Noble savages

In environmental activist circles, and others, there is a belief that all pre-industrial primitive peoples lived within a state of complete harmony with the Earth. Many believe that pre-industrial man used every single piece of every animal they killed for food, knew how to farm without damaging the environment, lived in a complex balance with the ecosystem knowing how much to take and when to stop, were not warlike and did not kill or war unless it was to defend themselves, and had a mystic spirituality that reinforced those behaviors. These views are widespread and many believe them without bothering to test their veracity. In movies you'll see the noble savages teaching the ignorant Europeans how to live in harmony with nature until the villains come and destroy it all. This sort of romanticized image of primitive man sounds too good to be true and as it turns out, it is completely incorrect. This myth started in Europe and the idealized version of the savage became romanticized until it stuck in the general consciousness and has been there ever since. Research though has shown us the absurdities of these ideas and has highlighted information such as that murder rates in the Middle Ages were higher then they are now, 100 for every 100,000 people as opposed to 1 in every 100,000. It has also shown that primitive peoples were not as peaceful as we assume, aggressively and preemptively attacking and massacring enemies even selling other tribes of peoples as slaves to the Europeans. The point is people idealize the past and make assumptions about how things were and apply those assumptions to how they want things to be. Funnily enough this trend is not limited to the studies of history and the environment but also is widespread in Christendom.

Every new Christian movement attempts to gain legitimacy by claiming an affinity to the early church, the church that existed right after the ascension of Christ. In many people's minds the early church made no mistakes: they operated perfectly free from the strictures of dogma, open to the leading of the Holy Spirit, unbound by years of tradition flowed with supernatural displays of divine power daily, unburdened by structure able to flow organically and meet whatever needs they saw, and able to communicate the truth of the Gospel pure and undiluted. The problem is this is just as much of a myth as the noble savage. Both may have some grains of truth to them but both are patently untrue. I am always coming across sayings like, "More Jesus less Christians" or "No churchianity just Christ." or "No religion, only Jesus." or "More people would be Christians if it wasn't for the Christians." These sort of sayings sound good and sound well thought out, well one is because Ghandi said it, but they aren't. They are pop sound-bites that have little merit. I am getting sick and tired of Christians being the greatest disparagers of Christianity. I am tired of Christians being the most vociferous detractors of their own faith. The early church was constantly fraught with financial difficulties because everyone sold everything to live in a community. Sure everything was shared equally among all but if everyone is sharing equally but no one is making any money to keep everyone fed and clothed then what good is living in community? The Apostle Paul in his surviving Epistles is always mentioning that the church in Jerusalem needed financial support. The Bible records the beginnings of the church and the powerful displays of miracles wrought through the apostles but it is far from a day to day account. Acts is an overview, a brief history of a movement that spread like a wildfire. Just because people were healed and miracles took place does not mean that people were seeing miracles every single day. We cannot assume just because there were mighty displays of God's power that this was something that they continually experienced 24/7. Day to day life goes on. Somehow we have in our minds this notion about how pure and how perfect everything was in ancient times. Why do you think the church has evolved the way it has in terms of structure and organization? The early church had no structure or organization so they had to create those structures and organize things so they could continue to be effective. Why do you think doctrine had to be codified? In oder to combat the rise of sects and heresies that arose because the people didn't know the teaching of the apostles.

Now do structures and organizations need to be reformed from time to time? Yes. Have Christians at many times throughout history lost their focus and needed to be brought back into order? Yes. But how? Through structure. Through doctrine. Through right dogma. Through evolving methodology to reflect cultural shifts. Organization and structure can be a curse but they are also a great blessing when used correctly. Our methodology and liturgical forms have changed not because they've lost potency, but because they've had to change. So what if people meet in churches instead of homes? So what if one Pastor has oversight of one flock? So what if people baptize by immersion or by sprinkling water on your forehead? Many of these things have come about because of profound changes in societal structure and the way we live and how we live. So what if people started gathering in synagogues and the synagogues became churches? All the first Christians were Jews so now they should have stopped going to synagogue and started going to home churches? So what if people choose to worship at a church with 40 or 40,000? As long as their spiritual needs are being met and as long as they feel like a part of a community, who cares if they're not meeting at a home church? Who cares if their structure is different. One thing we all should keep in mind about structure and organization is that nowhere does Jesus or the Apostles lay out any sort of outline as how they thought things should be run. The only thing they do highlight though is correct doctrine, but that's something for another time and a clarion call to return to an imagined past is just as stupid as refusing to adapt to the future.