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Notes -
Christian agape applies to Christians, the in-group. Christians have an obligation to lead strangers to Christ, but the emphasis of love in the gospel is decidedly not on strangers. In Christianity, the voodoo practitioner is not your neighbor even if he literally lives next door to you.
Among other things, this interpretation doesn’t really jibe with the Great Commission.
The Great Commission does not say to make disciples out of neighborly love, or any love for that matter. It says to make disciples. Upon becoming Christian they become neighbors, brothers, etc. The theology of this can be explored through other passages: “many are called but few are chosen”; “he chose us in him before the foundation of the world”; “he predestined us for adoption to himself as sons”; “No one can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws him”; “You did not choose Me, but I chose you and appointed you”. It’s not simply that you create disciples through your own efforts and they become Christians from a blank slate because they have persuaded — there’s an element of Christ having already chosen those who would hear his message. There are logic and moral arguments against this which are known among atheists but that is, of course, outside the premises of the religion. Romans 9 takes this idea to an extreme level, calling those who can’t hear Christ “vessels of wrath prepared for destruction, molded by God to show his wrath”. Not very neighborly to non-Christians, right? Barely humanizing. Another interesting tidbit is that the original Eucharist was called the Agape Feast, the same word used for love. Outsiders were completely excluded from participation in the central love ritual of the religion, and not just outsiders but students who were yet confirmed members. Those who participated but in Judas-esque fashion were also utterly dehumanized in the epistle of Jude, labeled “reefs at your love feast for whom the gloom of utter darkness has been reserved forever”. Lastly, I would ask you whether Christ can love someone he never knew? Christ, plainly, never knew those who do not follow him, and at his return he tells them to go away. (Matthew 7:23).
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