Spiritual McCarthyism

Spencer Burke has an article “From the Third Floor of the Garage” at The Center for Progressive Christianity website. It introduces what I think is in fact an insightful term, “spiritual McCarthyism”. Of course, the term relates to an era in history that is not part of the experience of many of us, but for those who know what it means, the image is vivid.

Here’s a sample:

Spiritual McCarthyism…encourages people to orchestrate their lives to avoid censure and minimize risk. In short, it teaches people to live in fear – to put up and shut up. I don’t know. I guess I’m just not sure that fear, intimidation and control should be the defining hallmarks of Christianity.

He then goes and spoils it by talking about “spiritual Darwinism” when I think what he means is “social Darwinism practiced by and between religions”. But the article is still worth a look. And on a similar note, Michael Westmoreland-White recently posted about what Progressive Christianity is.

If that’s not your cup of tea, then you can always try something different – what about the cantina music from Star Wars played on the harp? [HT SF Signal] It’s actually not as far from the initial topic as might first seem to be the case – it’s a great example of how something that sounds too “out there” when you’re told about it can turn out to be pretty wonderful when you give it a chance…