So says Rev Dr Gavin Ashenden; and he is right:
A former chaplain to the Queen has said that the quarter of Christians who say they do not believe in the Resurrection “cannot be Christians”.
The Rev Dr Gavin Ashenden said in a letter to the Times that a survey which found that one in four self-proclaimed Christians do not believe in Jesus’s Resurrection “made the mistake of confusing British culture with Christianity”.
He said: “Those people who neither believe in the Resurrection nor go anywhere near a church cannot be ‘Christians’.
“As with so many things, the key is in the definition of terms. Discovering the evidence for the Resurrection having taken place to be wholly compelling is one of the things that makes you a Christian; ergo, if you haven’t, you are not.”
Of course, sophisticated clergy in the West would usually not be so crass as to straightforwardly deny the Resurrection. Instead, they cast doubt on the meaning of the word.
Here is a master of the technique, Rev Peter Wall, Dean of the Diocese of Niagara, putting his seminary training into practice in 2009. First he applies it to the Virgin Birth:
And then the Resurrection:
So Peter Wall doesn’t know what the Virgin Birth means and doesn’t know what the Resurrection is, but after “struggling”, against all reason claims he believes both.
“If Jesus rose from the dead, then you have to accept all that he said; if he didn’t rise from the dead, then why worry about any of what he said? The issue on which everything hangs is not whether or not you like his teaching but whether or not he rose from the dead.”
– Timothy J. Keller
Can’t improve on that one, JJM.
Wall believes in his right to draw a salary.
If you can identify as a left-handed lesbian albino midget Eskimo transvestite super model, (did I cover everyone?) you can identify as a Christian and should be allowed the confessional of your choice.
Eventually we just learn to ignore those folks, they are often too far gone to desire redemption.