One of the good ones

And other lies I've told myself about being Christian

“You are spiritually dangerous.”

These words seared my soul a couple months ago. I had shared some of my thoughts about reading the Bible on a very public-facing social media platform, suggesting faithful ways to read scripture that do not insist upon a literal or inerrant interpretation, while welcoming curiosity, context, and creativity. I was prepared for fundamentalist voices to shout me down, to be told I was not a “real Christian,” or that as a woman I had no business teaching about the Bible in the first place. I’m familiar with finding that dialectic edge and navigating it.

But that’s not what happened. And I was much less ready for what in fact transpired: folks who had been deeply hurt by the Christian church responding that the Bible has been weaponized in catastrophically death-dealing ways, and that Christianity has nothing but violence to offer the world. They wanted me to know that anyone who props up this system by continuing to belong to it is responsible for perpetuating this violence.

Hi, it’s me. I’m the problem, it’s me. (Apologies to Taylor Swift). Photo by Simon Hurry on Unsplash.

In effect: Hi, it’s you, you’re the problem, it’s you.

Ouch.

Setting aside the binary thinking behind these statements for a future essay, I’ll just say for now that this shame-based “all or nothing” approach left me disinclined to dialogue in that space. Yet, the immense emotional weight of this perspective lay heavy on my heart, and led me to some intense self-examination.

I’ve been attending to what these statements — especially the first one I quoted — activated in me as they interacted with the stories I’d been telling myself for a number of years. When I’m really honest with myself, one such story 'I have told myself as a progressive Christian goes something like this:

Yes, I’m a Christian. And Christianity as a system is responsible for a lot of suffering. But I’m one of the good ones! I’m a woman who preaches and I love queer folks and I am prayerfully pro-choice. I’m a safe Christian to talk to — I won’t judge you or try to change you, and I don’t believe in a literal hell. That should be enough for you to trust me, right?¹

Reflecting on my online interactions, I recognized that being “one of the good ones” is a fallacy.² As a Christian — especially an ordained member of the clergy — I represent the system of Christianity to many people. When it comes to Christianity as a system, I don’t get a free pass because of my individual beliefs, or because I belong to a generally more progressive branch of the institution. My participation in it still props up the system. Because that’s how supremacist systems work.

When I say Christianity is a supremacist system, I mean: 

• A structure of conditional belonging maintained by the threat and use of violence by organized power to enforce domination over other systems of belief and belonging.

When legislation criminalizes the existence of trans people, and books are banned because they discuss the real life experiences of Black teenagers with police, and a 13-year-old girl can be forced to carry a pregnancy to term after being assaulted, and all of these outcomes are being pushed by people loudly claiming the name and intentions of Christ, then what we’re dealing with is a violent power structure seeking to maintain a hegemonic culture.

Meanwhile, living within the delusion of the “one of the good ones” fallacy is what has allowed me to derive meaning, community, and livelihood from the Christian institution while locating its problems “over there” in other pockets of Christianity (especially amongst adherents to the cult of white Christian nationalism, but I digress). Such fallacies are generally what make it possible to belong to a privileged class while feeling exempt from blame, responsibility, or accountability for the violence of the system. Recognizing this fallacy as a tool of Christian supremacy is a place to begin reckoning with the role I play in upholding the this system.

I’ve long taken issue with the culture of abuse baked into the power structures of many church institutions; I’ve spoken up about white supremacy culture in the church (including the church’s need to engage in reparations); and I am on the steering committee of a grassroots organization of clergy swimming against the tides of white Christian nationalism. I don’t mention all this to justify myself. Rather, I mean to say that I have largely located the source of Christianity’s ongoing systemic violence outside of myself. Up to this point, I’ve failed to recognize that I am part of (another) privileged class in this country, and that simply by virtue of belonging to the group, my presence helps legitimize and thus maintain the status quo.

Telling myself “I am one of the good Christians” is akin to saying “I am one of the good white people.” It’s a hall pass from the societal reckoning which Christian supremacy is beginning to undergo. The “one of the good ones” fallacy gets me out of accepting accountability for violence enacted in Christ’s name.

The former head of the Southern Baptist Convention recently recounted hearing from multiple pastors whose congregants were complaining about their preaching on the Sermon on the Mount, dismissing Jesus’ call to love enemies as a “liberal talking point” that “doesn't work anymore.”

It would be easy to sneer and say, “What a joke. Those are obviously not true Christians.” But to do so would be to fall back into the “one of the good ones” fallacy in order to evade responsibility.

We’ve heard these rebuttals before: “Not all men abuse women,” or, “Not all white people are racist.” These are an exercise in missing the point, fallacies that fail to see that men collectively derive power from patriarchy — a system that keeps women deprived of power — and white people collectively derive power from white supremacy — a system that deprives Black, Brown, and Indigenous people of power.

Likewise, Christians derive power from Christianity, a system that deprives those of other belief systems and cultural identities of power. Addressing the “one of the good ones” fallacy means acknowledging that Christians do have power. (Note that theology and sociology coexist here. You can believe “the kingdom, the power and the glory” are God’s, and still reckon with the inequitable distribution of power in human society).

You may be a progressive Christian, an evangelical Christian, a Black Christian, a white Christian, a male Christian, a nonbinary Christian, a female Christian, a straight Christian, a queer Christian…whatever prefixes your Christianity, if you are a Christian in the United States, Christianity concedes a certain degree of privilege. Here are just a few points of privilege:³

• having holidays off from work that align with your religious practice;

• moving to a new place and being asked “where do you go to church?”;

• being able to wear a cross — a symbol of public execution! — on jewelry, tattoos and t-shirts in public without being pegged as threatening;

• not being asked to explain your religious beliefs to strangers you’ve just met;

• hearing Christian music stream in restaurants and other businesses;

• putting bumper stickers with Christian messages on your car without being pulled over because of them;

• sharing Bible verses on social media without fear of censorship;

• being able to go to church without fear of being harassed, jailed, or killed.

I am actively reckoning with these and other privileges I have had as a Christian. Maybe the cost of discipleship as a Christian in the United States in 2023 has something to do with counting the cost of supremacy for our collective soul. I don’t have a nice, clean way to wrap this essay up. Just a couple of questions to open up conversation in hopes we might engage in some collective curiosity:

1. I wonder what privileges come to mind as you consider Christian supremacy, whether you are a Christian yourself or someone who knows the power of the system by living in a society steeped in it?

2. If you identify as a member of a privileged class (whether Christianity or another group), do you recognize the “one of the good ones” fallacy as being a story you’ve told yourself? How have you challenged this story within yourself?

1. I could also easily tell this as a story about people-pleasing and really wanting to be liked.

2. Some have referred to this as an example of the “no true Scotsman” fallacy, wherein a generalization is made (e.g. “no Christian would hate another person”), a rebuttal disproves this universalized statement (“my uncle is a Christian and he told me he hates Democrats”), and the generalizer then resorts to a purity test, “well, then he must not be a true Christian.)”

3. This list is inspired by Peggy McIntosh, who famously compiled a list of privileges conferred by white privilege called Unpacking the Invisible Backpack.