Now this man Micah had a shrine, and he made an ephod and some household gods and installed one of his sons as his priest. – Judges 17:6

Today’s Scripture Reading (December 16, 2015): Judges 17

I struggle with the concept of the Atheist Church. Or maybe that isn’t quite right. Maybe I understand it more than I am willing to admit. As far as I have been able to tell, the Atheist church combines the basic human need for community, the idea of unconditional acceptance and a place for the struggle for meaning in life, all unencumbered by an inconvenient belief in the existence of God. And I get that. I understand that as much as God has chosen his church as the method of bringing these very elements into this world of ours, the Church (and for the purposes of this discussion I will limit it to the Christian Church, because it is the organization with which I am most familiar) has failed completely at reflecting God and these important human elements to the world. Every time I hear about a new scandal inside the Christian Church, there is something inside of me that shrinks and shrivels. This is not who we are supposed to be. The Christian Church was never intended to be an institution of hate. God is not the God of hate and judgment, but we (the Church) seem to have the passion to reveal him as just that.

So knowing that we have revealed a god that does not reflect the one who has called us, I get that there is a temptation to want to erase God from the equation – to be able to struggle with the meaning of life without having to struggle with the character of God. My problem is that I really believe that these things are only available, at least in their highest form, from God. Community is only available in its highest form from the God who exists in essential Community as Father, Son and Spirit. Unconditional acceptance, in its highest form, is only available from the God who is willing to separate us from our sin as far as the East is from the West. And a safe place to struggle for the meaning of life only exists within the confines of the one who gave us life. The problem, which our atheist brothers and sisters have rightly noted, is that the Christian Church still struggles with these concepts – we haven’t arrived yet. And while some of us are quite aware of that fact, others seem blissfully ignorant of our own shortcomings.

So Micah begins to set up his own religion. It is important to note that he has no intentions of serving Ba’al or Moloch or any of the other Canaanite gods. His intention is to build a religion with a God that he can proclaim is the God of Israel, but who in actuality is just a god that he can control – or no god at all. He is attempting to build a church without the inconvenience that the real God of Israel introduces. His religion features all of the trappings and ornamental features of true Judaism, but its heart, the God who has removed Israel from its slavery and guided them into the Promised Land, has been removed. And that is a problem.

I started off by saying that I don’t understand the Atheist Church, and yet I do. The reality that I know is this – many Christian Churches are really already Atheist Churches. We have done the same things that Micah tried to do. We have retained all the external trappings of the Christian Church, but we have removed its heart, because God no longer resides there. In his place is either a god that we can control – or no god at all.  

Tomorrow’s Scripture Reading: Judges 18