Here's another reason North American Christianity is in decline - John Eldredge's 'revised and expanded' Wild at Heart - a free copy of which was furnished by the publisher for review on this blog. This me-centered, fringe interpretation of the Christian Gospel aims to bring men back to the faith by reclaiming the 'real' message of the Bible, which apparently had gotten away from us for a few millennia. The book's overwhelming drawback is its misunderstanding of adventure and human fulfillment. Eldredge's take has its roots in his fundamentalist piety and its Himalayan peak: a deeply personal ongoing and inner experience with Jesus. Eldredge blatantly ignores the main Gospel message which is outwardly focussed - it is mainly about giving, not getting - giving ourselves up to engage in the mission of Christ and the healing of the world.

I'd first heard of this book when it was mentioned in a New Yorker article, then again in Wikipedia. Apparently its Spanish translation is used as a textbook for the notorious Mexican drug cartel/cult La Familia. It is attractive to them, and to many North Americans (more than 500,000 copies of the original edition sold, published 10 years ago) because it is 'muscular Christianity.' It is not 'be nice' Christianity which, in Eldredge's mind equals 'boring' Christianity. Rather Eldredge wants to show us the 'He man' Jesus who knocks over tables in the Temple and tells Peter that carrying a sword is OK (Luke 22:36). What Eldredge neatly skirts is the main message of Jesus and his blatant pacifism. Jesus did not complete His work by mustering a militia, calling down scores of armed angels to beat back the Romans, or by punching Pilate. Rather Jesus went by the name 'Prince of Peace' for good reason. Violence, aggression, and anger are of the most limited vocabulary in Jesus' dictionary - however Eldredge would have us believe they are Christianity's long buried headline. Nowhere does the author mention the ban the early Christians put on military participation as a requirement for conversion. Rather Eldredge goes the other way, condoning the use of weapons, swords, knives and guns, even at one point claiming that women emasculate men by not letting boys learn to shoot guns. (p. 67 )

Eldredge seems to ignore one of the central claims of the Bible - that the heart of man is desperately wicked - this is not to be celebrated, or even toyed with but understood that urging men to kindle their base feelings of anger, aggression, retaliation and conflict is downright dangerous when the goal is to build Christian character. His twisted theology, then, finds heroes in World War II soldiers and movie characters - who seem to dominate the book - and not the real 'men' of contemporary Christianity who did the more difficult work of avoiding and healing conflict like John F. Kennedy, Martin Luther King, Jr., or Desmond Tutu.

Of course, these men would not be widely accepted heroes to Eldredge's conservative flock, like his neatly divided notion of human sexuality certainly is. Eldredge makes it clear that we are born either male (who desire only females) or female (who desire only males). The recent row over female track athlete Semenya Caster which brought to light the ambiguity surrounding sex determination is a notion certainly ignored by this crowd, as are the millions of gay Christians in North America - of course they would not be considered Christians by these folk and would not be reading much of this book anyway.

My brother John Eldredge does a wonderful job reminding us that the Christian life is the world's great adventure. However he does great injustice by assuming that adventure ends with personal fulfillment in a Macho Jesus. The Gospel is not about us - it is about God and God's mission to save the world. The greatest adventure is found in giving our lives away - standing up for the oppressed, fighting racism, ending poverty and hunger. Eldredge paints the picture of the 'real man' as one who climbs a mountain or fights a bear when it's the real man who does something about the 2 billion people who get by on $2 a day or less. It's the real man who learns how to avoid fights and practice peacemaking.

The wild popularity of this book feeds into the wild individualism that has crept into the Church and made it as irrelevant as it is today. A generation ago our Christian bookstores primarily contained commentaries and exegetical studies to help people more deeply understand the Christ of the Bible. Now they are nothing more than self-help stores mainly kept afloat by fundamentalists where this book was bound to be a bestseller.