I am a Christian. And I Am Angry

I am a Christian. And I am angry.

I am angry about abortion and gay marriage. Why? Because so many Christians have been led to believe that abortion and gay marriage are the most important issues facing us today. Because so many Christians have been led to believe that a politician's stands on abortion and gay marriage are all one needs to know in order to make one's voting decisions. I am angry because so many politicians have chosen to use abortion and gay marriage as "wedge" issues to get themselves elected while ignoring other issues that should be of concern to all Christians. I am angry because we have focused on abortion and gay marriage to the exclusion of any other issues.

I am angry about AIDS. I am angry that so many Christians seem completely unconcerned about the 3.1 million people who died of AIDS during 2004. I am angry that we are more concerned with preventing the use of condoms than preventing the deaths of human beings. I am angry that we have stood idly by while as many as 20 million children have been orphaned when their parents died of AIDS, and that we continue to stand idly by while AIDS makes orphans of over 2 million children every year, a new AIDS orphan every 14 seconds. As Christians, we should all be angry about this, and we must act now to bring about change.

I am angry about poverty. I am angry that one of every 8 persons in the wealthiest nation in the world - the United States - lives in poverty. I am angry that nearly one quarter of the world's population, more than a billion human beings, lives on less than a dollar a day. I am angry that half the world's population, more than 3 billion human beings, lives on less than two dollars per day. As Christians, we should all be angry about this, and we must act now to bring about change.

I am angry about hunger and starvation. I am angry because every day, forty thousand human beings - 15 million every year - starve to death; three-fourths of them children under five. I am angry that one third of all children in developing countries suffer from malnutrition, causing stunted growth and cognitive development, and decreased resistance to disease. I am angry that, in the United States, the fatty, grain-fed meat we eat is killing us with heart disease, while the grain we feed to our livestock could feed a billion human beings. As Christians, we should all be angry about this, and we must act now to bring about change.

I am angry about homelessness. I am angry that in the United States, we may have as many as one million of our people homeless at any given time; as many as 3 million homeless at some point during the year. I am angry that, worldwide, there are more than 100 million human beings who are completely homeless, and nearly a billion more - one-sixth of the world's population - who are squatters in houses or on land they do not own, or are residents of refugee camps or temporary shelters. As Christians, we should all be angry about this, and we must act now to bring about change.

I am angry that we are spending 500 billion dollars this year on bullets and bombs, as much as the defense budgets of the entire rest of the world combined. I am angry that we could - and should - be spending a large portion of this money on healing the sick, clothing the poor, feeding the hungry, and sheltering the homeless, and yet we do not. As Christians, we should all be angry about this, and we must act now to bring about change.

I am angry that we have allowed ourselves to be fooled by self-serving politicians into voting based on only one or two issues. I am angry that we have ignored our responsibilities as Christians to help those less fortunate than us, and I am angry that we have failed to elect leaders who will do those things that we as Christians know are the right things to do.

Let us all be righteously angry, as Christ was angry and grieved at the hardness of our hearts (Mark 3:5), and let our anger lead us to action.