A Good Kind of Weird

Have you ever looked at someone you’ve known for years and found his face unfamiliar? You still know who he is, but for a few seconds, by virtue of some newly-discovered angle or perspective, it’s like you’re looking at someone you’ve never seen before.

I do this sometimes with Christianity. I grew up with Christianity, so I take many things for granted. But once in a while, because of some new situation, information, or angle, I step back and it’s like I’m suddenly on the outside, examining it for the very first time. And when that happens, I realize: Christianity is kind of weird.

A Weird Religion

Yesterday I was listening to the radio on my way to work. The first song I heard declared that on our own we are incapable of doing anything that lasts; we are utterly powerless. This was immediately followed by a song which chorused “we have the power, power – we have the power, power.” This was followed by a song about how we are all pitiful losers, unable to get it right, broken and evil. This was followed by a song about how we are all royalty, unique and priceless.

Normally, I sing these songs without a second thought, but as I listened to them yesterday, I realized how very contradictory they appear. I know the theological context of them, so they make logical sense to me, but they would be very confusing without that context. How can thousands of perfectly rational people go about their daily lives believing they are at once powerless and powerful, pitiful and priceless?

Just a Cultural Quirk?

I know what answer many of my non-religious friends would give. They would say that religion is one of those things you don’t think too hard about. It’s meant to provide comfort and a sense of community, not to be logical. Of course it doesn’t make sense; it isn’t designed to. It’s just a bunch of nice sayings and vague cultural sentiments. To accuse it of illogic is like accusing Mary Poppins of being unrealistic; you’ve missed the point.

My friends, unfortunately, don’t know what they’re talking about. Why? Because this collection of nice saying and vague cultural sentiments sounds, if we’re honest, rather boring, and so they haven’t put much effort into studying it. If they did, they would find that the history of Christianity is full of deep thinkers, all believing in these seemingly contradictory things (and filling libraries elaborating on them). Moreover, they would find that hundreds of thousands of people have found these paradoxical statements true in ordinary life.

The paradoxes, you see, are like puzzle pieces; they may face opposite directions, but they fit together when they take their places in a larger picture. The ones I have mentioned above can be solved with two words: “with God.” On our own, we are powerless, unable to find happiness or fulfillment; with God, we find power even in apparent weakness. On our own, we are wretched and evil, constantly messing up and choosing the wrong way. But if there is a God in whose image we are made, and he loves us, that makes us priceless.

Going Wrong the Right Way

If Christianity were a religion that someone had made up, it would not make these weird claims. It would say something nice and straightforward, like: “we can improve ourselves and do some good, and we will be rewarded for it.” This is what Socrates and the Stoics believed; it is what many today still teach. It’s what makes sense if you’re figuring it out for yourself. Christianity’s truth, on the other hand, isn’t the sort of thing you can think up on your own. It is grasped not by logic, but by intuition. It isn’t the sort of thing that works without actually having a God around to make it true.

In short, Christianity does not match up with straightforward logic; Christianity is weird. But it is weird in just the right way. As Chesterton put it, it goes “wrong” just where real life goes “wrong.” We have a lot of ideas in our heads about how to live well – make lots of money; never voluntarily forego what’s yours; love your friends and hate your enemies – that psychiatric research has debunked. Christians two thousand years ago knew what the psychiatrists are just now getting around to discovering.

What is my point? For those outside Christianity, my point is that Christianity makes perfect sense; it is simply an intuitive sense and not merely a logical sense. It goes beyond logic, just as truth does; it requires more – something we might call revelation. For those inside Christianity, don’t take these paradoxes for granted. They do not exist in any other religion. Christianity is utterly unique as a system of thought and behavior. You will appreciate this more and more if you take the time to step back, listen to its teaching as if for the first time, and say to yourself, “huh – this is weird.”

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