To Love or Not Love the World

Recovering from a Malformed View of the World took Time

At age six, I understood why I couldn’t see ‘Mary Poppins’ in the theatre. I already knew the Fundamental Evangelical mantra: the world was evil, Hollywood and movies were the epitome of “the world,” and the Bible says “love not the world, neither anything that is in the world.” 

But I kinda liked the world. ‘Mary Poppins’ seemed good to me.

From childhood, I was taught to loathe the world and shun anything “worldly.” This was the holiness church ghetto in which I lived. It would take me years to understand that this was not normal, a deformation of a healthy worldview with a skewed moral compass.

Eventually, through some tepid—and some quite insanely risky—forays into “worldliness,” I came to appreciate, respect, regard, live in and caringly critique “the world” in which I reside as a fallen, fallible, striving neighbor.

Through encounters with authentic and loving “worldly” neighbors—those whose genuine goodness defied/defies my malformed Fundamental Evangelical moral and metaphysical constructs—I have come to embrace this world, my neighbors and my responsible role in this world as what matters most.

Greater than the warning to “love not the world” is the radical admonition of Jesus to “love your neighbor as yourself.” As we do so, the way of the hoped-for future for the world opens before us.