Why does a Christian subculture exist? Why are there Christian bookstores and Christian magazines and Christian books and Christian music and Christian concerts and Christian clubs and Christian coffee mugs? Perhaps so a good intentioned grandmother can buy her grandson something uplifting. Nice answer, but it doesn’t justify an entire subculture.
The only decent reason for the justification of the Christian subculture I’ve been able to come up with is because we’re trying to ensure that what we are filling our minds with is good, wholesome, and pure. The easiest way to do that seems to be substitute everything we like in the mainstream culture with a sanitized, Christian version. The only other justification is mere profit, and I’m sure that’s not the reason.
The sad thing is this desire for sanitized products shows only one thing: laziness. We’re too lazy to actually test and discern what is good for our own consumption, so we let others do it. We trust a certain record label or book publisher to tell us what is Christian, then we buy anything they put their stamp of approval. Funny that evangelical Protestants do this and at the same time most of them mock Catholics for their unswerving devotion to the divine word of the pope. Protestants have simply replaced the pope with a Christian adjective that can be applied to anything.
Safety, security, laziness, profit. These are the words that justify a Christian subculture. I don’t remember Jesus calling us to any of that.
It is sad that a “Christian subculture” exists at all. It does breed laziness, and a lot of “Christian” movies, books, etc. are crap. Much of that merchandise lacks creativity, talent, and even truth. And some of it is just stupid. C’mon….a rock with a verse on it? Mints that have Scripture? Makes no sense. We should be excelling at whatever craft or talent we have. We should be finding truth in everything, not just what we find in a Bible bookstore. We are limiting our exposure to truth, and thus, our exposure to God.
Hell yeah… Great word. You are right.
-Johnny Lanson
The Christian subculture exists because Christians are, in God’s eyes at least, a distinct people group – and all people groups are distinguished by their unique culture. The Bible contains many warnings not to be conformed to worldly patterns, philosophies, standards, etc. Christian subculture can be about sincere Christian people living out a radically different lifestyle as a witness in full view of the world.