Stop whining and get on with it

Cat at Quaker Pagan Reflections has posted an absolutely brilliant rant (well, she says it's a rant, but it's actually very mild-mannered) asking Pagans who have left Christianity behind to stop moaning about it and start exploring their own spirituality, i.e. instead of talking about why they don't like Jesus, they should start talking about why they do like Odin, or Freyja, or Isis, or the Tao. If more than 50% of your blogposts involve moaning about Christianity or Jesus, then please read it.

I couldn't agree more. I shudder at the number of times I have had to sit through interminable rants about how dreadful Christianity is at pub moots, and the number of blogposts I have had to sift through that were whining about how all the ills of the world can be laid at Christianity's door, and how they stole the Pagan festivals, yada, yada, yada.

Yes, Christians can be bigoted bastards. And yes, the Inquisition was bad. But on the plus side of the balance sheet, there's charity and compassion (not uniquely the preserve of Christians, but they do walk their talk in that respect).

It could be because many Pagans have come from a fundamentalist Christian background. I sympathise, because I have been there. But moaning about it incessantly is not the answer. Go and get some really good therapy, deal with it, and move on.

But it's not just Christianity and Jesus that get the blame for all the ills of the world. Oh no - in fact it's monotheism that is the bad guy, according to some. Last year, during Pagan Values Month, there were a number of posts going on about how polytheism was inherently more tolerant than monotheism. I disagree - I have met tolerant monotheists and intolerant polytheists. It's taking things literally that is the source of narrow-mindedness, and fear is the source of bigotry.

Trinitarian theology is mostly exclusivist, because it maintains that Jesus is the only gateway to the Divine Source; but all other forms of monotheism are conducive to the view that polytheism and monotheism are different perspectives on the same reality. But even some Trinitarians see their theology as a metaphor for other theologies.

So, unless you have made some effort to study other religions' theologies in some depth, don't assume that the narrow-minded fundamentalist mindset you were brought up in is typical of the whole of Christian thought. Some of the best minds in Europe were devoted to theological musing for centuries, so it's actually quite subtle.

Unless you are aware that there are several different models of the atonement, plus Christus Victor theology, plus the Arian heresy, and you know what theosis, kenosis, coinherence and perichoresis are, when original sin was invented and by whom, and what the causes and implications of the Filioque controversy were - then don't think you are qualified to hold forth on what's wrong with Christian theology.