Tag Archives: spiritual selfies

Spiritual Selfies: Evangelism

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Spiritual SelfiesThis is the third post in a series about how we Christians twist Christianity towards ourselves.

Evangelism is supposed to be about loving someone different than you. A Christian ought to be so overjoyed at being a child of God, now possessing hope that will not disappoint, and receiving the gift of understanding God’s words that we want others who aren’t in the same situation as us yet to experience the kind of love we have. What evangelism can often be about is a Christian making himself feel better because some of his shame is staved off during the time he blabbered on about how he doesn’t approve of gay marriage. That can come across as not loving (because it is). When evangelism becomes a way to soothe ourselves we’ve created a spiritual selfie. Our working definition for “spiritual selfie” is taking something that was created to be other/Other focused and turning it inward for our own purposes. Continue reading →

Spiritual Selfies: The Bible

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Spiritual SelfiesThis is the second post in a series about how we Christians twist Christianity towards ourselves.

If you grew up in the western world, you are more inclined to think the world is about you as an individual, probably more so than any other culture on Earth thus far. Our rabid individualism knows no bounds and our disease hungers to increase its territory. When someone living in this milieu becomes a Christian and now submits to how the Bible teaches us to live, we should expect some problems with confronting our formerly self-obsessed selves. This is hard, though, because it’s like describing water to a fish. It’s all around us and has become invisible. Continue reading →

Spiritual Selfies: Community

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Spiritual SelfiesThis is the first post in a series about how we Christians twist Christianity towards ourselves.

The selfie. Ubiquitous on social media, subject of many a diatribe, and a common practice of others. Previously referred to as a “self-portrait” by art history for hundreds of years, we’ve decided two syllables are better than three. But more than just shortening the word, the selfie is allowed to be low-brow. After all, “self-portrait” sounds a bit intimidating and time consuming.

For the selfie, one turns an outward camera inward. And most cameras (some people call them “phones” but let’s just call it what they are) undo the problematic flipping-the-camera-around-thing by including a front facing camera, assuring the artist of the best possible shot. Continue reading →