Happy Thanksgiving! And the holidays and Christian Humanism (or, I John 4:12 and the Greatest Commandment)

So, Jessica Smith and The Poetry Foundation Blog have got me thinking about the kind of Christianity I could really embrace. Jessica mentioned that she’s not religious, but that the verse “No one has seen God at any time; if we love one another, God abides in us, and His love is perfected in us” ( I John 4:12) pretty much sums up what a religion should be about.
Ange Mlinko on the Harriet Blog talked about how Auden got in trouble with Christian friends and Rationalist friends alike for valuing the commandment “Love your neighbor as you love yourself” above the rest of the cannon or the Church (which, as Ange points out, Jesus said in a related verse could be used to replace entire Old Testament Law.)
These days, Christianity has a terrible rep in America, as a bunch of smug, self-righteous people trying to start another set of crusades (cough, President, cough.) But I think of back when I read the Bible myself at 12 or 13 (complete with rainbows and Jesus-hugging-sheep pictures!) that I was really struck with I John 4:12, and that I thought, that is really a God I could picture and get behind, a God who, crazy as it sounds, is love. I think the verse in I John goes onto say something about “God is love. He who does not love does not know God…he who does not love his brother, whom he has seen, cannot love God, whom he has not seen.” (This is a paraphrase, I don’t have it memorized.) It really puts that religious stuff in perspective – listen, if we can’t get be kind and stuff to all the crazy people around us (our families included – and they’re the craziest of all, usually) then we don’t have any business going around saying how much we love God.
In high school my Honors European History class studied Christian Humanism, and several pieces of work by Erasmus (In Praise of Folly was a really witty piece of writing I still enjoy reading) and Blaise Pascal. Like Auden, they were intelligent, educated people who didn’t believe the Church was really acting for the good of the average person, and encouraged people to 1. think for themselves, read the Bible for themselves, which was pretty radical in the 1500’s etc. and 2. do that thing where you love your neighbor instead of doing a lot of religious rituals.
Hmm. Must be all the Christmas music in the air, but that all sounds good to me. I’m basically a selfish person, and tend to forget that the people around me (the slow person in line, or the idiot weaving over both lanes going 40 in a 55 mph zone) are real people, with internal lives and struggles, just as valuable as me. It would be good for me to remember more often that the best way to be a spiritual person is just to be decent to the person next to me.

Pshaw. What will happen to my Villainess reputation if I keep up this kind of talk. Bah Humbug I say! Poison apples (and pumpkins) for all!

Plus, I just got done watching A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving. If that doesn’t make you all sentimenal for your high school history theology-studying days, I don’t know what will.