I don't have to be wounded to not be xian

an interesting observation from today's clinical pastoral seminar. at 1 point after having, on the advice of my wife--who is pretty keen about these sorts of thing--come out to my seminarmates about not being a xian, 1 of them, in response to 1 of my proposed learning goals about being better able to be with xians in prayer and christlanguage, made a comment suggesting she understood my having been wounded by xianity.

and I don't think she meant it this way but I think the unspoken assumption that lay behind her comment was unless I'd been wounded I would see the truth of xianity. I haven't, as it happens, been wounded by xianity, certainly not as much as some people have and not the way some xians who have decided to remain with it have been. while I should applaud the recognition she had that some people can be harmed by what she sees as the ultimate good thing, what it also suggests is an inability to recognize that someone can be faced with the best aspects of xian practice and thought and still, definitely, refuse to accept them. my take on xianity is that, like mark twain's definition of golf as a good walk spoiled, xianity takes a good teacher, jesus, and adds more bricolage to his shoulders than any human should have to bear. whoever or however many people jesus may have been he or she or they could only be human since other than plant and animal and mineral life that's all we've ever seen and I'm not about to ascribe causation to the invisible ghost someone else sees in the room. I don't have to be wounded by the invisible ghost to decide I don't believe in it.