Thank you for, once again, writing this. Might you consider making this into a copypasta, considering how often it has to be repeated here? /s
And:
cf. the second paragraph of something I posted here a while back about teaching history to university students, and getting to the part about the Reformation:
I write on the chalkboard “Justification by Faith,” and “Justification by Works.” Then I ask the class: “Do you have to do good works to get into heaven?” and most of the class says “yes.” Then, “Well, isn’t faith alone enough to do it?” Again, the class says “yes.” So we discuss. They settle on “You have to go to church, and you have to contribute to charity, and you have to have a pastor who knows a lot about the Bible, and you have to follow all the rules of the Church.” But, then, they also say “Well, accepting Jesus is all you need.” So, I ask, “If you accept Jesus but then go out an murder people and fornicate and steal, is it all good?” “Yes, because Jesus will forgive you.”
Your point about “They can do nearly anything, and it will get forgiven,” is spot-on because it’s how they’ve been taught to approach their own version of Christianity. They’ve accepted Jesus–everything else is a footnote. They see their own cultural interactions the same way, except in this case there’s the “other” to deal with. Their own people will forgive them, and be forgiven by them. But the “other” has to tread a much finer line, because they haven’t expereinced the true “grace” of being on the inside.
