> Jom"i-think-everything-is-ok-as-long-as-you-arent-fanatic"meke
>
> Uh-oh. Don't let Sam see this. Or me either, for that matter. Good thing it's lunchtime and I'm hungry, or I'd take the time to rake your logic over the coals right here and now. :-)
>
> Iss "my button just got pushed" achar

Okay, I'm back and turbo-charged from a Burrito Supreme with "Fire Sauce" from Taco Bell, so here goes:

How come "Fire Sauce" isn't really all that hot? If you read the ingredients, it's actually just the "Hot Sauce" (also not very hot), but with garlic added. (Hhhhhh-ey!! Hhhhhhh-ow come everyone's hhhhhhhhh-olding their noses?)

Okay, back to the subject, about fanatics: I'm compelled to note some positive aspects of fanaticism or extremism, or whatever term you prefer. The relationship of the extremist towards others is unambiguous: either "for" or "against". There's an advantage to having this sort of clarity, and you're never uncertain whether the extremist is your friend or your opponent. The extremist also has a fairly orderly worldview, since things are categorized as good or bad relative to a clearly-identified absolute, instead of relative to an inconsistent set of ideas and preferences, which is what most people found their worldviews upon.

We tend to dislike extremists because we dislike friction and conflict in our lives (unless it's on Jerry Springer), and our usual experience with extremists is that of being on their list of enemies. Most people we think of as extremists aren't friendly to us, because we aren't within their exclusive circle of fellow extremists. But most of us have also had the benefit of having an extremist on our own side, though we seldom recognize it.

Think about the way that a mother (a good one) feels about her child. Her position is unambiguously in favor of that child, and a person who threatens her child instantly becomes an enemy. We've heard of mothers who are fanatically devoted to their children and consequently smother them, but the error there is a consequence of a lack of wisdom, not the presence of extremism. If the mother is wise enough, she'll recognize that the most good she can do for the child is to help him or her grow into a full, independent person.

As a Christian, I'm susceptible to being charged with fanaticism. I identify an absolute -- Christ -- and categorize everything else as either good or bad as it relates to Him. Life itself is only a qualified good, and if God issued a clear instruction that I should kill a particular person, that would be the right thing for me to do. Fortunately, my clear instructions from God aren't to commit homicide; instead, they're to love my enemies, treat others as of greater value than myself, oppose injustice, and so forth. As a fanatic, I'm unambiguously in favor of others, and that position is non-negotiable. It's an extremist position.

Where Christians get into trouble with other folks -- apart from cases of Christian hypocrisy -- is that most people don't agree that what's best for them is what Scripture prescribes. So an unmarried, s*xually-active [the content filter forbade that word] couple might see me as an enemy, for instance, because what I consider (following Scripture) to be damaging to their lives, they think of as good. As someone with an extremist position *in their favor*, my aim isn't to attack them personally, but to help them get rid of influences and practices that will hurt them (spiritually, if not materially). The idea I'm getting at is that being fanatical doesn't prevent me from making the distinction between opposing another person and opposing certain evils that are attached to that person. When Mom told me to eat my spinach, I thought of her as an enemy, when in reality her extremist position in my favor led her to attack the malnutrition that could have harmed me. We had a different interpretation of what was good for me (candy vs. spinach), and that was the root of the problem, not her extremism.

These things are easier for me to write than to live out, of course. Meeting an extremist in person usually turns me off, since the thing or issue they choose as their non-negotiable absolute usually doesn't seem capable of holding the weight of an entire worldview (gender politics, abortion rights or non-rights, etc.), and that leads to what I think of as stupid behavior. But I have to admire the purity of thought and motive that goes along with extremism, and if I could change something about an extremist, it probably wouldn't be his fanatical soul. It would probably be the thing to which he fanatically attaches himself -- attach him to Christ instead, and you've got a dedicated advocate for every person on earth. Not a bad thing.

Iss