Over at Street Prophets, Pastor Dan takes down Jim Wallis and it is a sight to behold. I am not now, nor have I ever been, a fan of Jim Wallis. I am glad to see that others share the sentiment, for pretty much the same reason. His preening, self-important style ("Gee, I was at an international conference the other day . . ..", "I have a plan to end the war that sounds an awful lot like George Bush's plan only we won't call it that . . ."), his ignorance of theology even as he tries to talk about it ("I'll use the name 'Augustine' and the phrase 'just war' in a sentence to make me look smart . . ."), and his failure to distinguish between people around the world and Christians around the world (most people aren't Christians, Jim, and we should probably respect that) all show him up as the fraud that he most certainly is.
As Pastor Dan points out, the most important thing from a Christian point of view isn't a survey of various Christian theologies. It isn't cocktail chatter at meaningless international events with other pompous preeners. It is solidarity with and for those who suffer. Such solidarity is pretty difficult from the distance of time, space, culture, and faith that we American Christians currently have, so the best we can do is work to end this insane bloody nightmare. We can offer the hand of peace and friendship to our Muslim brothers and sisters. We can demand an end to religious cleansing in Iraq. We can demand that our country open its borders to those fleeing the chaos we have caused by our unjust, stupid on-going war, and the subsequent religious and political civil war our evacuating power from the venter in Iraq has caused. We might even show ourselves willing, as the leader of the hip hop caucus showed us, to put one's body in danger of official distrust and silencing of dissent. Wallis offers us nothing but pabulum and platitude, most of which show he is woefully uninformed and ill-suited to anything but self-promotion. We must be challengers of the status quo, not players within its borders and its (not very) comforting illusions.
Virtual Tin Cup
