The Man in the Middle
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The Man in the Middle |
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Christians on both sides of the political spectrum might do
well to consider how Jesus was crucified between two thieves, one on the right,
the other
on the left. As the crowd mocked them, one thief defended
Jesus. It was that "good" thief to whom Jesus said "today you will be with me in
paradise."
The Bible doesn't tell us whether "the good thief" was on
Jesus' right or left . But it does tell us that Jesus was "the man in the
middle",
and that the men on the left and the right were both thieves.
The only difference was, one admitted it. Fascist and Communist alike
have used religion in the past to further their agendas,
and probably always will. Imagine government as a circle. It doesn't
matter if you
begin drawing from left or right. When the circle is
complete,both directions meet at the starting point, an authoritarian form
of government.
Would you rather have lived in Hitler's Germany or Stalin's
USSR? I would imagine most people would answer, as I would, "neither".
Both were tyrannical dictatorships and public, or even
private, dissent could land you in prison or worse. When we cling to the belief
that "the left is right and the right is always wrong", or
vice versa, aren't both sides guilty of "stealing" the other side's Jesus like
two
thieves and molding him in our political image? Colombian priest
and Marxist revolutionary, Father
Camilo Torres Restrepo was
known for his quote, "If Jesus were alive today, He would be a
guerrillero." Contrast the far left Jesus, and their
brand of
Christianity to that on the far right professed by
Anders Behring Breivik, the
Norway killer, whose Facebook page
listed
his religious beliefs as simply "Christian" and his political views as
"Conservative".
Folk singer Pete Seeger asked in his version of the old
Florence Reece song, "Which Side Are You On?"
As for me, occasionally, it's both. I'll confess that
although more often than not, I lean to the left politically, ,
but sometimes I find myself agreeing
with the likes of
Pat Buchanan or even,
(heaven forbid) Glenn
Beck.
As Arkansas writer Cliff Jackson
stated in his book
"Childhood's Rend: Memories of the Dog Star",
"Even a blind hog finds an acorn now and then."
