The Revolting is Christ

The Revolting is Christ January 18, 2017

Celestine Ngulube / Public Domain
Celestine Ngulube / Public Domain

 

Twice today, I’ve received messages criticizing my writing. The first said that persons who are attracted to or intimate with animals are revolting and that I was revolting for writing about them. The person also said that they should be given an express ticket for hell. The second person was a little subtler. Initially, they told me that my writing was too provocative. Then, they told me that calling Chelsea Manning the Transgender Christ was revolting. Towards the end of the message, they told me how revolting I was. While I get these types of dumbass messages all the time, I was inspired to think deeper about them today.

 

Not long after the shooting in Dallas, I was approached by the editor of a publication that I’d been writing for for a considerable amount of time. In the phone conversation, I was told that my writing was too revolting for their audience. Most of the time, I just let these encounters roll off and I keep on going. Honestly, I hadn’t even thought about that chicken shit publication again until today. After reading the two comments mentioned earlier, I immediately recalled what the editor of the publication said. Between the comments and the editor’s words, I realized that the construction of revolting was the core principle of my theology. Christ is in our ideas of the revolting and we cannot be saved without going there.

 

Christ speaks to the revolting. In Matthew 25, we are told that the marginalized and oppressed are the only vehicle for an encounter with Christ. The marginalized and oppressed will always be the most revolting amongst us. People talk about praying and reading their Bibles all the time. If you really want to know Christ, you’re going to have to get much dirtier than that. The revolting is both our revolution and our salvation.

 

 

Amen.


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