what I had in common with Jerry Falwell

Most of the google-driven hits on this blog are a search for the phrase "christian environmentalist." I find this encouraging, because it wasn't that long ago that this phrase was, in the minds of most people, a paradox. The growth in the past few years of a rising tide of Christian environmentalists is just one of many signs of how the face of American Christianity is changing. But I felt that change more powerfully than usual yesterday, when I heard about the death of Jerry Falwell.

I've never been a fan of Falwell, neither his preaching nor his politics. When I was a student at Sweet Briar College, just fifteen miles from his home and the seat of his Liberty University in Lynchburg (which we jokingly called Jerrytown), I was occasionally fascinated and more often repulsed by the hold that his opinions and charisma seemed to have over many in the community. I even attended his church once, just to see what the attraction was about. But I couldn't see it. I was, in fact, so disgusted by the experience that I walked out in the middle of the sermon, although I can't remember now why. I was a college student then, and even more opinionated and idealistic (if it's possible) than I am now.

But hearing of his death, I was surprised by my own reaction. I was touched, and even a little saddened. Not because I'll miss his voice or his opinions in any political or theological arena--I doubt he's ever said anything I really agreed with. But, well, perhaps simply because he was a person, and despite my general dislike of him, his death made me recognize what I do have in common with him. It made me think, too, that our commonalities might be even bigger than the obvious fact of our humanity.

Falwell was the founder of the Moral Majority and one of the leading voices that paved the way for the marriage between evangelical Christianity and politics. The danger of this marriage is easy to see in retrospect, especially in light of some of Falwell's own remarks about it. (His infamous comments about 9/11 come to mind.) But are my own political remarks really so different?

I like to think that my political positions are founded on love and concern and not on laws. But the truth remains that much of my thinking is based on the desire to apply what I believe theologically in the political realm. This is a necessary activity, and an important one, but it is also inherently dangerous.

The danger is not just that we will fall into judgment based on what seems to us to be the clear dividing lines of political righteousness. The greater danger is that we will begin to believe that there is, even in some small way, salvation in any political or environmental or human solution. The danger is that we as Christians will forget where our true loyalty lies, and think of ourselves as citizens of a country--or a planet--instead of a Kingdom.

Father Stephen writes in his post on this subject of a moment that heralded the end of a different era, that of Soviet Russia:

Shortly before the fall of the Soviet Union, on one of the days in which the Politburo stood atop Lenin’s Tomb to watch the parade of Soviet military might pass by, a priest came bursting through the crowd with a handcross in his hand. He shouted, “Michail Sergeivich! Christos Voskrese!” And he was not shot or hampered in any way. It was the signal of a change in that regime.

There are still plenty of politics in America’s religion, and plenty of religion in America’s politics. There is far too little proclamation to George W. and anyone else in power, “Christ is risen!” Or a recognition by our culture of the significance of the statement.

But Christ is risen, the significance does not depend on anyone’s recognition. Christ is risen, and everything else has passed into shadow beneath the power of the Cross.

And this is the true message of Christian environmentalism, as it is the glorious message of every Christian. Christ is risen, and all things are changed. Christ is risen, and the world is redeemed. Christ is risen, and we are honored with the task of working out that redemption in our lives, in our neighbor's lives, and in the life of the world.