Response: Are the Flanders Good Christian Role Models?

LINK to the original blog post

Good point at the end! I didn't even consider the fact that Ned should have been at church too.

I agree with you – the Flanders are not good Christian role models. But I believe they are very accurate representations of many “Christians” in the world today. Having gone to church since the day I was born, I have come across every type of church-goer, which includes people or entire families that act very much like the Flanders. Like you mentioned, the Flanders seem more interested in keeping their church’s membership up than in being true to their faith. I had been part of a church that split into two sides after years of political tension. The church that had split formed two separate, new churches and fought over the remaining members. Both churches played a game of tug-o-war to increase their membership and frowned upon individuals who decided to attend the church that opposed them. Although both churches continued to practice the same religion, the people seemed to care less about whether individuals were true to their faith than whether they attended the “right” church. The Flanders and their concern for their church’s membership over faith seems to be an accurate representation of many people involved in the Christian church today.

The scene with the Flanders singing the hymn was probably my favourite part of the episode because it reminded me of Christian missionaries who do the same thing around the world. Many of these missionaries decide populations of low- and middle-income countries need Christianity more than anything else and spend resources without looking at what communities might actually need. More often than not, people who go to LMICs end up gaining more out of their experience than the communities they were visiting (Darnell, 2007). The Flanders remind me very much of people who travel across the world with missionary zeal to sing hymns and talk about Christianity whether the local populations want to listen or not.

Darnell, S. (2007). Playing with race: Right to Play and the production of ‘whiteness’. Sport in Society, 10(4), 560-579.