Over the years I have heard it all about Jesus. We have been told that Jesus is a socialist. Jesus is a greenie. Jesus is a pacifist. Jesus is a feminist. Jesus is an anti-nukes campaigner. Jesus would bless same-sex marriages. Jesus would approve of heroin injecting rooms. Jesus would favour euthanasia.
So when a new play opens in America claiming Jesus is a pro-abortion activist, I guess we should not be surprised. Indeed, we have managed to turn Jesus into a wimpy, limp-wristed, tree-hugging hippy whose only contribution to the world was to inspire the Beatles’ to sing “All You Need Is Love”.
Indeed, if we now have mega-evangelical leaders making it onto the cover of Time magazine, promoting a book which argues that there is no hell and everyone will in the end go to heaven, then you know that the feminisation or emasculation of Jesus is pretty well complete.
We have managed to totally strip Jesus of any divine attributes, such as holiness, righteousness, and majesty, and turned him into a poster boy for every trendy new activist cause. Jesus the conquering king who comes wielding a sword, his garments dripping in blood as he judges the unrepentant nations as recorded in Revelation, has been replaced with a Jesus who wouldn’t harm a fly and thinks everything and everyone is just really neat.
Thus we have transformed Jesus into more of a pacifist than Ghandi, more of a communist than Lenin, more of a global warming alarmist than Al Gore, and more of a gay blade than Elton John. We have remade Jesus into our own secular trendy image. He has now become all things to all men.
Of course when we engage in such radical redefinition, we are destroying the Jesus of history, the Jesus of the Bible, and the Jesus who created the world and who will one day judge the world. Instead of Jesus sitting in judgment over us, we are now sitting in judgment over Jesus, making him whatever we want him to be.
But let’s get back to this pro-abortion play. This is how the New York Times covers the story of playwright Theresa Rebeck: “In a first, the English and theater departments at the University of Delaware gave Ms. Rebeck a $50,000 commission last year (the funds came from a private foundation) to write a play blending American history and contemporary issues. She has produced ‘O Beautiful,’ a satirical look at the politics of the Tea Party, Glenn Beck and the failed Senate candidate Christine O’Donnell, as dramatized through the abortion story and a related, fictitious incident of bullying at a high school. The university’s Resident Ensemble Players, a professional Equity company, will perform the play on campus from Wednesday to May 15.”
The article continues, “‘O Beautiful’ also deals with suicide, date rape, gun rights, the founding fathers and, of course, abortion — in a subplot starting with the first scene, in which a pregnant teenager, Alice, seeks counsel from Jesus Christ, who wanders through the high school and characters’ homes without explanation. Jesus, rendered as sympathetic to everyone irrespective of their politics, reaches a provocative conclusion when Alice, who has been raped, asks where in the Bible he opposes abortion.
“Alice: Did you ever say, ‘I’m Jesus, and I say that stupid girls who let guys talk them into going to the back seat of their cars have to have babies?’ Did you say that ever?
Jesus: No.
Alice: All you talk about is, be nice to each other! You never said nobody’s allowed to have an abortion.
Jesus: No.
Alice: So can I? Can I? Can I?
Jesus: Honestly, I — I don’t really have an issue with it.”
So there you go folks: Jesus “doesn’t have an issue” with the slaughter of the innocents. He couldn’t give a rip about abortion. He has no interest in the sanctity of human life. Instead he is just a trendy pro-choicer, who probably votes for the Greens, wears a Che Guevara t-shirt, and marches around with a sign saying “Land rights for lesbian whales”.
Interestingly, the playwright was raised Roman Catholic and is in fact a graduate of Notre Dame. Of course this institution of higher learning once used to be known as a fine Catholic school. Perhaps not so much anymore, one suspects.
The article concludes this way: “‘Part of the university’s mission is to provoke thought and debate,’ Mr. Robbins [the University of Delaware’s theater department chairman] said. ‘And even people who may disapprove of her Jesus will see, I hope, that this is a loving, caring Jesus’.”
Yep, here we go again: the “loving, caring Jesus”. We have heard so much about him lately. He is the same loving, caring Jesus who would never send anyone to hell as Rob Bell informs us (even though he spoke more about hell than anyone else in Scripture).
He is the same loving, caring Jesus who would be a card-carrying Obama supporter, as socialist activists like Jim Wallis insist. He is the same loving, caring Jesus who would support Marxist dictatorships around the world, who would support one-child policies and carbon taxes, who would join in gay pride marches, and who would celebrate the legalisation of all drugs.
Yes that is our new, improved loving, caring PC Jesus. But for what it is worth, I think I will stick to the Jesus of the Bible, thanks. He is far more radical, revolutionary and earth-shaking as found in Scripture, than all the modern white-washed – and heretical – versions of him put together.
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/14/theater/theresa-rebecks-play-o-beautiful-at-university-of-delaware.html?ref=abortion
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