What ever happened.....

to "Christian civility"?

Maybe I'm a bit outdated, but I can remember--and remember well, at that--when Christ-followers treated each as "brothers and sisters" in the Lord--even when we disagreed with one another.

That doesn't seem to happen much anymore.

And it's sad.

I was sitting here at my desk remembering how I was vilified and demonized more than two years ago--by people I've known a long time--because I refused to vote for the re-election of the current President of the United States and his ensuing administration.

I was made out to be some "monster" that would destroy the United States--just because I didn't vote for Bush/Cheney/Rumsfeld, et al. I was called just about every name in the book, and some that I had never heard of before. All because I exercised my legal, lawful, Constitutionally-guaranteed privilege of "freedom of speech."

Of course some of the same people who have "monster-ized" me claim to be Spirit-filled believers. I have no doubt in my mind they are indeed.

But what bothers me--and I may wax lengthy, if not eloquent here--is that too many Christ-followers now allow little room for diversity and difference in points of view when it comes to non-essential matters.

We Christ-followers have gotten mighty hasty in labeling people...believing that if we can "label them" that we fully understand them.

Nothing is further from the truth.

We are quick to call people "liberal" or "sectarian" or "less-spiritual" or "out-there"---particularly when we don't agree with them. If there are biblical bases for not agreeing, we can do so, but we are still enjoined to use grace and goodness--

Even in our disagreements.

Go ahead, call me a name. But make sure you are honoring the Christ to whom we all belong when you do it.