Being a Stalker
A long time ago I stumbled across this BattlyCry thing, an evangelical conservative attempt to save our teenagers from the Evil One, namely, from Pop Culture. Recently while I was going through my San Francisco newspapers, which I do from time to time, I stumbled across this article. What was so appalling to me was the language used to describe the "3" different classes of Christians, seekers, student and, wait for it, STALKERS!
I understand the guys point, but for the love of God, he sounds like the evil one himself up there telling teenagers to be stalkers. Good God! It is sad to to see this, but it is the nature of our times right now, an unwillingness to dialogue, an unwillingness to listen, and unwillingness to embrace and offer our youth a way to live in love rather than hate. Lately, I have been told that the new trend in language is not to be tolerant anymore. We should not be tolerant of anyone, what we must do is be empathetic, we must be sympathetic, to the "other", to those who are different than us.
I like that, I like the sense of listening and hearing that is within that, I like the sense of striving to know something about what it is you are afraid of in the other. The guy talked about how stalkers know everything about the person they are going after and that we as Christians must have the same "passion", (Far from passion is this idea of stalking as it borders on obsession and hatred and all things evil and bad) as stalkers have when they are goining after their prey.
Stalkers do what they do to kill, stalkers do what they do to oppress, stalkers do what they do to humiliate others. I guess I shouldn't be surprised that a radical conservative Christian is doing all this, he is right, most of these people are so out there, so obsessed, so filled with desire for power and so afraid, they are nothing more than stalkers, seeking to humiliate, oppress and even kill.
What is our response then? How do we respond to such hatred? Clearly a restraining order will do no good, forgiveness won't work with people who will not listen, what is our response?
I saw 300 last night, the very movie that this group is trying to discourage, by the way, don't take kids 16 or under to see it, mostly cause of the sex scenes, they were a little much and the whole training a kid to be a warrior and killer thing was a lot too, anyway, as the Persians bear down on the Spartans, King Leonidas faces Xerxes one last time, and in that scene comes to understand how he and his men had been betrayed. He looks at the one who betrayed him, a character who betrayed him for gold, women and glory, Leonidas looks at his betrayer and says, "I hope you live forever." In that moment, the character knows what he has done, understands why Leonidas had to reject him in the first place and how his decisions have brought down powerful and just men.
How can we stand in the face of death, in the face of such hatred and respond as Leonidas did, offering salvation, offering love, offering freedom to those who would kill us, kill people who are different from them. Leonidas died in the end, Christ died in the end, we are afraid to die, we are even afraid to simply stand up and refute such awful claims on Christ and Scripture. The newspapers can do it, the Ann Coulters and others of the television world can do it, we will sit idly by and watch as this evil man corrupts our youth and destroys their future with nothing but empty promises of hatred.
What will we do?
A+
I understand the guys point, but for the love of God, he sounds like the evil one himself up there telling teenagers to be stalkers. Good God! It is sad to to see this, but it is the nature of our times right now, an unwillingness to dialogue, an unwillingness to listen, and unwillingness to embrace and offer our youth a way to live in love rather than hate. Lately, I have been told that the new trend in language is not to be tolerant anymore. We should not be tolerant of anyone, what we must do is be empathetic, we must be sympathetic, to the "other", to those who are different than us.
I like that, I like the sense of listening and hearing that is within that, I like the sense of striving to know something about what it is you are afraid of in the other. The guy talked about how stalkers know everything about the person they are going after and that we as Christians must have the same "passion", (Far from passion is this idea of stalking as it borders on obsession and hatred and all things evil and bad) as stalkers have when they are goining after their prey.
Stalkers do what they do to kill, stalkers do what they do to oppress, stalkers do what they do to humiliate others. I guess I shouldn't be surprised that a radical conservative Christian is doing all this, he is right, most of these people are so out there, so obsessed, so filled with desire for power and so afraid, they are nothing more than stalkers, seeking to humiliate, oppress and even kill.
What is our response then? How do we respond to such hatred? Clearly a restraining order will do no good, forgiveness won't work with people who will not listen, what is our response?
I saw 300 last night, the very movie that this group is trying to discourage, by the way, don't take kids 16 or under to see it, mostly cause of the sex scenes, they were a little much and the whole training a kid to be a warrior and killer thing was a lot too, anyway, as the Persians bear down on the Spartans, King Leonidas faces Xerxes one last time, and in that scene comes to understand how he and his men had been betrayed. He looks at the one who betrayed him, a character who betrayed him for gold, women and glory, Leonidas looks at his betrayer and says, "I hope you live forever." In that moment, the character knows what he has done, understands why Leonidas had to reject him in the first place and how his decisions have brought down powerful and just men.
How can we stand in the face of death, in the face of such hatred and respond as Leonidas did, offering salvation, offering love, offering freedom to those who would kill us, kill people who are different from them. Leonidas died in the end, Christ died in the end, we are afraid to die, we are even afraid to simply stand up and refute such awful claims on Christ and Scripture. The newspapers can do it, the Ann Coulters and others of the television world can do it, we will sit idly by and watch as this evil man corrupts our youth and destroys their future with nothing but empty promises of hatred.
What will we do?
A+
Comments
I'm with you on the idea of listening to others with whom we differ....and on the value of stiving to know something about what we're afraid of in the other. That's so relevant and important. My own experiences lead me to believe that so many people who are critical of people with differing positions from theirs think they know as much as they need to know about those other positions but really have so little understanding of what these people are about, what makes them tick, and how the world fits together in their view. If we aren't working to understand these things about those with whom we differ, how can we hope to move beyond unproductive battles (physical or semantic) or coerced compliance with the agenda of whoever is able to muster and effectively manipulate the most power?