Obsession
When one obsesses over something or someone, it is said that they throw caution to the wind in favor of that pursuit. To obsess is to preoccupy one’s mind and drive on one or several things. A compulsion, usually out of the control of the person in question, to pursue a goal, trail, concept, idea, or person, with no end in sight. We understand that obsession can be a psychological disorder where one may be unable to desist from their often harmful habits, not to say they may not even admit to the fact that they have a problem, to begin with. Obsessions control the mind, spirit, and soul to the point of self-destruction if not understood, diagnosed, challenged, corrected, healed, and overcome.
The opposite of obsession, an inherently negative term, is indifference, unconcern, or worse, apathy. When one shows little to no attentiveness to that which matters in life, say, their diet, for one, their health begins to deteriorate. Another example is how one may show no concern for social life, community, family, or love. This absence of mind and heart in things is a pathology yet to be diagnosed, perhaps an issue far deeper than an individual is willing to discuss, hence their reluctance to talk about said issues in the first place. Their apathy is evident in the face of some events wherein everyone but them experiences a shared sense of mourning. They in turn critique or mock the situation with a flippant sense of superiority on the matter when they are emotionally and socially crippled by their indifference.
Both obsession and its opposites are intrinsically harmful habits and habit-forming thought patterns for human beings.
Dreams of Death
Growing up in an evangelical (fundamentalist) Pentecostal denomination allowed me to grow in the knowledge of God, Scripture, community service, the ins and outs of choirs and worship groups, music, and the majestic splendor of Brazilian cuisine. I might have lived to 100 had I grown up in any other culture with a cuisine that utilized less sodium in their diet. But here I am, 34 years into life, with a potential risk factor as a result of my country’s high sodium diet. Sodium, however, was not the only thing my culture and the church were obsessed with.
I recall many days and nights when I visualized my graphic immolation at the hands of some lynch mob in Africa. Other times I would daydream about the glories of being shot dead by some Communist soldier as I shared my faith with Slavic believers behind the now-defunct Iron Wall. I recall many times how I shared my faith with fellow students at school, during our weekly lunch gatherings to discuss God, faith, the Bible, and yes, martyrdom. I recall the times I shared the stories of martyrs in antiquity and how my eyes would water up at the thought of me being next. I had Not Of This World (NOTW) stickers and merchandise everywhere. I had just about memorized every death in DC Talk’s Book of Martyrs. I sang and rapped songs that discussed martyrdom as if I were preparing my mind for my death in a similar situation. I always feared that soldiers or police officers would kick down our home or church door, round us up, and execute us for our faith in Christ because so often this stuff was discussed at church by our leaders as if it were going to happen today or tomorrow. I was programmed into wanting to become a martyr via my work as a missionary. I had no aspirations of becoming a doctor, firefighter, nurse, theologian, architect, or electrician. My dream was to preach Christ to the most remote areas of the planet and die doing so. My fanaticism surrounding martyrdom was accentuated by the romanticization of my church body and church culture created around suffering and death. Almost the same way some people romanticize and reenact the death of Jesus as some form of cultural remembrance of Christ’s death. As if Christ’s crucifixion wasn’t horrific enough, we would dramatize it time and again for kids to watch. We idolized Mel Gibson’s Passion film before it was bloody good and depicted martyrdom, a trophy many of us secretly and openly wanted to emulate.
I wanted to be a martyr. But the truth is, I was misled into believing that I wanted to be a martyr for Christ. The truth is the sensationalization of real or imagined violence against Christians only increased the number of people in our church and from that influx of people, we saw a burst in apocalyptic preaching, and as a result, spontaneous baptisms which in turn made thousands of intellectually challenged people running on fear members of a church that valued money and power over the spiritual and mental well-being of its adherents.
Our church, as an extension of numerous churches in Brazil and abroad (US, Europe, and Africa) shared an unnatural and constant obsessive fascination with the social malady that is persecution and the undeniably sad consequence of it, martyrdom.
That denomination, at least a sub-sect of that denomination, is still very much active in the world today. It has hundreds, if not thousands of churches that believe the same way. I know this because the same man who presided over the ministry and denomination then when all of this stuff was being taught, explicitly and implicitly, is still the president of the ministry now. I believe he has created for himself and his family (also high-ranking members in the ministry and local government bodies) a religious dynasty.
Persecution of the Church
You see, throughout Church history, from Jesus up to date, Christians all over have experienced a spectrum of discomforts as a result of being and professing faith in Jesus. The Jewish Sanhedrin of antiquity hunted and imprisoned Jewish Christians for their faith in the Jewish Rabbi who many claimed to have seen rise from the dead. The Jews of that day would flog and at times enact lynchings against the followers of Jesus. These extrajudicial executions were public and witnessed by dozens if not hundreds of assenting Orthodox Jews and their religious clerics. In their mind, they believed that Christians were idolatrous and a nuisance to the political well-being of Jews in Roman Palestine.
Outside of Palestine/Judea, Greco-Romans hunted down Christians and charged them with inciting violence, blasphemy, monolatry (idolizing a single deity, as Rome had a plethora of deities that had to be worshiped), and treason against Caesar (as the Emperor required worship as well, which Christians denied him any). There exist today numerous paintings of Christians being crucified, mauled by lions, stabbed by gladiators, flogged by Roman centurions, and more. These paintings accurately depict what life was like for religious minorities who refused to pay lip service to the king and paid for such disobedience with their lives. (Not just nor always Christians, but yes, many Christians.)
These Christians would then and now be recognized as martyrs (witnesses) with beautiful hagiographies (the lives and veneration of saints) produced about them. People who offered their lives up to the flames of hate and violence in the name of their God.
Persecutions continued throughout the world, throughout the centuries, under Christian Empires or Ottoman/Muslim Empires from then on. Christians (and Jews, later on) were hunted, captured, rounded up, and massacred en masse in numerous states and nations. If it wasn’t a Pope ordering the massacre of dissenting believers then it was a Sultan ordering the massacre of people who did not believe in the power and prophetic calling of Mohammed.
The world over, followers of Christ sought refuge in Africa, western Europe, and later, the Americas, from religious persecution. They fled Protestants who wanted to erase Catholics. Others fled Catholics who wanted to eradicate Protestants. These massacres and wars were equal parts political and religious, as both camps sought to attain hegemony over the concept of clarity of theological thought and of political power to live out those theological ideals without dissent.
Even with the advent of the Renaissance, the maturation of atheism and other philosophies that live outside or without the concept of faith in God or gods, the overthrow of clericalism in Europe, the concept of individuality, free thought outside of the Church, and the Christianization of culture without compulsion, people continued to experience varied forms of persecution throughout the world.
In Eastern Europe and parts of Asia, with the onset of Communis, many religious groups in these areas faced extensive violence and repression under totalitarian regimes. Whoever expressed faith in God in those environments would end up in a penal colony somewhere cold and remote or worse, dead. In the Americas, varied Christians experienced persecution not solely because of their faith but because of their indigeneity or their race. Believers who looked different or not white were excluded from theological conversations, Church formation, liturgical organization, and social development. Non-White Christians in the Americas suffered persecution well into the late 1960s and 1970s as a result of their social-reform-focused faith movements that spurred the rise and success of the Civil Rights campaigns in the United States of America, and as a result, throughout other American countries thereafter.
With well over a millennium of horrible and numerous tales of persecution and martyrdom, one might give into the thought that the same animus against Christians that existed then is just as present and prevalent now. Namely, that the same governmental and political powers that exercised total control and grievous punitive measures against Christians then are in power and active in the world today.
The fear of a totalitarian anti-Christian government body does NOT exist in the world today (outside of North Korea, a select few Islamic nations, and Asian nations that restrict proselytization or church gatherings without a permit).
The fact is that there are more “Christians” in power around the world today than ever before. And by power, I mean political, religious, social, and financial power. The reason why I typed the term Chrisitan in quotation marks is because I need you to understand that the moniker and identification of “Christian” does not necessarily translate into the concept that someone follows the words and teachings of Jesus Christ. With time, people-states have co-opted the term to identify their ethnic, racial, or national identity as Christian, more than their religious affiliation and disposition to spread the Gospel and live out the meek, humble, and redemptive teachings of their Lord.
Therefore, consider the Christianized world today, as Christians do have a monopoly on industry, news, power, and more, and ask yourself if there is a need to focus on or sensationalize persecution and martyrdom where it does not exist.
What ends up happening with and when cultural Christians lose an inch of political and social influence over their immediate and distant spheres of power, is they perceive that loss or perceived loss as persecution; similar to that of antiquity wherein they are in fear of bodily harm at the hands of an encroaching mob.
What many “Christians” mean today when they say something to the effect that “persecution is just around the corner” or “they’re going to round us up next” is that these Christians are losing their hold of influence on culture and this equality of power and influence is perceived as oppression.
If it is true that scores of Christians are being massacred (as it does happen from time to time in Nigeria, under Boko Haram; in Syria, under the Islamic State; in Gaza, under the Israeli Defense Force; in China, under the People’s Party; in India, under the violent lynchings done by Buddhists and Hinduists; etc.) then we must pay homage to those whose lives were lost because of their faith. We must elevate our voices, as a collective of believers to denounce targeted violence and demand that our local and national leaders influence those regions of the world where freedom of expression is denied to create in them a haven of ideological plurality without the presence of fear and violence. Today we have that power because enough Christians gained it, in some places (sadly) by violence and in others by the plebiscite, to usher the world into a safer place for Christians and non-Christians alike.
But, if the thought of persecution and martyrdom circles around one’s loss of political power and influence, namely, on whether a Democrat or Republican takes office, whether a progressive or conservative is in power, whether a man can marry another man or whether a man can cross-dress or not, whether the grocery store manager speaks Spanish instead of English, or whether your taxes are being diverted from military defense spending toward public healthcare, education, retirement funds, and more, are not signs that you are experiencing imperial persecution at the hands of devilish dictators. These are signs that society is evolving.
The fact is that Christians have held hegemony over the Western world as we know it for nearly 1,700 years. The equalization of power throughout different demographics does not mean you are a victim of persecution. People NOT wishing you a Merry Christmas come December does not mean you’re going to be impaled outside the local government building on December 26. Your denunciation of gay marriage and trans rights does not mean you will experience a literal crucifixion. You’ll be ostracized in public or social media, but you’ll still have your home, your job, your church, your car, your savings, and your two vacations a year to Mexico to build homes for homeless Mexican children whom you’ll ostracize should they ever seek a better way of life across the border into your country, some two thousand miles away from where you live. You’ll still be able to go to church come Sunday, or on any day of the week to visit one of the sixteen churches down the main street of your town.
When a Black woman runs for president and presents a world different from the one you grew up in, that does not make that woman nor her administration the anti-Christ. It simply means the world is changing, at times, often, for the better, and the world as you knew it, the simple, racially monochromatic, patriarchal, often misogynist world, is disappearing.
Persecution and martyrdom, as we read in books like Foxe’s Book of Martyrs, The Spanish Inquisition: The History and Legacy of the Catholic Church’s Notorious Persecution of Heretics, and other similar works, no longer exist in the West, and many parts of the East and Far East today. The world is more open and relaxed toward religion today than it has ever been. Ever before. To the point where one can adhere to a particular belief, several beliefs, or none at all, without facing any form of governmental or social backlash. Today, you can walk into a university classroom and find people who adhere to various faiths, working together and for a brighter tomorrow.
Closing Thoughts
My essay is for people, fellow believers, who are constantly fretting about the advent of a nefarious dictator or overlord who will round Christians into jails and divest the world of followers of Christ in some cruel and gruesome way as the world watches on. You have nothing to worry about.
We do not have a Roman Caesar to fret. We do not have a bloodthirsty Pope to fear. The Crusades were wrong and thankfully they ended over 700 years ago. The Reformation wars have come and gone. Imperial and colonial rule, as a result of greed for power, money, manpower, and religious hegemony has lost its steam. Christians today are attempting to decolonize their faith in an attempt to see Jesus through the power-grabbing monarchs and systems of oppression of yesteryear.
The truth is that obsession of any sort is unhealthy for your spiritual and communal development. Giving into conspiracy theories, prophets of fear and doom, and political fear-mongering is antithetical to the Gospel message for which you were called.
The martyrs of antiquity fretted a real danger that no longer exists today. They walked the flames, drank the poison, sat in vats of oils to be cooked alive, were mauled by beasts, speared by soldiers, hung, drowned, and ravaged with no other thought in mind but Christ. Their fervent and constant focus on the Divine Healer and Redeemer afforded them the peace and resilience required to endure such horrific deaths.
We don’t have those pressures today, hence our constant obsession with loss of influence becoming a persecution in and of itself as if our faith is made valid by some form of suffering without which our whole concept of Jesus and faith on earth is nullified. This way of thinking about purpose and calling is pathological, at best, and satanic, at worst.
Let go of this mindset and take on the mind of Christ, which liberates, educates, sanctifies, and ushers us to help our neighbors (friend or foe).
It may be that your very obsession with being persecuted and martyred may lead you to persecute and martyr innocent Christians and non-Christians, in the name of playing it safe for Jesus. Do not allow this obsession to become a beachhead from which the enemy of your soul will exploit this opening into your life to accomplish his goals. He has used this tactic throughout history before, hence the robust volumes of Church History wherein the church committed some of the most heinous crimes ever recorded.
Your obsession with persecution may be a projection; an unnamed unhealthy desire where you derive pleasure from suffering, yours and that of others. Seek help. Find deliverance. Be free from fear.
“There is no fear in love, but perfect love drives out fear, because fear involves punishment. The one who fears has not been perfected in love. We love because He first loved us. If anyone says, ‘I love God,’ but hates his brother, he is a liar. For anyone who does not love his brother, whom he has seen, cannot love God, whom he has not seen. And we have this commandment from Him: Whoever loves God must love his brother as well.” – 1 John 4:18-21
Speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves; ensure justice for those being crushed. – Proverbs 31:8 NLT
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