But there is also a deep goodness that exists. And when I look in that mirror I see it in me. It’s not perfection but perfection cannot exist.
I think that is where Christians differ from most people. My self as a non Christian does not see myself as a sinner in the metaphysical sense.
And I'm not going to reject that deep goodness, intrinsic to the historic and orthodox Christian perspective is the innate and intrinsic goodness of all creation. Being a human being is a good thing. So to talk about "re-humanization" that assumes that being human is a good thing; the problem is the ways that--from a Christian perspective--we have lost our humanity. That there is something un-human and de-humanizing tangled up in our present humanity; we need a re-humanization--because the alternative is de-humanization.
Of course that de-humanizing aspect, that un-human element, I don't think that can be argued for on a purely philosophical, or even moral grounds; I think it presupposes certain theological ideas that, if someone isn't a Christian, they'd see no reason to agree to or even seriously entertain.
I'm sure it does sound, as
@stevil said, "cringey". At the very least it's not appealing, it doesn't sound good. Of course my counter to that is bad news never sounds good or appealing, hearing from a doctor that one is sick doesn't exactly make someone happy; and it is quite naturally human of all of us to not want to be told we're wrong, or that something is wrong about us. Not even speaking metaphysically here, there is a kind of natural inclination each of us has toward our own biases, we like that which confirms our biases and we tend to push back against that which goes against that. So, quite naturally, nobody is going to like hearing that, and it's going to sound bad, and it's going to be unappealing, and it's going to even be offensive. But from the perspective I hold--and I'm not expecting you or any non-Christian to take my perspective here--that natural inclination and rejection of hearing something like we are, of ourselves, in a state of deep wrongness, is part of that wrongness.
To offer a kind of example, you and I would both agree that the owning of other human beings is wrong; and that owning people and forcing them to work, and depriving them of basic autonomy and the right to flourish for themselves is a bad thing. The slave-owner, however, if told that it's wrong, is going to react in a very different way than if you and I are just talking about it. The slave-owner doesn't want to be wrong, he wants to be right, he wants his slave-owning to be a good thing, a right thing, and that he is entirely justified in his ownership of human beings--and he'll probably provide all manner of arguments as to why what he is doing is perfectly okay, and even good.
Or consider the multitude of political arguments that happen, even right here on this forum. How often does saying that something is wrong, or unethical, or harmful receive a strong response of opposition. I mean I probably don't even need to give examples--I think most of us recognize that we naturally like to think of ourselves as right, as good, and that our ways of doing, thinking, feeling, etc are at least basically right.
The Christian position, though, is that on some level nobody is actually right, we're all actually quite wrong. It's not really about being perfect or imperfect; but rather than the natural inclination bends inward. We don't even need to talk about great big moral categories such as good and evil; we can talk about it in simpler ways: I am, naturally, more interested in my own needs, desires, and appetites than I am someone else's. I am more keenly aware of when I'm hungry, so I'll think about how to feed myself instinctively--but we don't have an equal concern for someone else's hunger. It's not that we have all these malicious thoughts, like "haha, I'm feeding myself while this person goes hungry", it's more that we may not even think about how others are hungry; and it's not that we don't when we do think about it, feel empathy, or go out of our way to help someone out. But, at the end of the day, we have the natural inclination to place ourselves at the top of a hierarchy of needs.
To which, however, the question can be asked: Is that wrong? Is it wrong that I am more interested in my own needs than others? After all, every creature has a built-in need for survival. It's in our genes--survive, survive and pass on our genes.
But the Christian answer to that is, why, yeah, it is a problem. Not the desire to survive, not the taking care of yourself part; but rather than our basic way of being is, in some sense, determined by two factors: The threat of death and the inwardly bent desire. The two go, in some way, hand-in-hand. Death creates a problem: We all need to compete for survival, and so if it comes down to whether I live and you die; or you live and I die--just about everything in me is going to prioritize myself over you.
That, that is the wrongness. It's not just the internal wrongness; but also the external wrongness. Death itself is a wrongness that exists; our own mortality drives us in ways which can often mean we act in terrible ways. And because we create hierarchies, often a hierarchy of myself, my offspring, my family, my kin, my tribe, my community, my nation, etc it breeds tremendous amounts of conflict.
There is a wrongness in ourselves, a wrongness in the world at large; one that is depriving the world of its beauty, depriving us of our full humanity; that creates conflict, creates discord, that creates suffering. Christians call it sin, but that word just means error, wrongness, or missing the mark. There's something wrong, my way of being human just isn't right. Not that there is no goodness or beauty; but that the goodness and beauty that is there is dulled, lessened, obscured.
This isn't meant to convince anyone of anything, but merely trying to unpack religious ideas that are often clothed up in a familiar jargon.
-CryptoLutheran
