It's for the church

I've been discussing with some friends recently the idea we've come across that 'if it's for the church, then it's o.k.' This idea comes from some who attend church regularly, are active, who tithe and seem to be model parisioners. And then we find out that they've been making a few copies at work for their class or spending some time at work preparing the presenttion for Sunday or something else and they've never talked about it with their employer.

Where does being a good Christian involve stealing from one's employer?

But they don't see it like that. The good Lord needs them to do it and their employer has all of these supplies sitting around or they have time during their work hours or .... and since it is for the Lord they should just get it done.

I wish I could say this was an unusual intepretation of what it means to be a good Christian, but I can't. And so we have those for whom Christianity becomes something they will never do, becasue of the actions of so-called Christians which deny the very one they claim to worship.

Or as Karl Rahner says -

The number one cause of atheism is Christians. Those who proclaim God with their mouths and deny Him with their lifestyles is what an unbelieving world finds simply unbelievable.

Karl Rahner, quoted in _The Wittenburg Door_, June/July, 1988