It’s not surprising to me that a mainstream liberal newspaper, the New York Times, would publish an op-ed on Christmas Eve that assumes the reality of Jesus as the son of God. There are of course endless lessons one can draw from this myth, and the NYT has always been soft on religion. Remember the op-ed column by Anglican minister Tish Harrison Warren, in which we were subject to a weekly dose of anodyne pap? (The paper apparently ditched her after a while.)
But today we get an essay from Peter Wehner that, to me, seems arrantly stupid in its very thesis. For that thesis is that IF you believe in Jesus’s genealogy, and IF you think that one’s genealogy beyond one’s parents could be a source of shame, THEN you could draw lessons from the story of Jesus as told in the Bible. Every one of these links is weak, and yet the paper published the essay anyway. I’ll give a few quotes below (click below to read the article, or find it archived here, but don’t bother):
Wehner was impressed by a semon her heard at a Baptist Church, and simply draws on its content to show that Jesus was amazing in overcoming his lineage:
One of the forgotten facts of the story of Jesus’ life is that he came from a profoundly dysfunctional family.
I was reminded of this while listening to a sermon this month at Groveton Baptist Church in Alexandria, Va. Chris Davis, the pastor of the church, took as his text the first 17 verses of the Gospel of Matthew, known as the genealogy of Jesus. Those verses, a long list of names that ties one generation to another, are often skipped over in favor of the story of Jesus’ birth. To the degree that they have any meaning at all, it’s usually because for Christians it establishes Jesus as the heir to the promises God made to Abraham and David.
But as the pastor pointed out, Jesus came down to us through broken families: “one generation begetting brokenness of another generation begetting brokenness of another generation begetting brokenness of another generation.” There were murderers, adulterers, prostitutes and people who committed incest, liars, schemers and idolaters.
Now I’ve forgotten my New Testament (yes, I read it), but I’m not sure how broken Jesus’s fictional ancestry was. But let’s assume it was pretty screwed up. From that Wehner ()and Davis) draw the following conclusions, all based on assuming the truth of the New Testament). I’ve indented the quotes; bolding is mine:
1.) The disreputable lineage of Jesus reminds us of something else as well: Past is not prologue. If Jesus himself came from a line of murderers, adulterers, cheats and frauds, the Rev. Scott Dudley, senior pastor at Bellevue Presbyterian Church in Bellevue, Wash., told me, “then there is hope for all of us. He’s a cycle-breaker showing that generations of dysfunction don’t have to be predictive of future events.
The next lesson is pretty much the same:
2.) A Jesus who showed up from nowhere, fully grown and without ancestry, might have too. The actual Jesus, though, shows us something different. We are not our bloodlines or our family histories.
And the lesson in wokeness:
3.) But Jesus’ awareness of broken lives wasn’t restricted to his family tree; it defined his ministry. He identified with the least and the lowliest, not just those in his lineage but those in his life.
4.) The genealogy of Jesus is also a story of radical inclusion. Several of the women listed in the first chapter of Matthew are Gentiles [non Jews]. This incorporation has significance, according to Craig Barnes, a former president of Princeton Theological Seminary.
And that’s about it. Is there anything new here except to draw lessons from a work of fiction? Those lessons, in fact, are purely made up, and the last two are simply wrong. Yes, you could couch Jesus as a Social Justice Warrior, who included everyone in his great love, except for the fact that he stated that he himself was the only way to get to heaven. Remember John 14:6 in the King James Bible?
Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me.
That alone should dispel the idea that Jesus’s teachings were inclusive, for what about all those nonbelievers outside of the Middle East who had no opportunity to accept Jesus. Further, Christian theology tells us that these were tainted by Original Sin, and, as unrepentant sinners, were doomed to fry for eternity in Hell.
Yes, what we have here is a believer cherry-picking Scripture to tell us something that everybody knows (if some of your ancestors—but not your parents!—were dysfunctional, you can overcome that); as well as telling us something that isn’t true (Jesus’s love extended to everyone), But yes, it’s the Christmas season, and it’s grinch-y to even say that Jesus might not really have been the wonder-working Son of God.
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Well, of course the MSM has always been soft on religion, adhering, even if atheistic, to “belief in belief”. What bothers me is that one aspect of my own ideology, which is opposition to the performative and ineffectual forms of wokeness, is also getting soft on religion. I’m not referring to right-wing media like Fox News, which of course won’t go after religion, but to the liberal form of anti-wokeness. Like this article that just appeared in the Free Press (click to read). In some ways this one is worse than above, for it demonstrates the regret of a mother (the author) for not having imbued her children with more of the Jesus-y aspects of Christianity. And that despite the fact that author Larissa Phillips (founder of the Volunteer Literacy Project) and her husband are atheists. (This article isn’t fully archived.)
The thesis here is that yes, Christmas is a great time to get together with family, celebrate in traditional ways by opening presents, having a big feed, and socializing with others. But this still leaves a God-shaped hole in one’s persona. Now a mother with kids in her twenties, Phillips regrets not having injected more traditional religion into her kids’ upbringing. And remember, she and her partner are atheists. What gives?
Of all the treasures that came out of the cardboard box of Christmas decorations every December of my childhood, the nativity set was the best. Joseph, Mary, the kings, the shepherds: Our tiny figures were made of clay with a white glaze that looked like icing. I treated them like delicate, special dolls, rearranging them and moving them around the living room, from the coffee table to the stereo console, to the mantle. I might add a blanket for the baby, sometimes a scarf for Mary, cut from scraps of velvet or felt.
These are experiences that my own children, who are now 21 and 25, never had. Their father and I are atheists who, without debate, raised them entirely without religion. At Christmas, we still did the tree and the lights and the presents—all the secular parts of the holiday—and my kids knew the Christmas story, the way they knew about Greek myths. But there were no religious symbols in our home, and no going to church. In recent years, I’ve begun to regret this.
Apparently problems arise if you bring up your kids without Jesus. One of those problems is the Santa myth:
But right away, there were problems with secular Christmas, and they got worse every year.
Santa Claus, for example. If you’ve decided to raise your children without God because you are into truth and reason and rationality, are you going to tell them that Santa Claus is real? And refuse to budge even when your kids become stout little rationalists demanding answers? I thought it was bizarre to lie to your children, but by the time they started asking difficult questions, we were committed to Christmas. We went half in on the Santa delusion, referring to Santa with a wink.
Yes, but kids stop believing in Santa after a while, and you don’t see Santa-believers doing bad stuff to others. This isn’t always the case with Christians. And then there is the Present Problem:
The problem with presents was worse and ever-worsening. I love presents. I love buying gifts and wrapping them and hiding them in secret places. I love the sight of a Christmas tree surrounded by presents. I love Christmas morning, sitting around in pajamas opening all the gifts. And when the kids were still little it was simple: Fill a stocking with a few chocolates and trinkets and wrap up some presents. Preschoolers are easy to impress. They like boxes more than anything else. (“Mom!” my 4-year-old daughter stage-whispered to me one Christmas morning, having peeked under the tree. “He brought clementines!”) But older kids always want more. By middle school my daughter had graduated to texting me an extensive shopping list with links. She once told me that her friends’ parents spend $1000 on each child. It made me wonder whether I should give up on presents completely.
Seriously? I know families whose present-giving is minimal, and I doubt that Amish or Orthodox Jewish families engage in this sort of wholesale gift-giving.
But the biggest problem is that God-shaped hole:
Maybe we didn’t have to reject every aspect of the religious traditions.
I’m sure my kids would have had complaints about church on Christmas Eve. I’m sure I would have too. I can imagine sitting in a pew silently grumbling about the minister’s call for obedience. My husband might have sighed pointedly when the man behind us sang too loudly. It wouldn’t have been perfect. But lately I can’t get those services at my grandmother’s church out of my mind. Even as a teenager it was impossible not to be moved by the sight of the familiar building at night, dressed up in garlands and ribbons, the stained glass windows in dark shadows, the altar flickering with candlelight, everyone in velvet dresses or ties or even suits. I remember the voices of the choir vibrating in my chest and the feeling of something very big and old and special.
My generation had the best of both worlds. We played in the crumbling remains of Christian traditions without realizing how much structure and beauty they gave us. I’m still an atheist, but I’ve come to believe that taking religion out of my children’s Christmas was a mistake. They never really witnessed the celebration of a miracle that goes back two thousand years. They didn’t have a nativity set, even though I loved mine, because when you scrub God from your holiday celebration, it’s strange to give your kids a tiny baby Jesus to play with. Isn’t it?
I’m not sure anymore. I couldn’t pass on to my kids a faith in God, but I could have shared the traditions that have always shaped and enchanted childhoods in this part of the world. The remnants were still there, and they were good. To today’s young atheist families building their annual rituals, I offer this advice: It’s okay if you don’t believe in God. Go to the Christmas Eve service anyway. Learn the carols, even the religious ones. Get the nativity set.
Yes, you have to let your kids see that celebration of a delusion. But what Phillips is mourning here is not really the lack of traditional religious beliefs. She’s mourning what Richard Dawkins likes about Church: the ceremony, the incense, and the singing. What she’s talking about is not a god-shaped hole but a hymn-shaped hole. The problem with this article is just that: it confects a problem that really doesn’t exist. Does atheist Phillips want her children simply to know more about religion? If so, give them a Bible? Or, if she wants her kids to hear hymns and sniff incense, well, that’s simply ceremony. Yes, I went to midnight mass at Notre Dame when I lived in Paris, and it was quite the spectacle, with the swinging censers, the music, and the beautiful cathedral. But not for a minute did I believe what they were celebrating, and I could get the same feeling by going to a concert of Tagore songs.
Of course Bari Weiss, the founder of the Free Press, seems to be religiously Jewish; as far as I can see, there are aspects of Judaism that she believes in. But she’s not explicit about it, and so I can’t be sure that she’s not a secular Jew like me. I’d like to ask her exactly what supernatural stuff she believes in, and what about this article merited its publication.
UPDATE: This just came up: an interview of Tom Holland by Bari Weiss:
An excerpt. Bolding is mine:
Whether you believe in the story of the virgin birth and resurrection, or you believe that those miracles are myths, one thing is beyond dispute: The story of Jesus and the message of Christianity is among the stickiest ideas the world has ever seen.
Within four centuries of Jesus’s death, Christianity had become the official religion of the Roman Empire. It had 30 million followers—which amounted to half the empire. Today, two millennia later, Christianity is still the largest religion in the world, with more than 2 billion adherents.
How did the radical message of Christianity catch on? How did it change the world? And how does it shape all our lives today?
These questions motivate the latest episode of Honestly. My guest is the incredible historian Tom Holland, one of the most gifted storytellers in the world. His podcast, The Rest Is History, is among the most popular out there. Each week, he and his co-host, Dominic Sandbrook, charm their way through history’s most interesting characters and sagas. I can’t recommend it more highly.
I also recommend Tom’s book Dominion: How the Christian Revolution Remade the World. In it, he argues that Christianity is the reason we have America, that it was the inspiration behind our revolution. He also argues that Christianity is the backbone of both “wokeness,” as an ideology, and liberalism, which so often sees itself as secular.
Oy vey! Something is going on at the Free Press. I guess it’s the claim that Christianity is the backbone not just of wokeness, but of liberalism.
“Joseph, Mary, the kings, the shepherds”. One of the most amusing things about Christmas is the way that the two utterly incompatible nativity stories in Matthew and Luke get mashed together. All religious people do it: the Catholic Archbishop of Westminster was at it on the radio this morning.
The many contradictions between the two Gospels include:
1.Matthew has Jesus born under Herod the Great, who died in 4BC. Luke says it was when Quirinius was Governor of Syria, ie after 6AD.
2.Matthew says Mary and Joseph lived in Bethlehem; Luke invents a story about imperial taxation to get them there from Nazareth.
3.In Matthew, the angel appears to Joseph after Mary becomes pregnant; in Luke, it appears to Mary before she becomes pregnant.
4.In Matthew, Jesus is born in a house, attended by magi; in Luke, he is born in a stable, attended by shepherds.
5.In Matthew, the family flee to Egypt; in Luke, they go to Jerusalem to present Jesus at the temple.
6.In Matthew, the family move to Nazareth to evade the tetrarch Archelaus; in Luke, they return to Nazareth because it is their home.
This is just scratching the surface; there are many more inconsistencies. But every nativity play you see, and every Christmas sermon you hear, cherry-picks from the two stories with gay abandon. Merry Christmas everybody!
I like to think that this sort of pablum is largely contained to this time of year. I admit that I was surprised—and disappointed—to see the piece in The Free Press, as I had thought that they were immune. But, alas, apparently not. I’m expecting that this, too, will pass once we get past the holidays. At that point Act II of the Trump show will take center stage.
I’ve also got the impression that Bari Weiss is a believer, and coupled with the fact that the gravitational pull of the commenters (and I suspect subscribers) to the FP seems to be preponderately to the right, the softness on religion there is not at all surprising, though of course disappointing.
This may be a signal that wokeness is fading away and we are resuming the conversation where we left it in the 2010s. It’s time for New New Atheism!
I don’t completely believe this, but time will tell!
“…resuming the conversation where we left it in the 2010s.”
Hear hear!
I am partial because I’m Italian and the patron of the country is St. Francis, the one who invented the first representation of the nativity. And I appreciate that, since he was an environmentalist and animalist ante litteram, and he embarassed the Church with his preaching of poverty (he gave away his considerable wealth to become a beggar priest). Nativities are often pieces of art (just look at Naples) and taking that away seems like taking the turkey off from thanksgiving.
But more to the point, I don’t see the problem with Larissa Phillips since she’s clear she’s atheist and she’s mourning the ceremony, the incense, and the singing; she’s talking about a hymn-shaped hole, not a god-shaped hole… exactly what Richard Dawkins likes about Church. Do we have an issue with him too?
I just with people would admit what is missing, not God, but hymns, As you can see from my own post, I too have enjoyed the religious ceremonies of Christmas. I just don’t wish that I could have embraced Christianity.
Wehner’s essay is an adaptation of trauma-informed therapy for the holiday season. Parishioners can “share their struggles, sorrows and traumas” on the couch, er, in a church that is a “good steward of our pain” where Jesus himself will break our “generations of dysfunction” so that “[f]amilies…can be healed.” This seems pathetically weak to me – incitement to victimhood. The best gloss I can put on it is that it’s consistent with the Sermon on the Mount (“blessed be the cheesemakers” etc.). But it’s also nonsense because it’s inconsistent with the main message of Jesus throughout the Gospels: the redemption of believers after death as compensation for their travails in life. Nothing about sharing sorrows or healing traumas in the here & now (I guess those were just a given for people living under the thumb of Rome).
I confess (ha ha) that my dim view of Wehner’s rhetorical style is coloured by my costly efforts to get out of the Catholic church as a teen. And my catechism could be all wrong.
The healing family trauma thing is one more way the Christians try to suck people in. I agree with you, it’s not what the “good book” is about but they’ve got to fill those seats (and that plate) somehow, right?
I was raised Methodist, and was not taught that the main message of Christianity was the afterlife. We focussed on “doing unto others, visiting the sick and imprisoned, the good samaritan.” In my experience, Methodists in the midwest focussed on good works.
Mr. Wehner confides to us: ” He identified with the least and the lowliest, not just those in his lineage but those in his life.
4.) The genealogy of Jesus is also a story of radical inclusion.”
Let me offer a small bet: 2 to 1 that trans ideologues will soon claim Jesus for one of their own. After all, the virgin birth necessarily determines that his sex chromosome karyotype was XO, as in Turner Syndrome. And somatic haploidy might have inclined him toward, well, toward
neurodiversity, if not complete DEIness.
Re: the trans ideologue will soon reclaim Jesus
They already have, can’t understand how serious they are anymore. Just an example: https://x.com/jk_rowling/status/1870852232205455476
I doubt that any belief system “remade the world.” People with new technology dominated. Helped by circumstances (government aid–>New World discovery). If you had the horse and sword (Attila) you conquered. Religion might unify society, or (Moors) enable expansion. But it’s relatively neutral. At times China, Middle East, Europe were hegemonic. Any ol’ religion will do. (Or, perhaps none.)
Well, I certainly cannot get a relion-based comment past the NYT censors. Rather, the NWT.
Regarding the Phillips article, I have encountered this sort of attitude several times. And I do understand, humans like traditions, celebrations, rituals, ceremonies, communal engagement, etc. Unfortunately, people like Phillips go on to idolize the things they found entrancing when they themselves were children and decide that they must be depriving their own children if they do not have the same experience.
I disagree. Confusing children by bringing in all the supernatural folderol, making it seem special and giving it an air of legitimacy, is neither necessary for a fulfilling childhood nor helpful for a child’s burgeoning understanding of the difference between fact and fiction.
Through she says not, it seems as though Phillips must be a religious recidivist, either that or she’s engaging in a certain form of narcissism. Your own experience, magical as it may seem in your fading recollections, does not mean that it will be the same for anyone else, even your own child.
I am an avowed atheist, and yes, we celebrate the holiday season at our house. We just try to get into the “spirit” of the season without getting “spiritual”, in the form of virgin births, holy ghosts, and other palpable nonsense. I am pretty sure that no one feels deprived. Quite the contrary.
Jesus was God himself, of course he could overcome such lineage. Jesus is not a model humans can/should draw inspiration from, in christianity’s context. He is Perfection, nothing he did we could emulate. And thus, you create flawness and self-worthlessness in people’s hearts.
St Paul, the author of half the New Testament, was a contemporary of Jesus, persecuted Christians while Jesus was alive and lived in the same city as Jesus (Jerusalem). That he never questions or answers questions on the existence of Jesus suggests that he either knew Jesus, or at least knew people who knew Jesus.
All the other New Testament books are later and clearly have their own author’s objectives and slightly bend history to their objectives. If u read ‘Christianity from the Ground Up’ there’s more detail in this.
Paul never knew Jesus during his lifetime. The info you give is hardly good evidence.
I’m late to this conversation but I’ll add to Jerry’s comment. As you say, Paul supposedly lived at the same time as Jesus, and even claims to have visited Jerusalem and met with the so-called “pillars” of the Jerusalem Christian church — yet don’t you find it odd that he never mentioned Mary, Joseph, Bethlehem, Nazareth, any parable Jesus uttered or miracle he performed, anything about disciples (the Jerusalem Christians were “apostles”, i.e. missionaries, but Paul never said they’d actually met Jesus)? And by the way, Paul made it quite clear that no one had known anything about Jesus until after his execution and resurrection. And that Jesus would soon arrive on Earth, but he never said he would return!
It’s almost as if when Paul was writing, decades before the first gospel was composed, no one had heard of a Jesus on Earth at all.
The Apostle Paul did not actually write half of the New Testament. Roughly seven of the Epsitles written under his name are likely authentic. The rest are forgeries. This is the concensus of critical New Testament scholars.
Paul never indicates that he ever met or even laid eyes on Jesus. And there is no way to know when Paul started to persecute Christians, or what he even meant by “persecute”.
Most of what you wrote is just typical Christian apologetics.
I don’t think Christianity is responsible for wokeness, but historically it has a strong claim to be foundational for liberalism. See Larry Siedentop’s 2015 book, Inventing the Individual. I quote below from my own review of the book in the British newspaper, The Independent:
‘Who said “it is a basic human right that everyone should be free to worship according to his own convictions”? John Locke? John Stuart Mill? No: this basic liberal principle was put forward by Tertullian, an early Church father, in the third century AD. Siedentop’s thesis is that the liberal principles of modern western states have their origins in Christianity.
Siedentop argues convincingly that the idea of the individual was born along with Christianity; in earlier societies, persons were not conceived of as having any rights separate from family, clan or tribe. Christianity, in stressing the individual’s relationship with God, made the idea of rights for individuals comprehensible and persuasive; the role of the clergy made representative government possible; the doctrine of the equality of all souls paved the way for greater rights for women. This magisterial work of history and philosophy shows that secular liberals owe far more to Christian ideas than they might think.’
It does not follow that because a Christian had an idea that that idea was rooted in Christian doctrine. I’m willing to bet the notion of freedom of conscience predates Tertullian and was likely applied equally in secular contexts.
If Mr. Wehner wants a religion with a dysfunctional family, maybe he should worship the old Greek pantheon. 😉
As for Mrs. Phillips’ problems with a secular Christmas: Christianity only adopted existing traditions around the Winter Solstice. So why not just make your own from it, too? I’m a lifelong atheist bar the usual “Good God” (Lieber Gott in German) my mother casually mentioned from time to time in my early childhood, and up until now in my 50s, I never had any problems celebrating Christmas – or whatever .
Today, many of my friends are fellow atheists, some are more or less Christian, some the older traditions and may wish you a happy Yule (no practising Jews as far as I know, so no Hanukkah invitations for me 😢). Some are into presents, some aren’t. But we all can celebrate the dark season and our friendship. So, no offense to Mrs. Phillips, but I see her problems as rather overblown, self-made and first-worldly.
Re Mr. Trump’s recent musings about Canada becoming the 51st State . . . the following letter to the editor appeared in the Edmonton Journal the other day under the heading “Remind Trump about the War of 1812”:
Someone should remind Mr. Trump the last time the U.S tried to take over Canada, we burned down the White House.
Thanks for that update on presumptuous eye-rolling Trump musings. Were Canada to become the “51st state,” then Canadians (assuming they were immediately made U.S. citizens and not merely tolerated as the population of a U.S. vassal state) would no longer be grievously deprived of experiencing the divine aura and guh-lor-y of “American Exceptionalism,” eh? (I imagine a world-wide collective act of performance art where non-Amuricuns lie prostrate in the direction of the center of the continental U.S., zombie-like repeatedly murmuring, “greatest country in the world . . . .”
“We” didn’t burn down the White House (and many other public buildings in Washington including the Capitol.) That, like much of the fighting on “our” side in the War of 1812, was accomplished by the regular British Army and the Royal Navy and Marines. I don’t think we can count on them to do our fighting for us next time around.
Biden might have pardoned Canada, you should check your emails to be sure.
In concluding her introductory remarks prefacing her podcast interview with Tom Holland, Bari Weiss states her intention to ask Holland “if he thinks we’ll soon be ending our little vacation from Christianity.” Pray tell, who is the “we” here? Do I correctly recall that Weiss (has said that she) is a practicing (Orthodox?) Jew and, if so, does she accordingly intend to maintain her “vacation from Christianity”? Surely she would endorse the position that (not) ending that particular vacation is an unforced INDIVIDUAL decision not dictated by some dominant/domineering group of religiosos. Re: the word “Dominion” in the title of Holland’s book (coincidentally?) scheduled for release December 24.
In the podcast Holland is refulgent with phrases like “an incredibly incredible sort of upheaval” and “a kind of very radical kind of understanding.” I trust that he (and other younger set writers who talk like that) does not write like that for final publication (if an editor has anything to say about it).