Gravitational heresies

Here is a list of attractions that have persistently invited Christians, over the centuries, to veer off course. Surely, when you're off the course, you've dropped into heresy.

But there are bad attractions (like sin and passion and atheism), and then there are "good" attractions. And for these latter ones, Christians really ought to always be "attracted" by these:

1. Universalism -- i.e., the belief that everyone (including the devil) will eventually be saved. Yes, it's a heresy (ask Origen, maybe). But the idea should at least remain appealing. No one should be happy about the inevitability of perdition. And, for God's sake, no one should ever "need" or be assured that someone is going to hell. It is better to be a Universalist than to be a Double Pre-destinarian. Better to believe in Gaia than to believe in a deity that damns before conception.

2. Pacifism -- yes, we all know that there will never be perfect world peace until the Messiah comes for the second time. But frankly, in this day and age, Christians need to "man up" and admit that there is and never was a truly Christian warrant for violence. At best, the "just war" theory -- as dubious as it really is -- is an accommodation with the way the world is. And at best, the provision of personal and family defense is just that also -- only an accommodation: it can never be part of one's Christian birthright (please note, before the fever sets in, that we are speaking of defense against humans and not sport or, less likely, the necessary provision of food).

3. Charitism -- this is a made-up word, admittedly: but it represents the tendency toward giving money and food away to those in need, and even supporting the State's involvement. Indeed, one can go too far along these lines (and one often does), and becomes so liberally accepting that he gives up on theism completely, and becomes "religiously" communistic (and ends up supporting a tyrannical culture of revolution). After all, it was the Byzantine State that invented hospitals, and one doubts very much whether present-day libertarians would have enjoyed the taxation economy of Constantinople's regime. True, there are real Christian criticisms of socialism (as usually defined) -- enough so that prevents any acceptance of a socialistic state. But at the same time, there are real Christian criticisms of capitalism: enough so that prevents any Christian acceptance of the system that we now have.

4. Environmentalism -- yes, there are crazy EarthFirster's and moonbats who demand a "return to the wild" (like l'enfant terrible Rousseau). But Christians should be able to tell the difference between these folk, and the much more valid concern for the land. All Creation belongs to the Creator -- so the whole idea of owning land is temporary at most -- and we call this temporality "stewardship." "Dominion" has never meant foolish exhaustion of resources, or the ugly befouling of natural beauty -- which is itself a symbol of God's Beauty. Christians should always "tend" toward environmentalism. They should at least remember that the paternal protection of the beautiful land and its creatures is the first and truest meaning of "conservatism."