“Toleration — isn’t the church about toleration” the young man said sitting in Crankeverend’s (CR) office one day. “Didn’t Jesus teach something about toleration?”
“Nope. Sorry! Jesus did not teach us to tolerate anything”, CR told the stunned young man. “We are not to tolerate the hypocrites of this world, we are not supposed to tolerate people who think differently than us, who look different from us, and who talk differently than us. Jesus said nothing about toleration. He didn’t say we should tolerate sinners, tolerate liars, tolerate backstabbers, tolerate poor people, tolerate the homeless, or tolerate yuppies, guppies and puppies.”
“Wait”, he said. “Are you sure Jesus didn’t say “Love the Lord your G-d with all your heart, mind and strength, and tolerate your neighbor”? “Tolerate your neighbor?” CR said. “What does that look like, tolerate your neighbor?” “Well”, he said. “Aren’t we supposed to tolerate people when they come to our church but only want to have a baptism or a wedding, and then they don’t come anymore once it is complete? Or aren’t we supposed to tolerate those who come to church and have opinions that are not like ours — so we tolerate them until they either get the message that they are not wanted here and go to another church or they learn to stop sharing their opinions? And what about the young families who bring their children into the church, and they cry and cry — aren’t we supposed to tolerate them, shooting them evil looks, but tolerate those babies until the parents realize there are no programs for them anyway so we tolerate them until they decide to go somewhere else?”
“Nope. Sorry! We shouldn’t even tolerate that”, CR said. “CR doesn’t think Jesus wants us to tolerate anyone who is different from us, or louder than us, or thinks differently from us, because if we tolerate one group, well then we will have to tolerate all different groups of people, and then there will be chaos in the church. And besides, you’re going to have to leave now because CR can’t tolerate all of your questions anymore.”
The young man left CR’s office as confused as he was when he came in. “Tolerate others”, CR said to himself. “Jesus said nothing about toleration — in fact CR hates the thought of toleration.” Looking at the ceiling, CR shouted, “CR cannot tolerate the word tolerate” as if yelling at the ceiling means G-d will hear CR better.
CR remembered a quote he once read about this thinking, and so he began feverishly digging through his records, until he found the quote. It was from an opinion piece written in the Presbyterian Outlook in 2003. The quote read:
“There is room for everyone in the household of faith, but it is the genius of American Protestantism that nearly every Christian believer can find and affiliate himself with a religious community that is congenial to his cast of mind. The important thing is that we should all respect these differences, not that we should try to bridge over them.”
“There it was”, CR thought to himself. “There is some proof that many people think Jesus taught us to tolerate one another.”
Crankeverend (CR) plopped his medium sized frame on one of the seats he tolerates in his office, and slowly shook his head. Tolerate one another. CR tolerates the chairs in his office, and still plops his butt on them, but he is just as willing to throw them into the dumpster in the alley if he gets the mind to stop tolerating them. And that is the same thinking that many have in the church today, that if they just tolerate people they don’t like long enough, that eventually they too will go the way of the chairs we finally choose not to tolerate.
But people are more than furniture, and Jesus taught more than toleration. What Jesus taught is love — a love that is so deep, so unconditional, so all encompassing that the example he chose to give was a “Father running to hug the son that treated him like he was dead”, The Prodigal Son. Not only did the son treat him like he was dead, demanding his inheritance before his father had died, but he wasted it on parties and women. And when the son finally came to himself and decided it would be better to work for his father, the one he treated so disgracefully, than to be working with pigs, when the son was still far off, the father ran to the son to welcome him home. That is not toleration, that is a love you and CR could wish to show others, but can only dream of showing to everyone, all the time, in all situations — because we are human — and humans have trouble with unconditional love. Humans are good at toleration — we are terrible at love.
Do any of the presidential candidates talk about love — or do they all speak of toleration? In the church, we better be working at loving people with the love Jesus is talking about, or who will tolerate coming to join us?
Crankeverend……………Out!
The "Frowning Glory" 
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