An open letter to Christians. From a pastor who has defended the rights of Muslims.

Dear fellow Christian,

Thank you for your feedback regarding my support for Halal certification in Australia, for calling for unity in the wake of the Martin Place tragedy and for my public stand of solidarity with my Muslim friends when they are vilified and abused.

I don’t think Jesus wants you to “come past my church and pull my tongue from my throat.” I could be wrong about this, but it seems that between “love one another”, “love your neighbour as yourself” and “love your enemy” there isn’t much space for that kind of behaviour.

Have you heard those ‘Halal food funds terrorism’ stories? Yes? Read this.

It’s been good for me, though, to discover what it’s like to be on the receiving end of some of that old-time Christian love. The kind that’s expressed in phrases like, “I love everyone, but do I have to like them?” and “I love everyone – and that’s why I have to tell them how despised / damned / depraved / demonic they are.”

And my favourite – “I love everyone, but I need to tell the truth about them too,”  – meaning the “truth” about Muslims / gay people / Aboriginal people we read online or heard a preacher say.

The Apostle John once wrote to us, “This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us.”

Pastor Brad Chilcott

It’s up to us, then, to measure love by only one gauge: Jesus Christ. We know what love looks like because we know the way he loves people: he gave up his life for them.

Yet, if I had a Bible for every time I’ve heard a Christian use “love” as an excuse to be bigoted, insular, selfish, fear-mongering and self-interested I’d be the library at the Vatican.

I’m pretty sure there isn’t a special, secret, form of love that looks and feels a lot more like hate but on a higher spiritual plane still qualifies as love.

If it sounds like hate, feels like hate and has all the same outcomes as hate… then it isn’t love.

If it looks like prejudice, feels like prejudice and excludes people like prejudice, then it’s prejudice.

I’m suspicious of any claim to “love” that allows us to act hideously towards others, to safely stay in our insular faith communities, to judge people from an impersonal distance and to protect ourselves from diversity of ideas, culture and practice.

Dear Australian Muslims: We will ride with you.

There’s a reason that doesn’t sound a lot like love.

Because it isn’t. It’s prejudice wrapped up in faith.

It’s ignorance veiled in religion.

It’s bigotry masquerading as Christianity.

It’s selfishness appropriating the name of the Selfless One to excuse greed and insularity.

It’s not love, it’s blasphemy.

I support Halal certification for one simple reason – my Muslim friends would like to know what they’re able to buy and eat and I think that’s fair enough. Because they’re people like me and I think that’s what love would do.

I visit mosques and encourage others to do the same because love grows with understanding and mutual respect. You can’t love someone from a safe distance.

Jesus taught us that, too. We call it the Incarnation.

I expect that my Christian friend was planning on removing my tongue “in love” – or at least “in truth” – because that’s how we Christians tend to give all our violent, discriminatory or offensive actions a sense of religious legitimacy.

And so I write, dear Christian, to remind us all of the only measure of love we know, and to seek to engage with the world and all its people accordingly.

This is how we know what love is: Christ laid down his life for us.

Pastor Brad Chilcott