Editor’s note – Christianity gets dismissed as divisive more often than it gets argued with, and that charge can be enough to make believers go quiet. This author admits believing it once. What follows traces one clean line: the real question was never whether a claim divides people, but whether the claim is true. Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s stand against the Nazi state gives that argument its sharpest edge.
Critics of Christianity say it is bad because it is divisive.¹
I believed this myself for a long time. The claims of Christianity seemed far too polarizing to be able to live in a world I shared with others.
That was part of the reason I acted like I was ashamed of Jesus.
But it turns out both beliefs rested on deception.
Through God’s grace, I came to see that Jesus truly does know me and love me. Just like He loves this former satanist, this former tarot card reader, and you.
And I now see the so-called problem of division is also built on a foundation of deception.
Here’s how the implicit framework plays out:
- (1) Dividing people is bad
- (2) Christianity divides people
- (3) Therefore, Christianity is bad
The unstated argument hinges on whether division is itself a problem. We often live like it is.
But it’s not.
The Reality of Truth Claims
The real issue isn’t whether a claim causes division, but about whether the claim is true.
Jesus claimed to be the Son of God who came to give His life as a ransom for many and reconcile the world to the Father.
That’s a big claim.
And an exclusive one, since He also said He was the only way to the Father.
It is a claim of exclusive and objective truth. It challenged people. It thrilled people. It confused some of them. It threatened some and made them angry.
And this is what happens with all truth claims. The bigger the claim, the bigger the reaction and the greater the need for careful evaluation.
It’s not only Jesus.
Every claim of exclusive and objective truth automatically distinguishes between what is false and what is true.
Bonhoeffer and the Nazis
Dietrich Bonhoeffer and the Confessing Church in Germany were polarizing forces in Nazi Germany.
Bonhoeffer said the German state was acting in an evil and immoral way, and he claimed that it was wrong to be silent in the face of such evil.
He claimed that when the Church sees that the State fails in its function to create law and order, the Church has a duty not only to “bandage the victims under the wheel” of the State, but must “jam a spoke in the wheel itself.”²
He was undeniably divisive.
He divided true Christians from the Nazi controlled German Christian movement. He divided lies from truth. He divided cowardice from courage.
Was he wrong?
Or was he right to pursue division because Nazism was built on evil lies of racial superiority and domination?
Even in a postmodern age of relativistic “truth,” the answer is still clear to most of us.
Bonhoeffer was right and Hitler and the Nazis were wrong. Moral claims are truth claims. And all claims of truth are inherently exclusionary to competing claims.
Editor’s note – Bonhoeffer paid for that division with his life, hanged by the Nazis weeks before the war ended. Standing on truth rarely comes free, and the cost is often what critics miss when they equate division with wrongdoing.
Another Example
Who was Jesus?
Christians, atheists, Gnostics, Muslims, and Jews all have different answers to that question.
- Muslims claim that Mohammed was a prophet from God who came to bring the Quran after the Bible had been corrupted. They believe Jesus was a great prophet born of the Virgin Mary but was not crucified.
- Many Jewish people believe Jesus was a false prophet who was not the Messiah and certainly not the Son of God.
- Gnostics believe that God in the Old Testament is different from God in the New Testament.
- Some, but not all, atheists believe Jesus was not real.³ And all atheists reject the claims Jesus made of His divinity and the accounts in the Gospels of His Resurrection.
These are all claims to understand objective reality.
Whether we recognize it or not, we’re all living with truth claims as our guiding principles each and every day.
Christianity IS Divisive
Jesus never claimed to be a unifying force.
He is the Prince of Peace, but He’s supremely realistic.
During his earthly ministry, He gave an open invitation to all who are weary and burdened to come and follow Him. But many chose to reject Him.
Jesus didn’t celebrate the resulting conflict, but He knew that truth forces people to make decisions.
Do you think I came to bring peace on earth? No, I tell you, but division. From now on there will be five in one family divided against each other, three against two and two against three. They will be divided, father against son and son against father, mother against daughter and daughter against mother, mother-in-law against daughter-in-law and daughter-in-law against mother-in-law. [Luke 12:51-53]
Christianity is indeed divisive, just like every single worldview is.
But division itself is not the goal of Christianity. The goal is healing, wholeness, forgiveness of sin, and newness of life found in Christ alone.
Editor’s note – Jesus predicted this division; He never apologized for it. He promised Himself, not comfortable relationships, and left people to decide what to do with that.
How to Evaluate Worldviews
The best way to evaluate any objective claim of truth is to test it.
Investigate the claims using rational thinking instead of unreliable emotional reasoning.
One test is what kind of fruit comes from the life of true believers. Jesus said fruit will grow in the lives of those who follow Him and will be missing from false prophets who claim to operate in His name.
Bonhoeffer was one who was clearly empowered by his faith to love God and to love his enemies.
“If our enemy cannot put up with us any longer and takes to cursing us, our immediate reaction must be to lift up our hands and bless him. Our enemies are the blessed of the Lord…We are ready to endure their curses so long as they redound to their blessing.” [Bonhoeffer, The Cost of Discipleship]
He shows us it is possible for Christians to love our enemies even as we follow Jesus in standing for objective truth and morality.
Editor’s note – Bonhoeffer never softened his opposition to the regime, and he never stopped loving the people caught inside it. Holding both at once is the actual Christian call, not a contradiction to resolve away.
The real danger isn’t about causing offense and leading to division.
That’s inevitable.
The danger comes from shrinking back from the truth because we’re afraid of the cost that might come from standing with it.
1: Here’s Nietzsche in The Antichrist, aphorism 58:
“The Christian and the anarchist: both are décadents; both are incapable of any act that is not disintegrating, poisonous, degenerating, blood-sucking; both have an instinct of mortal hatred of everything that stands up, and is great, and has durability, and promises life a future…”
2: Seeking Dietrich Bonhoeffer: https://www.cslewisinstitute.org/resources/seeking-dietrich-bonhoeffer/
3: Did Jesus Exist? https://atheists.org/classic-resources/did-jesus-exist/
A Word from the Editor
We should not shrink back from truth, in love, for fear of its cost. That fear is old – Peter felt it by a charcoal fire – and the church has faced it ever since. Jesus never asked us to manufacture unity through silence; He asked us to hold what’s true and love the people it divides us from, the way Bonhoeffer did until it cost him his life.
Salvation – Eternal Life in Less Than 150 Words
Distributed by – BCWorldview.org
Editor Comment: You show that truth, not conflict, is the real dividing line, and that matters because Jesus said as much before you did. Bringing Bonhoeffer into the argument gives readers a concrete picture of what costly, faithful division looks like when the lie being resisted is evil. However, as firm as we need to be in expressing the truth of God's word, we also can accomplish that goal while also showing His love and compassion, even in situations where it is not returned.
This article appeared on Medium and is reprinted with modifications and by permission.