is the viewpoint *I* subscribe to, by the way, just saying it's one I've heard argued that I think makes a valid point. Like I said at the beginning, I tend to lean more toward the concerns reflected in your blog entry, about the way in which turning something with a Primary value into a capitalist enterprise introduces secondary values that eclipse the Primary.

I changed the thread title on my post because I really think this is less about cash itself and more about consumer culture as a whole -- would that be an accurate assessment?

[Bravus]

Nico: I think that's a fair point, and will stick with the revised title. I think you've hit it on the head - maybe there's some validity in having such products, I don't know. But it does seem like these were the kind of services that the moneychangers and merchants in the temple were providing. Mind you, I think it was the extortion they were practicing that he objected to, so maybe if every Christian business is ethically and fairly run they have no problems. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" />

I think the issue of providing alternatives to mainstream culture also has some value, but it always worries me when people seal themselves up into mental ghettos. It makes it hard to connect with people who might need to know a Christian and hear of a saviour when you basically regard everything they know about as evil and corrupt, and know nothing about it yourself. What happens to 1 Corinthians 9:

19 For though I be free from all men, yet have I made myself servant unto all, that I might gain the more.

20 And unto the Jews I became as a Jew, that I might gain the Jews; to them that are under the law, as under the law, that I might gain them that are under the law;

21 To them that are without law, as without law, (being not without law to God, but under the law to Christ,) that I might gain them that are without law.

22 To the weak became I as weak, that I might gain the weak: I am made all things to all men, that I might by all means save some.

23 And this I do for the gospel's sake, that I might be partaker thereof with you.

Maybe that's a special thing for apostles and those with particular spiritual gifts - but that's part of the question.

The other question is about what adding money into the mix does to sacred things. Neil Postman argued that adding television to anything from education to religion transformed it all into entertainment. Maybe adding commerce to religion converts it all into business. It was Jesus who said:

Matthew 6:24 No man can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God and mammon.

Nan: Thanks for that - I had no idea how old this idea is, not being someone who is much into exercise vids. I think I was thinking more broadly about the Christian marketplace, than just exercise vids though - that was just a starting example. See Nico's points above and my response.

[Nicodema]

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But it does seem like these were the kind of services that the moneychangers and merchants in the temple were providing.

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I think you are onto something here, Bravus. The service they provided was to change the corrupt coinage of the world into the "sacred" coinage of the temple (correct?) so that this "sacred" coinage could be used to purchase the sacrifices the worshiper would present to Yahweh. We (Christians) want to change something "dirty" with its worldly association (either socially or even just in our minds) into something "sacralized" so that it's OK to use it at God's temple, i.e., in our lives (the N.T. says our bodies are the temple of God ...). So ... we want to read fiction. Bzzzt, not kosher, it's tainted, it's worldly ... what do we do? PRESTO! Christianized fiction. Now it's "clean" supposedly. Same thing with an exercise video, or even a dance party!

The absolute most appalling example of this I think I ever encountered (at least to me, at the time -- and bear in mind it is hard for me to be objective about something so long ago, I can barely sort out my feelings about this time period in my life let alone how I feel now about the same things) was when I was at CUC and they had some sort of "nightclub night". They set up the cafeteria as if it were a bar, served fake ("virgin") drinks (made sans the alcohol), got a dry-ice machine going to simulate a smokey atmosphere, and the college prez -- ol' "how do you THINK you communicate with God; it's through your imagination" himself -- presided like a moldering-beyond-aging hipster blowing on his saxophone. It made me nauseated. I wanted to tell them all, hey, if this is really what you want, why fake it? Why pretend? There's the door -- go on out there and have it for real!! I mean who did they think they were fooling???

Themselves, I guess -- and that's the point, isn't it. Ultimately we are only fooling ourselves. Our historical romantic "Christian" literature isn't any better or purer than the paperback kack sold on the grocerystore rack. It just has less overt puerile references maybe, but it's still every bit as much a distraction, every bit as much a self-indulgence, every bit as much a chasing after things that ultimately belong to this world -- when viewed in the starkest light possible -- as any other mass-produced paperback. It isn't any more "sacred" than the products of the world. It's just had the label "Christian" slapped onto it.

When we chase after the world, wanting our versions of the world's things, we deceive ourselves. We deceive ourselves about our real motives -- we are just as self-seeking as the rest of the world. Just as much wanting to escape, just as much victim-participants of consumer culture, just as much indulging of our own personal desires. Christian versions of popular culture products don't make us any more holy than our non-Christian neighbor. We deceive ourselves on that point, too, thinking we are doing something more holy, more better, more obedient to God than they are, because we only buy Christianized fiction, or Christianized music, or whatever it is. Nonsense. And finally, we deceive ourselves in thinking what we are doing is participating in or adding to the Kingdom of God somehow. Rubbish. Is it not fulfilling our own desires just as much as they fulfill theirs?

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I think the issue of providing alternatives to mainstream culture also has some value, but it always worries me when people seal themselves up into mental ghettos. It makes it hard to connect with people who might need to know a Christian and hear of a saviour when you basically regard everything they know about as evil and corrupt, and know nothing about it yourself. What happens to 1 Corinthians 9:19-23 (quoted)

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Now THIS I find a really interesting point. I find for myself I'm just far enough there to be frustrated, not far enough to be effectual. I can understand and relate to my atheist and pagan family & friends way better than I can most Christians actually! And yet I find myself unable to share Christ with them. It would be like disrespectful to them, or a breach of their trust, if I were to suddenly start preaching. We discuss political stuff all the time so I'm constantly dropping not-so-subtle hints about the beast in Rev. 13 and how that contrasts with the way God/Christ REALLY is, and making it plain I'm aware that those who are so visibly presumably "christian" really are NOT, etc. But beyond that, I haven't yet taken the step to openly avow before them, "Hey, Christ is MY Lord ... and He is real ..." and whatever else. I just don't know how to take it to that level. These are not young fellers either -- they are my age and next gen up from us.

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Maybe that's a special thing for apostles and those with particular spiritual gifts - but that's part of the question.

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What do you think? I think it's meant for everyone who is active in sharing the gospel and living as a witness to the truth in this world to aspire toward -- while recognizing none of us can really be all things to all people in the literal sense of the word.

When I get ahold of a concept I tend to run it over & over, and that's how I've been with this notion that our purpose here in this world is primarily the same as Christ's: to bear witness to the Truth.

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The other question is about what adding money into the mix does to sacred things. Neil Postman argued that adding television to anything from education to religion transformed it all into entertainment. Maybe adding commerce to religion converts it all into business. It was Jesus who said:

Matthew 6:24 No man can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God and mammon.

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An excellent and apt point to be making, especially in these times. (Great parallel, by the way!)