Christianese

I’ve been having a problem talking with some of my Christian friends lately. For the first time in my life, I’ve been away from the Christian community for quite a few months and I’ve had a problem returning to it. Part of the problem is that I no longer completely understand Christianese. I don’t quite understand how Christianese ever started, but I regret that it did, and that’s not really the point anyway. I think very few Christians understand how difficult it is to bond with someone spiritually who uses this language. I want to explain what I mean by that.

Try to have a conversation with someone who speaks Christianese and you’ll usually hear the following phrases: “I have a passion for…” “I am blessed because…” “I have a heart for…” “I feel led to…” “I feel like God desires…” “My vision for…” “As Christians, I think we should…” “I have a lot of compassion for…” “What would Jesus do?” “I’ve prayed about it and…” “We should really seek God’s passion/vision for…”

In the examples above, the most common words used are passion, vision, desire, seek, feel, led, blessed, and heart. Rarely do those words occur in the English language in normal, every day life. In normal conversation, people who hear these words are not only forced to pause so that they can remember their meaning, but they also must understand the symbolism in context. For example, if I said “I have a heart for the poor,” native Christianese speakers would understand that I want to help the homeless. But our culture does not commonly use “have a heart” as a substitute for “want.” I understand that there is a deeper meaning in the term “have a heart,” but our common language is not without its deep meanings either. What if I said, “I have a heart for paying taxes,” “I have a heart to eat healthy,” or “I have a heart for not cussing?” Are these not still duties we can do as Christians? It would not only sound strange to say these things, but it would also put us at an unnecessary distance from our listeners.

This distance not only occurs between Christian and non, but also between Christians themselves. If you notice, the use of Christianese is considerably decreased between close friends and private conversations. It is possible that this is due to the dropping of social facades or fears, which might also be the reason Christianese is used in the first place. Honestly, I do not know. However, I can imagine myself speaking in vague, interpretive Christianese to get myself out of a conflict. “It’s not that I disagree with what you’re saying, it’s just that I feel like God desires me to have a passion for seeking his vision and purpose rather than doing what you say.” I know this works because I have used it many times before to avoid conflict.

An unintended, or sometimes intended, result of speaking Christianese is to avoid speaking frankly or honestly. It’s pretty lame, actually. If there were a Miss Christian America pageant, I could imagine the winner saying something like, “I have always desired to seek God’s face and pray for Him to change my heart so that I can be used to pursue His vision for the world.” In other words, “World peace.”

Anyway, I am trying to change my language such that every Christianese word that I use can be easily translated. I use the words “want,” “like,” “enjoy,” “love,” “hope,” and “happy” as much as possible now. To quote C.S. Lewis, “Nature never taught me that there exists a God of glory and of infinite majesty. I had to learn that in other ways. But nature gave the word glory a meaning for me. I still don't know where else I could have found one.” Perhaps we should not be inventing meanings for obscure words, but we should be using common, secular, and comprehensible language to describe our most intimate relationship. At the very least, I could start to understand my friends again, and they could begin to understand me. God knows I have a heart for it.