The Casual Christian

 “I will not continue to look on you with displeasure. For I am merciful,’ says the Lord. ‘I will not be angry with you forever. However, you must confess that you have done wrong, and that you have rebelled against the Lord your God. You must confess that you have given yourself to foreign gods under every green tree, and have not obeyed my commands”
(Jer 3:12–13).

The late Democratic Senator from New York, Patrick Moynihan, coined the phrase “Defining Deviance Down” to describe the process by which the most abhorrent behaviors gradually become acceptable as they become more commonplace. In the Christian context, we might call this process “defining disobedience down.” It is a phenomenon all too common among followers of God. Take the ancient Israelites, for example. They were commanded by God not to take wives from the peoples they conquered, yet as they fraternized with the surrounding nations, they relaxed their standards, taking foreign wives and abandoning the worship of God for the worship of foreign idols. Today the ease with which we offer absolution for sins that God condemns in Scripture is prima facie evidence of our cavalier attitude towards the Word of God.

No Strings Attached?

In the movie, The Other Man, Liam Neeson plays the role of a British husband, Peter, who discovers his wife, Lisa, had been carrying on an affair with another man for twelve years. He becomes obsessed with finding the man. He uses his wife’s email account to establish contact with Ralph, the lover.  Peter tracks Ralph to a chess hall and pumps him for information as they play chess day after day. The lover holds nothing back as he delves into all the intimate details of his relationship with Peter’s wife. For all his pretensions to wealth and status, Ralph turns out to be a janitor in a luxury apartment complex.

Again posing as his wife, Peter emails Ralph to request a meeting. Elated, Ralph hurries to the restaurant only to meet Peter who tells him Lisa will not show up because she died of cancer nine months ago. He knows this because he is her husband. In a veiled attempt to humiliate him in front of his friends, Peter graciously offers Ralph the chance to hold a reception in her honor at his expense. The guests show up, and Ralph gives a glowing eulogy to Lisa. When Peter stands, he starts to expose Ralph as a charlatan. However, his daughter steps forward to intercede on Ralph’s behalf. Peter thinks better of his plan and instead offers a toast to his deceased wife. Everyone breathes a sigh of relief and Peter releases the burden of hate that has consumed him.

Today’s Christians would celebrate this scene as a wonderful example of forgiveness. Peter resolved his anger and Ralph received grace. The fact that Ralph was an unrepentant adulterer doesn’t matter. I am certainly not saying that Peter would have been justified in humiliating Ralph, but the indignant attitude of an adulterer who considered himself the offended party and the breathtaking deceit of a woman who carried on a double lifestyle for twelve years show a blatant disregard for all norms of justice and morality. This is the value neutral, non-judgmental environment of postmodernism which our culture has been fostering for a generation and which has now engulfed the Christian community. It manifests itself in Christian circles through the lack of emphasis on repentance and sorrow for sin, which used to be a prerequisite for forgiveness.

As for Peter, the closing scene of the movie pictured him and his daughter sitting on a bench at the train station musing over their wife and mother. What was the father’s conclusion? “She never really did know us, did she?” Perhaps that is what the Lord will say about those who have never admitted their transgressions, “They never really knew me, did they?”

 The Casual Christian pp. 85-86