As much as some people would like to believe, not all of Jesus’ teachings were about charity and love. At times, Jesus could be downright mean. In the book of Mark, the earliest of the Gospels, Robert Wright writes in the Atlantic that “Jesus’ most salient comment on ethnic relations is to compare a woman to a dog because she isn’t from Israel.”

Much of the image of Jesus as a proponent of universal love comes from the gospel of Paul, according to Wright, and Paul’s motivations may not have been entirely theological. Wright explores the idea of Paul as an “ambitious preacher of early Christianity,” who wanted to set up an expansive and franchised religious organization in an increasingly globalizing world—as much a CEO as a spiritual leader.

This reading of scripture could be dismissed as simple atheism, but Wright insists that he leaves room for “the prospect of divine purpose generically.” Christianity’s promotion of transnational love, respect, and morality may have been spiritually pragmatic, but exists within a historical widening of tolerance and amity for people generally. And if history moves gradually, and “fitfully” toward harmony, according to Wright, “then maybe some overarching purpose is built into the human endeavor after all.”

The argument bears some resemblance to one in Franny and Zooey by J.D. Salinger. Zooey insists that 98 percent of Christians try “to turn Jesus into St. Francis of Assisi to make him more ‘lovable.’” The problem is that “If God had wanted somebody with St. Francis’s consistently winning personality for the job in the New Testament, he’d’ve picked him, you can be sure.”

Source: The Atlantic 

“Suppose you spent 1 million dollars every single day starting from the day Jesus was born, and kept spending through today…You would still have spent less money than Congress just spent.” This comparison opens an anti-stimulus package television ad launched today by the conservative American Issues Project.

By invoking Jesus’ name, the ad suggests that he too would have been opposed to the stimulus plan. It is jarring to think of Jesus—who wasn’t a huge proponent of storing up treasures on earth—spending one million dollars every single day. (Are we to assume that Jesus would have spent nearly all of one day’s million-dollar allowance on this ad?)

What’s odd is that the ad says nothing substantive about Jesus’ views on money. Instead, it manipulates people by referencing Jesus in an ad that’s really about objections to economic policy; it’s a classic example of the unlikely marriage between fiscal conservatives and conservative Christians.

It’s hard to know whether or not the stimulus package will work, let alone what Jesus would have thought of it.

Maybe he would have said something like, “Sell all you possess and distribute it to the poor,” or “Whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.” Or he could have looked to Jerusalem’s history for past leaders’ responses to crises. Like when King Jehoash hired carpenters and masons to repair the temple after a period of civil turmoil, or when Nehemiah ended exploitative lending practices and returned peoples’ mortgaged land to them during a famine.

The city of Edmond, Oklahoma, recently offered to pay for half of a sculpture that looks suspiciously like Jesus and is titled, “Come Unto Me,” the Associated Press reports. The 26-inch bronze sculpture by Rosalind Cook, which shows a familiar-looking bearded man in a robe and sandals talking to children, is to be placed outside a Catholic gift shop whose owner raised the funds to pay the other half of the statue’s $7800 price tag. Speaking to the AP, June Cartwright of the Edmond Visual Arts Commission said, “It doesn't state that it is specifically Jesus. It is whatever you perceive it to be.”

The claim might be slightly disingenuous, considering the artist identified the sculpture as one of Jesus on her website.

After an outcry led by Americans United for Separation of Church and State, the mayor of Edmond announced that the city would not go through with the deal, and that the sculpture would be paid for by private funding.

The controversy lasted only a few days, but it's just one of many instances where the city of Edmond has tried to muddle the line between church and state. In 1996, Edmond lost a Supreme Court battle to keep a cross in the city seal. Last year, city officials were forced to back down from their decision to use over $8000 in public funds to put a statue of Moses outside a local church.

Christian leaders in Korea are up-in-arms over a new television documentary depicting Jesus as a good person, a political leader, but not as God. The Korean Times reports that the TV show called “Shineui Gil, Inganeui Gil” (The Road of God, the Road of Man), “was intended to seek harmony among religions involving Jehovah, God, and Jesus.” Christian leaders, however, have tried to stop the program from airing, claiming the directors are “trying to tarnish the honor of Jesus.”

Considering the offence they took over the TV show, Korean Christian leaders should probably stay away from the Wittenberg Door’s recent list of 10 of the worst movies about Jesus ever made. Writer Danny Gallagher selected a number of standouts from Jesus Christ Vampire Hunter (seen below) to Jesus, the Miniseries. A few of these films walk that fine line between satire and a truly horrible movie. The list also includes the Tom Hanks bomb, The DaVinci Code, but mystifyingly neglects The Passion of the Christ.

Jesus understands the great power and opportunity that lies in our ability to clone human beings, according to a funny, fictional Q&A by David Ng in the Science Creative Quarterly. In the discussion, Jesus learns the basics of genetics and imagines cloning himself:

GENETICIST: It is strangely fitting that you talk about your own needs, since the ultimate hope is for one day to use these cloning methodologies to alter deficiencies within our own human genetics. In fact, we could even one day clone a version of You with alterations of your own asking.

JESUS: That, my child, is an interesting option. I am allergic to kiwi, and I LOVE kiwi. Also, truth be told, I am also deeply troubled by my inability to roll my tongue (sticks his tongue out). See? It is the seat of much anguish since both my parents, Mary and Joseph, can do it. Sometimes I don’t even think they are my real parents.

(Thanks, Seed.)

—Sarah Pumroy