Over the last 11 years, I’ve been going through the painful process of Deconstruction. And make no mistake: It IS a painful process. Losing faith means losing friends, fellowship and yes, sometimes even family along the way. This is not easy. Which is why recent reactions to some of the more high-profile Christians who have questioned their faith or walked away entirely have been painful to watch. Like this clip where the lead singer for a B-list Christian “Rock” band... Read more
It’s quite disturbing to me that so many Christian churches today are continually fixated on how sinful we all are. They constantly remind us that we are unworthy and that our sins are filthy and that this keeps us separated from God. But then, in the very same breath, they will remind us that Jesus is the “Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the World.” So, which is it? I mean, if the Good News of... Read more
“In the case of fundamentalist beliefs, people expect that choosing to leave a childhood faith is like giving up Santa Claus – a little sad, but basically a matter of “growing up.” “But religious indoctrination can be hugely damaging, and making the break from an authoritarian kind of religion can definitely be traumatic. It involves a complete upheaval of a person’s construction of reality, including the self, other people, life, the future, everything. “People unfamiliar with it, including therapists, have... Read more
In response to my comment: “If you would shoot your enemy in the head, you might not be a Christian”, I recently received a few deeply disturbing responses, like: “Bulls**t!” “Keith Giles is soooo wrong” and my favorite one: “This Keith Giles is a gut-shooter, not a head-shooter, a dumb-ass playing games.” [Nice].It starts to make you wonder, “How can Christians who follow the One who said ‘Love your enemies’ respond to my comment in this way?” Are they unaware of... Read more
Reason #2 – Christians in America don’t know what makes you a Christian I think the second reason that some Christians are so mean – or act nothing like Jesus – is because we evangelize people the wrong way. By that I mean that we tell people that they are “Christians” if they have prayed the “Sinner’s Prayer”. NOTE: This “Sinner’s Prayer” appears nowhere in the Bible, by the way. It’s just something we made up to make... Read more
It happens far too often. A few weeks ago my non-Christian friend shared with me a story about someone she knows who was turned away from a local church and asked to leave the property because it “looked bad” that she was crying in front of their building. Of course, the woman’s daughter was missing, she was close to losing her apartment due to HUD restrictions limiting her ability to care for her grand daughter, and she needed help with food... Read more
In this final section of the interview, my friend, Thomas Crisp and I talk about the Protestant confusion of the Gospel of the Atonement versus actually following Jesus daily. ** KEITH: The whole thing with the Isaiah House is really a blessing. I love what you and Chase and AJ and others are doing to just spend time with the people there on Sunday mornings to share breakfast and listen to them and befriend them. It’s so beautiful. If I... Read more
In this section of our interview, my friend, Biola Professor Thomas Crisp and I get very personal and practical and discuss the differences between sharing and giving. ** KEITH: In Western culture we think it’s about giving more. We think of writing checks but I think it’s really more about what we’d call sharing that Jesus is wants. It’s not just giving money apart from relationship with those who are poor. Really, I think it’s knowing their names and understanding... Read more
Part 1 of our dialog ended with me asking Biola Philosophy Professor Thomas Crisp an important question about what Jesus was asking us as His followers to give up and how far we should take this idea. Before we get around to discussing that, Thomas and I took a tangent first.** KEITH: Before we get into that, I wanted to first touch on something that you and I talked about a few months ago about what happened in the early... Read more
My good friend Thomas Crisp is a professor of Philosophy at Biola University. We became friends because we share a similar passion for issues of justice and following Christ into community with the poor. Recently, Thomas wrote an influential philosophy paper entitled “Jesus and Affluence” which I was fortunate enough to read. After considering the arguments in this paper, I asked Thomas if he would agree to an interview where we could discuss the paper in a more conversational manner... Read more
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