Priority is not Hypocrisy
Do Christians over-focus on sex and gender issues?
August, 2023
Imagine hearing criticism of the government of Poland during late September, 1939. The complaint is that Polish leadership is misusing its resources and military. In fact, they are unreasonably focused on just three enemies: Russia, Slovakia, and especially Germany. But why? There are many evil men and evil countries, so says the complainer. Why be so focused on these three? Why be so especially obsessed with opposing Hitler's German military? Don't they care about those other evils?
In another scenario, consider two doctors, arguing over treatment for a tuberculosis patient who is coughing up blood and struggling to breathe. The criticizing doctor points out that there are many deadly diseases; tuberculosis is just one. If they are to be good doctors, should they not also treat the patient for all dangers? Why not spend time, effort, and resources on giving the patient treatment for other dangerous illnesses? What about cholera, influenza, measles, shingles, cancer, high blood pressure, diabetes, and so forth? Why spend most time and effort on that one condition? Even worse, the other doctor has symptoms consistent with a head cold! Who is he to tell someone how to cure their fatal disease?
The reason for the imbalance in those situations should be obvious. Poland was not under direct assault by dictators in Japan, Greece, or Turkey in 1939. They were being invaded—primarily—by Germany. The patient in the hospital is dying of tuberculosis. Even if other diseases needed to be treated, eventually, that condition is the one that was most pressing.
Cultural critics accuse Christians of being overly concerned about issues such as abortion, homosexuality, and gender ideology. "What about other sins?" they say. "What about the sins Christians, themselves commit? Why not spend as much effort on greed, pride, anger, divorce, idolatry, or hypocrisy? Why do Christians ignore those glaring sins and judge people? Why ignore their own beams while attacking someone else's specks (Matthew 7:3)?"
The simple answer is those are the fronts on which the world is attacking faith. Christians "seem" to focus on issues where culture has decided to aggressively, directly, deliberately contradict the Christian message. People aren't demanding Christians stop criticizing adulterers, or denying believers the right to refuse to create violent art or media. They are, however, punishing believers for refusing to accept sexual and abortion-related ideas contrary to faith. Instead, culture makes a conscious effort to promote those ideas. Further, they shout down Christians who say otherwise, or coerce them to give approval.
Western culture is steeped in Christian morality; whether non-believers like it or not, almost everything they know about "modern" morality comes from a biblical worldview. That means most of the things Christianity considers immoral, so too does western culture. There's little backlash when believers scold people for being greedy…but tremendous resistance to biblical ideas about sex, life, and gender. If culture generally agreed that transgender ideology was absurd and harmful, that abortion was murder, and that homosexuality was abnormal, there'd be no pronounced focus on those coming from biblical Christians.
During the 19th century, Christians founded and energized the anti-slavery movement. Believers were sometimes told to stop being so obsessed with one sin—slavery—and worry more about their own problems. But in that era, slavery was a sin which wider culture insisted was to be defended and not criticized. Not only was it a much more egregious sin than many others, but it was also an evil which much of the world tried to say was no sin, at all.
Not all commentary on sin is inappropriate "judgment." Believers today sometimes fail to judge appropriately (John 7:24) and can let hypocrisy get in the way of truth (1 Peter 2:1). But it's a foolish person who says, "I cannot comment on your self-mutilation because I am sometimes greedy," or "I can't push back against any immorality, ever, because I am not perfect," or "I can't devote my current efforts to stopping the active mass murderer, because I should also be scolding the petty thief and repenting of my overeating."
It's legitimate to point out that believers—like all people—can be more worried about the sins of others than their own. Those are concepts which Christian writings, preachers, sermons, songs, and discussions mention all the time. One lesson of this month's spotlight verse (Luke 11:42) is that it's absurd to brag about following tiny things while ignoring bigger issues. But it would be backwards to claim that murdering the unborn is a "speck" and being prideful is a "beam."
In short, critics are not wrong to note if or when believers fail to live up to their own standards. We should avoid hypocrisy. Nor are critics wrong to notice that many who claim to be Christians—some questionably—are much more self-righteous than sensitive. But the fact is that the sins those critics want believers to downplay are "glaring" and being angrily waved in the faces of Christians. Modern sexuality, abortion, and gender ideology are being championed, so to speak, by a culture that demands total approval. If the world wasn't hyper-focused on defending and promoting those serious sins, it wouldn't make sense for Christians to give them as much attention. But that's not the situation we're in.
-- Editor
