“You have heard it said, ‘Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.”
Matthew 5:43-44
A popular word with many 21st century theologians and philosophers is the word deconstruction. This is process of taking apart or unlearning some of the ideas we’ve been taught, typically in a formal academic setting, in order to reach a higher level of understanding. Many adults go through this deconstruction phase very naturally and can often be very helpful. However, the danger in deconstructing our theology lies in leaving it deconstructed. This is when many young adults who grew up in the church never come back to church. This is when believers have questions or doubts with regards to their faith but don’t have safe spaces to freely discuss their doubts. This is when a college student takes her first philosophy class and doesn’t know what to do with what her atheist professor said in one of the lectures. With deconstruction should always come reconstruction; taking apart then putting back together. This is what Jesus would often do in His teachings, most evidently in his teaching called the Beatitudes. “You have heard it said… But I tell you…” This was Jesus’ way of not simply repeating what many people already knew; it was Jesus’ way of going deeper to a well-known truth and getting to the heart of the truth. So if you’re in a deconstructive stage of your faith, remember to put it back together.
