Together 2016 was a beautiful sentiment with honest believers surrounded by hate.
It seemed like as daunting a mission as solving for world peace. What if we could unite thousands of Christians from all over the country in one place where we could forget about our differences and simply love each other and worship our Savior? With more than 350 thousand people confirmed for attendance and a killer lineup of speakers and musicians, this seemed like a full-proof plan. Music, food, water, community, and hearts on fire for Jesus. What more could a Christian want?
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Walking In...
When we first came to the event, the metro trains were already flooded with Together 2016 attendees. This alone was exciting because we were wearing our faith on our sleeves. I felt like we were one community and one people. I smiled at anyone and everyone that looked at me. My heart was filled with innocent and naïve excitement.
Walking into the event was rough because the line snaked around the entire mall. Their hashtag dream of "fill[ing] the mall" was becoming a reality.
I'm not sure why I was surprised, but the moment I saw anti-Christian groups and hate-preachers (UNCW folks, pictures hundreds of Brother Ross's with megaphones and bigger signs), a hint of cynicism cracked through my heart. I tried not to let it get to me -- especially after we met so many other joyful, excited people. We got high-fives, amiable "Good morning!"s and so many "May God bless you!"s that I stopped counting.
But the megaphones were so loud and their signs looked like giant ransom notes.
What Went Right?
If you stayed in line long enough to get into the fenced off monument lawn area, it was beautiful. It was filled with music, community, worship, and love. The line up included famous Christian musicians like Lecrae, Hillsong United, and Casting Crowns.
It was beautiful at first. People were so sweet to each other and they all looked blissfully happy. Crowds of thousands were lifting their hands up and closing their eyes as they sang. Teenagers had come with their youth groups in matching, brightly colored t-shirts. They were laughing, running around, and standing in crazy long lines for food.
"If there was so much unity inside the event, then what's your problem?" you may ask.
What Went Wrong?
The purpose of this event was to unite all Christians. But a few things went wrong.
Unity And Love For All! (Except You People)
The idea of this event was beautiful: a reset button on our religious unity. However, we can't reset (it would seem) prejudiced and narrow-minded ideals that have been stone-stubborn for centuries. Since its very conception, our religion has been greatly divided based on beliefs.
If you are a liberal-minded (and I don't mean Democrat), praise-worship-music-loving Christian with a group of people, a straight shot to the event, and a picnic setup, then you would have adored this.
Personally, I was raised Baptist, but I attended this event with Catholics. (I've been interested in the religion and have been attending a Catholic bible study). They brought rosaries with them and wore crucifixes around their necks just as casually as Protestants wear crosses around theirs.
The moment people around us deducted that we were Catholic, I could feel the animosity growing.
"What the hell?" someone snapped when my boyfriend walked by with rosaries to give out for free (handmade, too).
"I'm not gonna take one until I know what you're about," another person said after accepting a pamphlet about the rosary skeptically.
It was then that I realized how privileged I had been in the popular Christian world. I had never had a fellow Christian tell me my faith was wrong.
All my Catholic friends had wanted was to share their rosaries and pray at this event of love and unity. There was supposed to be meditation and peace and prayer and love. Yet here we were, being cast aside as if we didn't belong.
All for One, but ... Not One for All?
There were soapbox hate-preachers lined up all along the boarders of the event. If you wanted to get into the event or leave it, you would be bombarded with so much hate and animosity.
I had to post a trigger warning on Twitter because an abortion group with graphic images of late-term aborted babies and Holocaust victims was being displayed outside one of the event's entrances.
I had to listen to someone tell me over a megaphone that they loved my soul but I was headed to the slaughterhouse. Another told me that I was a sinner and Jesus did nothing to keep me from going to hell. One even had the audacity to tell me that certain groups of people wouldn't go to heaven or even have their prayers count no matter what religion they were.
The one that hurt the most though was the group whose signs I pictured above. I had to pull my boyfriend away from a man in this group of mongers who called the Roman Catholic Church a "whore" and accused my boyfriend and his friend of idolatry, lies, and deceit. They told them as well that their prayers didn't count. That "Catholics don't go to heaven." They had on their signs Catholic hate and anger.
We, the Cains, Hate Our Fellow Ables.
Many of us came to this event for unity, but not all of us did. Despite the attempt, there was still that classic hate and fear. That classic prejudice. That classic narrow-minded, "I will just yell over you until you have a revelation that I'm 100 percent correct and that you're a sheep and an idiot" mentality. No one would listen to each other.
Inside the fence, there seemed to be community and worship. But outside, the world was still the same. This event was not a reset at all. In fact, I'm not sure it did anything for the unity of Christians in this country. We are divided. We are filled with hate. We are so blinded by each other's sins and our super-hero complexes to save each other from damnation that we cannot see our own tickets clutched in our hands.
What did Jesus tell us? He gave us one commandment.
Love each other.
That was all he wanted us to do. He came to earth to save us from ourselves, and that wasn't just our past sins. That was our hatred, our anger, our prejudice, and our fears.
I am a Christian, and I did not feel welcome at the Jesus Reset Together 2016 Event.
Please. If you are a Christian, if you call yourself that and follow Christ, follow his commandment, which is the simplest and yet most difficult of all.
Love each other as he has loved us.
He has seen our flaws, our faults, our sins, and our ugliness -- and he loves us anyways. I wish we could own up to what "Christian" truly means and start loving each other like he told us to.
Only then, I think, would there be a true reset and spiritual revival in America.
