Today Christians celebrate the resurrection of Jesus, an important event signifying that the corrupt powers of this world cannot murder truth. Yet many of these selfsame Christians have forgotten or distorted Jesus' teaching to signify something rather different, like a manual for leading a pleasant and prosperous existence within the world. This is a serious mistake, a category error that forgets how a true Christian is in the world but never really of it. For example, the story of the rich man whom Jesus tells to give all his belongings to the poor is distorted to focus on the worldly benefit done for the poor, when the true message is the spiritual benefit done for the rich man. After all, if the rich man gives everything away, he will now be poor as well, so there has been no improvement in worldly terms. The improvement is spiritual. Jesus instructed that poverty should not worry us nor the treasures of the world entice us; it is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to pass through the gates of heaven, not because wealth alone is corrupting, but rather because the acquisitiveness and worldliness necessary to gather it are. If you observe Easter as a Christian, take at least this much from it: follow what is right and true regardless of unpleasant consequences, least of all to yourself.
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