Describing the Pope’s last public mass, Anthony Faiola of the Washington Post wrote about young seminarians taking notes with tears in their eyes and tour groups straining their necks to catch a glimpse from the rear of the church.
Then he got around to describing Benedict’s procession. As Faiola told Post readers, “He walked with a gilded cane in the shape of a cross” as people cheered “Long live the Pope!”
The “gilded cane in the shape of a cross” he’s referring to was actually a crosier, the shepherd’s staff that symbolizes a bishop’s role as the leader of his flock.
The Post isn’t alone in its apparent ignorance of this most ancient of Christian regalia. Eight years ago, the New York Times, referring to the same object, called it a “crow’s ear,” which given the anatomical improbability of the phrase, should have caught an editor’s attention.
But it isn’t only Catholicism: Scarcely, a month goes by without some major news outlet referring to Evangelicals as “Evangelists.” Similarly, these outlets often use the word “evangelical” and “fundamentalist” interchangeably, and their work suggests that most of what they know about us is limited to what they have gleaned from the world of politics.
As Terry Mattingly documents regularly over at “Get Religion,” the doesn’t “get religion.”
And given the centrality of religion to so many people’s lives, this ignorance and tone-deafness is bizarre. Imagine a sportswriter repeatedly referring to the “last two innings of the Super Bowl.” You would rightly question his competence and go elsewhere for your sports news.
Yet something very much like this kind of ignorance pervades mainstream coverage of religion. Please note: I’m not talking about bias, of which there’s plenty. I mean people writing about a subject they just don’t understand.
Yet people who don’t know a crosier from a crow’s ear pontificate (pun intended) on whom the next pope should be and what the Catholic church “must” do to become relevant.
And people for whom Joshua, Judges and Ruth is, at most, an album by Lyle Lovett, report on people for whom the Bible is the guide to life.
I say this in sorrow much more than anger. It’s a painful reminder that we’re really living in a post-Christian culture.
Chuck loved to tell the story about the evacuation of British troops from Dunkirk in World War II. As the British people awaited news of their fate, they received a three-word message: “And if not.”
As Chuck said, “It was a reference to the words of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego standing before King Nebuchadnezzar’s fiery furnace. ‘Our God is able to save us … and if not, we will remain faithful to him anyway.’”
The British people understood the message, and organized what is considered a miraculous evacuation.
It’s difficult, if not impossible, to imagine something like that happening today. Neither the nor, to be fair, much of the audience, would get the reference.
To call ours a “post-Christian” culture isn’t so much a statement about individual people’s beliefs as it is a description of the role Christianity plays in shaping the imagination of our culture. For much of our history, Christianity played a central role in this shaping. Non-believers made and understood biblical allusions.
Now, even the most basic references go right over our heads. Everyone is a fundamentalist and popes carry birds’ ears. We just don’t get it anymore.
And we should note that sometimes we are guilty as Christians of the same ignorance. It’s not uncommon to hear Baptists misrepresent Pentecostals, or Calvinists caricature Arminians and vice versa. Or Protestants and Catholics repeat falsehoods about each other.
In light of the retirement of Pope Benedict, I invited Southern Baptist Dr. Timothy George of Beeson Divinity School and the Rev. T.M. Moore of the Colson Center to join me on BreakPoint This Week for a conversation about healthy ecumenism. Both George and Moore have a unique perspective due to their work with Chuck Colson and Catholics and Evangelicals Together. Listen on radio or come to BreakPoint.org.
John Stonestreet, the host of The Point, a daily national radio program, provides thought-provoking commentaries on current events and life issues from a biblical worldview. John holds degrees from Trinity Evangelical Divinity School (IL) and Bryan College (TN), and is the co-author of Making Sense of Your World: A Biblical Worldview.
BreakPoint commentary airs each weekday on more than one thousand outlets with an estimated listening audience of one million people. BreakPoint provides a Christian perspective on today's news and trends via radio, interactive media, and print.
Publication date: March 1, 2013