Hi, I’m Wayne Jones, and welcome to re:Christian, a critical and satirical reconsideration of Christianity, the Bible, and God. This is episode 17: “The 5 Types of Christians.”
So, Christians. It’s a simple term to cover the apparently 2.7 billion of them that exist in the world. And to put it into perspective, the population of the world is about 8 billion people, so that means 33% (one-third) of the too-many people we have on this fragile planet are Christian. Or at least they say they are.
The number may be so high because not all Christians are the same or believe in the same things or feel the power of their Jesus in themselves equally powerfully and conduct their lives accordingly. These are the five, according to my observation, either from meeting them, or reading about them, or seeing their manifestations in generally disturbing news stories I read about them. I’ll start with the least virulent.
1. Christians in name only. These are people who have been born into a Christian family and so adopt the term Christian to describe themselves, similarly to how they adopt the family name they are given. They may not attend church services, except for the big ones which often have a component of social participation about them. A typical example would be the nominal Catholic who makes sure to attend midnight mass at Christmas time. They don’t care or believe in anything the priest is droning on about, but it’s important for them to show up for the sake of family unity (or lack of family criticism), just as it is important for the family itself to show up for the sake of social respectability.
Out of church, the Christians in name only carry on lives that are identical to or not much different from the lives of people who don’t profess adherence to any religion. Atheists, agnostics, people who live a gritty life in the world without ever thinking about God, and all the rest of it. These nominal Christians don’t hesitate or feel guilt over, say, cheating a little on their taxes, having an affair on the side, treating people poorly, and breaking the odd commandment. They appear “normal,” just as a person of no faith would appear in our secular world. Average guy. Nice woman but hates to have to dress up for church services on the weekend when she has better things to do.
There’s a wide range of how much belief they have in Christianity, but generally it hardly affects their lives at all.
2. Christians who believe but consider it just one part of their lives. These are the Christians who have true faith, who pray, who believe in the Bible or in their denomination’s rules, and generally live a good life. They don’t miss church services without a good reason, and feel guilty about it when they do. They try to be good people, as far as they can glean that from the Bible (which they may not have read or only read parts of), from the prelate at their church, and from their own common sense. They may consciously make some exceptions to Christian beliefs though, often in cases where a sense of practicality or necessity precludes them from following what the religion or their particular denomination demands. The classic example I think of here is Catholic couples who practice contraception. They may even be very modern believers who discuss sex openly with their children and, for example, arrange for their daughters to be on the pill. They either don’t know or don’t care that the Catholic Church is still pretty categorical on artificial contraception, which it calls an “intrinsic evil.”
3. Christian true believers. These are Christians who are dedicated to and observant of the rules of whatever denomination they are members of. They “take it seriously,” so to speak. If their church condemns homosexuality or gay marriage, or prohibits sexual relations of any kind before marriage, or insists on attending weekly services, or confession—and on and on, as there are so many variations among the different denominations—whatever their church prescribes (and proscribes), they make a point of finding out about it and following it diligently in their lives.
Sometimes the true believers exploit the loopholes in the rules and end up being hypocritical about one or more aspects of their life practice. Just to take the example of no sex before marriage, some consider sex to mean penile-vaginal sex, and so other sexual practices with their boyfriend or girlfriend—for example, manual stimulation (or digital insertion, or fingering as they call it on the hard streets of Realityville) is perfectly fine, as are oral and even anal sex. The important thing is not to insert the penis in the vagina, whether for the purposes of orgasm or not. That is forbidden.
4. Hardcore Christians. These are super-strict Christians and typically members of evangelical denominations. They often believe in a literal interpretation of the Bible and don’t make exceptions under any circumstances. They live in a black-and-white world where the nuances of real life in a secular country are given no credence. It’s not their religion that has to adapt to society, but the other way around. Hardcore Christians are often very judgmental as they are either unable or unwilling to consider any other outlook on religious life other than their own. Some of the crazier ones end up preaching on street corners. Or protesting abortion clinics, graphic placards held proudly and high. The less crazy are just very tightly wound and categorical. This is wrong. This is right. End of discussion.
5. Militant Christians. I hesitate to say that these are the worst of the worst, because frankly I consider them all to be deluded or beneath respect. But the militants take it to the streets, often literally. They despair at the sinful society we live in and so they often go on proselytizing campaigns, either door to door like the Mormons (whom some Christians don’t actually consider to be Christians), or at demonstrations, or wherever God’s immutable rules are seen to be broken and they think they can do something about it.
So there you go. Those are the main categories, I think. Did I leave anyone out?
And that’s all for this episode. Thanks for listening. Please check the show notes for a transcript, a list of sources, and for how to contact me. And please join me again on Monday.