Citizenship Confusion: Wearing Our Faith

Last updated on: March 21, 2011 at 1:03 pm by Alan Noble

Every Monday in Citizenship Confusion, Alan Noble discusses how we confuse our heavenly citizenship with citizenship to the state, culture, and the world.

Can you believe that Christ Pop Culture has been around for going on four years? If you’re new to the site you probably can. But for those of us who’ve been around since the beginning, it is kind of strange to think how many posts we have published. A number of our old posts dealt with “citizenship confusion” even though I was not writing this column at the time. And so, occasionally I intend to highlight some of these older posts, particularly for readers who have only been with us for the year two.

Most Christians feel the need or desire to standout, to differentiate themselves from the world, to show that they have a different and superior citizenship. One way some choose to do this is by wearing clothing or buying bumper stickers which explicitly identify us as Christians, conservatives, or at least those who support the Christian “worldview.” But not all citizenships are the same, and some kinds require distinct or particular methods of communicating or establishing citizenship.

In response to this, I wrote an article entitled Wearing Our Faith in February 2008. In this post, I question the ways Christians identify and label themselves in order to stand out as Christians. Is there any benefit to wearing T-shirts that identify us as Christians? How should we demonstrate our heavenly citizenship?