So, today, as I was leaving the building after a day's teaching, my evangelical student finally comes out with the question that has been dangling from his lips like several months' worth of fetid drool.
Are you a Christian?
Of course, I replied, I'm a Unitarian.
This did not satisfy him. Unitarians are deists, and deists are bad.
Faith is more important than works, because that's what gets you into heaven. That's what Paul said.
So I said, well, I'm not very big on Paul. Actually, I mostly think he was full of himself.
But Paul is the word of God, according to my evangelical student. Everything in the Bible is the word of God.
So Paul is equal to Jesus, I ask?
No, but it's still the infallible word of God. You can tell because your conscience tells you. And, if you ask, you will find out that this line of reasoning differs from that used by Mormons or other cults in one important respect: the Mormons are wrong, and my evangelical student is not. He can tell that he's not wrong. He can feel it.
I can feel in my conscience that homosexuality is not wrong, I say. I can tell. Is there any reason why it is wrong?
Of course. God gave us AIDS to show how wrong it is. AIDS spreads so well through anal sex that you can tell AIDS exists to punish gay people.
Except lesbians, I say. Because AIDS does not spread as well through lesbian contact as through heterosexual contact. So according to his line of reasoning, lesbians are really the pinnacle of morality. God definitely approves of lesbians.
He doesn't know about that, he says. But God made a man and a woman, and they come together for a reason- to procreate.
So he doesn't believe in sex without procreation, or celibacy?
Oh yes- that's not the only reason why God created sex. But really, can't I see how this entire country is falling apart since the sexual revolution in the 60's?
Not really, I say.
He is incredulous. He doesn't even know how to respond to that, he says. I ask him to explain to me, since it is so obvious.
Well, look at the violent crime rates and how they have gone up. The government should definitely have laws against nudity, pornography, sodomy...it's very important for the government to set what is acceptable and be involved.
I consider this. I say, oh yes, and the sexual morality is even looser in Europe than here. He agrees- it's terrible! So I ask him why the violent crime rates are so much lower in Europe than in the United States.
He stops short. He doesn't know about that, he says.
Somehow the conversation turns to universal health care. I didn't bring it up. It is clear that he doesn't approve.
It is my turn to be incredulous. He doesn't believe in universal health care? After all this preaching about being Christian? Isn't being Christian about helping others and taking care of the poor?
Well, this is different, he says. He thinks it is better for the government not to get too involved with things. (Except for sodomy, which is much more important than people's health care. The government should definitely be involved in that. Sodomy is, like, official government business.)
I lambast him for about a half an hour about how un-Christian this is. He finally shows some signs of realizing that he is not making sense. This revelation may have been at least partially induced by my comment, "You're not making any sense." He promises to think about it.
The conversation goes on for a while longer, but mostly every time he can't answer one of my questions, he just sputters and then goes on about how my concience will give me the answer, but sometimes the conscience is wrong...no amount of pointing out the difficulty of this line of thinking is effective.
I leave with a promise to reread Paul so I can discover its wisdom, and I strictly instruct him to do more thinking about health care. Voting for universal health care is an opportunity to pledge his tax dollars to help those in need, I say, and he shouldn't be hoarding his money because it is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of an needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven.
I don't know, maybe I did some good. Or maybe I just elicited a lot of sputtering from a closed mind.
