What I notice here is that just about everyone (with the possible exception of Kat) is using the word "Christian" as if it denotes one monolithic group with one belief system. In the real world, that is not the case.

I belong to Central Lutheran Church on Capitol Hill in Seattle. This church does a lot of social service: provides free meals, seeks out housing for the homeless, visits prisoners at the Monroe State Reformatory (not to proselytize, but to conduct Alternatives to Violence workshops), headquarters for the Pacific Northwest chapter of the Lutheran Peace Fellowship. Lots of activism. Our pastors (a young woman and a very large black man with an ear-ring) have been known to get themselves arrested at demonstrations. One of our former pastors (now retired) did six months in the slammer for picketing at the Bangor Trident Submarine Base. There are some passages in Matthew 25 (about "the least of these") that these folks take pretty seriously. Evangelize? Button-hole people, drag them in, and try to save their souls? No. The best form of evangelism is by example. The congregation is burgeoning — lots of young people who join because they figure "these people are not full of hot air, they're actually doing something." Also, a few years ago, Central incorporated the "Affirmation of Welcome" (look it up "Advanced Search" on google.com). Boy did we get flak about that! From several other Christian denominations.

One the other hand, the Seattle area often has to put up with people like "the Redmond Rednecks." Same general stuff as the Southern Baptist Leadership Conference folks: trying to infiltrate the school system, demanding that certain books be removed from school and other libraries, the usual Fundamentalist blather. A few years back, they sued the University of Washington because the English Department offered a course called "The Bible as Literature." I took the course. The Prof treated the Bible as a collection of short stories, novellas, poems . . . in general, as literature. He made a point of saying that any religious interpretation was strictly up to the individual student, and we would not be discussing that part of it. That was the problem. The Redmond bunch objected because it was not being taught as the "revealed Word of God."

There are some huge gaps between various people who call themselves "Christians" As I mentioned in another thread, Fundamentalists give Christians a bad name.

For myself, I may actually be a Pagan. I'm still working that out.

Don Firth