Two Decades of Christian Deconstruction: 70 Commonly Held Positions I Reject Outright

I continue to affirm every last tenet of the Apostles’ Creed and the Nicene Creed without qualification or reservation. In fact, my faith is more centered there than ever with a recent pivot toward the Rule of Faith. That being said, after two decades of intensive historical and theological study I’ve done a ton of deconstruction and reconstruction. There’s a lot of commonly assumed positions that I now reject outright and have had to replace. As a precursor to a whole slew of forthcoming articles unpacking each, here’s the streamlined list of 70:

1. A whole worldview piously built upon the foundation of a logical fallacy: false dichotomy.
2. The disjointed separation of our emotional, intellectual, spiritual, physical, and social lives.
3. Fundamentalism, including both its conservative and progressive forms.
4. Christendom.
5. Christian Primitivism.
6. The Culture Wars.
7. The Prosperity Gospel.
8. The Greco-Roman interpretative lens of Classical Theism.
9. Each of the five Protestant solae.
10. Biblicism, the Perspicuity of Scripture, and proof-texting.
11. Reader-Response Criticism in biblical studies.
12. Biblical inerrancy and infallibility.
13. Every last facet of Dispensationalism.
14. Each of the five points of Calvinism + its understanding of Common Grace.
15. Each of the five rebuttal points of Arminianism + its understanding of Prevenient Grace.
16. The Holiness Movement en masse.
17. The Wesleyan Quadrilateral.
18. An ordinance understanding of baptism and communion.
19. Any of the common Western (i.e. Catholic + Protestant) conceptions of hell.
20. The standard understandings of sin and righteousness.
21. Seeing salvation as a one-time experience instead of an ongoing process.
22. All Western conceptions of Original Sin.
23. Patriarchy, complementarianism, and the whole “biblical womanhood” thing.
24. Any of the precepts stemming from 20th century Pentecostal or Charismatic spirituality.
25. Oppressive optimism (or what Brené Brown calls “toxic positivity“).
26. Patriotism and nationalism.
27. Any and all intermingling with American civil religion or other nationalistic religions.
28. The distrust of “big government” inexplicably applies to everything but the U.S. military.
29. Traditionalism generally, but especially in its Roman Catholic expression.
30. The increasing rejection of civility from both the Christian Right and Christian Left.
31. Just War Theory.
32. Young Earth Creationism.
33. What my friend, The Hippie Theologian, calls “Plantation Christianity.”
34. Sectarianism/Denominationalism.
35. Anti-ritualism.
36. Anti-clericalism.
37. Anti-intellectualism.
38. Anti-environmentalism.
39. Legalism.
40. Teetotalism.
41. Pietism.
42. Neo-Gnosticism.
43. Expressive individualism, especially as applied to a “personal relationship with God.”
44. The de facto prioritization of what is “right” over what is “healthy.”
45. The cultural expectation of unquestioning loyalty and submission to spiritual authority.
46. The cultural expectation of nice-ness.
47. All of the misguided cultural values bullshit covered in Jesus and John Wayne.
48. Populism and its anti-pluralism.
49. The frequent rejection of personal evangelism on the Christian Left.
50. The typical rejection of social justice on the Christian Right.
51. Xenophobia.
52. Homophobia.
53. The knee-jerk reluctance to talk about socio-economic differences and classism.
54. The instinctive tendency to downplay, dismiss, denigrate, or defend in-house abuse.
55. Using legal tactics to protect Christian institutions rather than transparency and repentance.
56. Christianese.
57. The blanket condemnation of colorful language.
58. Musical worship and oratory that’s anthropocentric and/or emotionally manipulative.
59. The Purity Culture and every other element of sex-negative Christian sexual ethics.
60. Fear of any and all religious syncretism.
61. Uncritical alignment with capitalism.
62. Premarital sex is always wrong.
63. Polygamy is always wrong.
64. Prioritization of the secular nation of Israel over the well-being of Palestinian Christians.
65. Perceiving the Gospel through the implicit lens of Honor-Shame Culture.
66. The absolute Modernist deconstruction when the Higher Criticisms go too far.
67. The inconsistent ethics of life almost across the board.
68. The multiplicity of fucked up ways the Church handles divorce.
69. The endemic embrace of postmodern “personal truth.”
70. The widespread lack of an explicit theological deliberative process to address issues.

But, ya know, other than that it ain’t so bad…

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Addendum

Well, crap for crap. After publishing I thought of a handful more:

71. The inability to distinguish between détente and shalom during interpersonal conflict.

72. The whole “forgive and forget” mentality.

73. Puritanicalism, by which I mean the propensity toward purity without compromise.

74. The inability to distinguish “religious freedom” from “Christian privilege.”

75. The oh-so-convenient habit of Christians casting Jesus in their own image.

76. The lingering stigma around mental health.

77. The social expectation of “in-house”-ism where conflict is always handled in-house.

78. Church leaders seem to feel empowered to protect abusers but not their victims.

79. The spiritual choice between Modernist objectivity and Postmodernist subjectivity.

80. The separation of Jesus from all culpability of things done by “the Bride of Christ.”

81. The belief that appearances are what matters most.