Recently Rev Alice Goodman has been propelled into the
public’s gaze with her rather unconventional bumper-sticker ‘wtfwjd’.
Apparently the sticker has resided on her car for
some time without causing too much of a stir, until Anonymous of Cambridge
wrote to a local newspaper to complain. The story was then picked up by
the Daily Telegraph, and before you could say ‘Holy Sh*t!’ statements were
being sought from Bishops and Archbishops in a media frenzy.
For example, Paul used a word which could properly
be translated as ‘Shit’ in the New Testament. Talking about the
righteousness he used to rely on before he knew Christ, he describes it all as
‘skubala’ compared to the treasure of knowing Christ. The strength of
this word is hard to understate. Although our modern translations
sanitise the word by translating it as ‘rubbish’ or ‘garbage’, it is really
‘street filth’ or ‘excrement’. The King James version comes closest
translating the word as ‘dung’ but in today’s language it would certainly be
‘crap’ and probably ‘shit’. Yet imagine the offence which it would cause
if we read that out in church…
“What is
more, I consider everything as loss, compared with the surpassing worth of knowing
Christ Jesus my Lord… I consider all these things as shit that I may
gain Christ!” Phil 3:8.
Then there was a famous Evangelist I worked with on
a mission. He was late for his opening address of the weekend.
Caught up in traffic, he arrived, hot, bothered and stressed, once the evening
meeting had already begun. He raced into the church and straight to the
pulpit where he launched into one of the caricatures he used of a ‘man in the
street’ to set the scene, but forgot to moderate the language, using the word
“F*ck” as he laid the foundations for his address. You could see people
in the congregation, looking at each other as if to say “Did he really say F*ck
in church?!”
And of course there is evangelical leader Tony Campolo, who has often begun speaking
about poverty with 3 things he wants to say to Christians.
“First,
while you were sleeping last night, 30,000 kids died of starvation and diseases
related to malnutrition. Second, most of you don’t give a
shit. What’s worse is that you’re more upset with the fact that I
said shit than the fact that 30,000 kids died last night.”
Which brings me back to Alice Goodman’s bumper
sticker which (it seems to me) has been blown up out of all proportion.
Don’t get me wrong – I don’t use the ‘F’ word very
often, and when I do it is usually followed by a swift apology and silent
request for forgiveness. But there are more important things to get hot
and bothered about. There are bigger priorities for the church and the
gospel than playing it safe all the time.
And we do get things out of proportion. If
Paul can use the word ‘shit’ in his epistles to shock his hearers into taking
his message seriously, then why shouldn’t Alice use another vulgar word to stop
and make people think? (Especially as most of the people who are likely
to take offence would not know what ‘wtf’ meant anyway?)
Like the Pharisees of Jesus’ time, we all have the
propensity to get our priorities so muddled that we miss God’s big picture
while getting hung up on the wrong thing yet again.
So I leave you with one more offensive item – the pictures
and caption below.
