When I first ventured onto the Internet and got my first e-mail address, it was not long before I started receiving forwarded messages urging me to tell everyone I knew about some startling news. Some new discovery had proven God's existence, or influential people were making an assault on Christianity, or a seemingly innocuous tradition was either of the devil or was crafted to symbolize Jesus Christ. Since I am by nature inquisitive, I started tracking down some of these reports and found that much of what we Christians circulate as news turns out not to be true. And such false information pre-dates my time on the Internet: sermon illustrations, flyers, and petitions have also spread these tales far and wide.
Our Christianity is a historical faith, meaning that its validity rests on whether or not certain events actually happened in history. This is especially true with respect to Jesus Christ. If He was not born of a virgin, if He did not live a sinless life, if He was not crucified for our sins and buried, if He was not raised from the dead, if He did not then ascend visibly into heaven, if He is not coming back the same way...then we are still in our sins and without hope. The Bible records many other historical events, from creation to the Flood, to the Exodus, to the conquest of Canaan, and on and on–events which, if untrue, cast a shadow of doubt over everything the Bible says about God, salvation, morality, human nature, and the afterlife.
Most of us in the evangelical churches are aware of how important truth is to our faith, since mainline Christianity has questioned all these events and classified us as gullible fundamentalists for taking the Bible at its word. But somehow, many of us have also confused gullibility with faith, and accept as true any bit of information that seems to support Christianity or vindicate our perception of ourselves as a persecuted people. Often we would rather jump to conclusions rather than risk becoming "skeptics."
The problem with this approach is that it simply makes all of Christianity appear less credible. I cannot make a convincing case that my faith in Christ's resurrection is well-reasoned and can stand up to any investigation, if at the same time I've fallen for the latest hoax simply because I heard it from a fellow believer. If in fact our faith is resting more on comforting legends passed along by word of mouth rather than solid reality, who are we to claim our religion is more valid than anyone else's? Any defense of Christianity as the one true faith stands or falls with the believer's commitment to truth in every area of life. In any case, it's worth the extra effort to check something out before passing it along.
There are many books and Internet resources on contemporary myths and legends. The best references I recommend are John Williams' book The Cost of Deception (Broadman, 2001), written from a Christian perspective, and the Urban Legends Reference Pages (www.snopes.com), written from a secular perspective. (Links in the following paragraphs are to Snopes' articles.) The people behind these resources go to inside interviews, newspapers, history books, official records, and other reliable sources to determine the real truth behind reports they receive. They also try to track down the source of rumors they learn are false.
Some of the more popular Christian myths and hoaxes relate to supporting or even proving Christianity. It is true that many archaeological studies have proven the accuracy of the Old Testament. It is also true that science confirms the order of events presented in the Genesis 1 creation account. However, it is not true that scientists in Siberia once found a hole in the ground leading to hell. Nor is it true that NASA astronomers have found proof in the positions of stars of a lost day in time, accounting for Joshua's long day and the sundial miracle of Hezekiah. Other claimed proofs of our faith–such as the shroud of Turin, James's ossuary, or secret codes hidden in the Bible–are the subject of legitimate debate but do not help present a good, persuasive case for Christianity. Readers should familiarize themselves with both sides of such debates but not get bogged down in them (Titus 3:9). Our focus ought to be on the important elements of our faith.
Being a Christian causes us to see the world in a new light. Nearly everything around us testifies to the truths we cherish. But we are prone to spoil this gift through exaggeration. For example, it is all well and good to take a tradition, or a pattern in nature, and make it symbolic of Christian truths. But it is another thing altogether to claim that the tradition or pattern was established for that specific reason. A case in point is the legend of the candy cane. Supposedly, a Christian confectioner created the candy to teach children about Jesus. Everything from the J shape to the number and width of the red stripes symbolizes something about Jesus. The problem is that some people take this as historical, when in fact it is simply a legend. The same is true of the song "Twelve Days of Christmas," an innocuous and fairly non-sensical English memory song that some claim helped preserve the teachings of Christianity during a time of persecution. But Christianity itself has not been under persecution in England since the language developed (though denominations have at times been outlawed). And the song (so the legend goes) does not preserve essential Christian doctrines, but simply numbers of things in the Bible (e.g., three wise men, ten commandments, twelve disciples). Many other Christmas traditions, such as Christmas trees, wreaths, and candles, were originally associated with secular or pagan winter solstice observances and have since received religious significance.
We should also be careful of stories about Christians and secular conservatives in the news. We should not be too ready to believe President Bush shared the gospel with a young teenager at an official dinner. Bush indeed presents himself as an evangelical Christian, and as such might witness to members of his staff, secret service agents, wayward family members, and others in private. But to single out a random citizen at a public event would surely bring a flurry of news coverage and outcries of church-state improprieties. We all saw a similar uproar when Jesus was mentioned in a prayer at Bush's inauguration, but if Bush's witnessing happened, there wasn't a peep about it from major news sources.
In a society that is becoming more and more hostile to unabashed, aggressive Christianity, a large number of Christians have developed a persecution complex. It is true, and biblical, that non-Christians are in rebellion against God and have no love for Christianity in its purest form. But it is not true that the "powers that be" are organized and united in an effort to keep us down. More likely, most in America simply regard us as a little too zealous for our particular religion, but not so as to be dangerous. It is true that the ACLU has led fights to have religious displays such as nativity scenes and the Ten Commandments removed from government-owned property. It is also true that atheist Madalyn Murray O'Hair was instrumental in the school-prayer court decisions of the 1960s. However, it is not true that O'Hair or anyone else is leading a fight to get Congress to ban all religious broadcasting. O'Hair died several years ago, and even when she was alive, she acknowledged that a total ban would be unconstitutional. It is also false that former Attorney General Janet Reno once defined all Bible believers as cultists during an interview. We must be careful of spreading made-up stories of persecution, or no one will listen when real persecution comes, as the Bible assures us it someday will.
Many of the warnings of immorality, blasphemy, and Satanism are likewise false. When UPC bar codes first appeared on grocery products, many believed they were the mark of the beast. But the number 666 is nowhere to be found in the code as is sometimes claimed. The rumor that Procter & Gamble's president was a Satanist may actually have been invented by Amway workers. Petitions against the making of a movie that portrays Jesus as gay are many years old and based on false information. (There was a play a few years back, but it flopped.) The abbreviation of Christmas as Xmas is Christian in origin; it does not "take Christ out of Christmas." (The X is the first letter of Christ's name in Greek.)
More recently, several soft drink companies have been accused of omitting "under God" from the Pledge of Allegiance on their products. The company in question is Dr Pepper, which used "one nation...indivisible" as a slogan of unity on its cans. No religious or anti-religious claim was intended. Milder warnings are age-old, such as that subliminal messages work or that birds die from eating the rice thrown at weddings. These claims too have no truth to them. Paranoia concerning occultism or Satanism in Star Wars, Pokémon, Lord of the Rings, and other wholesome entertainment similarly arises from misinformation, distortion, or a misunderstaning of certain kinds of fiction.
The Cost of Deception goes into great detail on some of these myths, and also deals with hitchhiking angels, the giant computer that supposedly contains information about everyone's whereabouts and purchases, the Y2K scare, end-times datesetting, and other misinformation. More importantly, it gives Christians strategies for discerning truth and error. The key is simply taking the time to check stories against reliable resources and common sense before passing them on.
In today's world, there is plenty of real persecution. There are real heretics, real heroes, and truly Christian traditions. Jesus really will return, and the Bible really is in accord with the facts of nature. The best way to present these truths as genuine is to keep them untarnished by falsehood, exaggeration, and rumor.
For a concise statement of my beliefs about truth-telling, see my Declaration of Faith.
