Extremists For Love

Hang on a second, aren't extremists bad? Maybe not. Perhaps it depends on whether it is extreme hate or extreme love. This is Shane Claiborne's point in Chapter 10, as he starts by looking at the effect of church on people.

I looked around and watched the news and found a church full of sick people and a world that had some decent pagans. My (sociology) studies taught me that the higher a person's frequency of church attendance, the more likely they are to be sexist, racist, anti-gay, pro-military...

It was enough to make him think "If that's what it means to be Christian, I wasn't sure i wanted to be one" and to wonder why "Jesus didn't take back his religion".

He and a friend created a video by interviewing people on the street, and doing word-association. They did number of words, and when they asked "Christian" they got responses of "fake", "hypocrites", "church" and "boring" - but not a single person associated the word with "love", "grace" or "community".

Shane gives a few more negative examples, summed up by the quote:

The greatest cause of atheism is Christians who acknowledge Jesus with their lips,then walk out the door and deny him with their lifestyle. That is what an unbelieving world finds unbelievable.

before then inspiring us with a numerous examples of people who were extreme in their love, and extremely closer to the example of Jesus.