Christianese

Words & Photography by: Naomi Allison

Over winter break, I met an old friend for coffee, and he told me a story about praying the Rosary to get the lead role in a school play. His prayer was answered, but I was unimpressed. I said he should go to God with more humility, pray for something like good memories with the cast or improvement in his acting. I told him to fix his heart posture, and he stared blankly back at me. I had accidentally slipped into Christianese. 

Most communities develop their own jargon over time, but a particularly grandiose language has emerged from American evangelical Protestant denominations. I wasn’t raised Christian, and it confused me after my conversion that being full of the Spirit didn’t mean you were possessed, and that praying for a child to be washed in the blood of the Lamb wasn’t wishing for that child’s death from infection. Aside from well-known examples such as the ever-wristbanded What Would Jesus Do?, there is the spiritual warfare of ignoring lustful thoughts, the fellowship time spent with other Christians and the mission field of people who do not know Jesus. 

The first usage of ‘Christianese’ to denote evangelical linguistic habits is unrecorded. Although undoubtedly influenced by church-issued rhetoric, there has been no official church guidance over the rise of Christianese, rather it emerged organically through evangelical social association. While theological jargon and liturgical terms may be equally unfamiliar to non-Christians, ‘Christianese’ refers specifically to casual language used interpersonally between evangelicals. The first academic study on the topic is Linda Coleman’s paper on “The Language of “Born-Again” Christianity,” published through Berkeley Linguistics Society in 1980. Coleman pointed out the unique status of Christianese, as its speakers are not distinguished from the rest of the population by ethnic or geographic divides, but by worldview.

Christianese expresses an aggressively evangelistic worldview, wherein your children’s playground is a mission field of parents with whom you should share your testimony (the story of your faith). Like all language, it creates an in-group and out-group: the evangelical Protestants who understand all of the allusions and hidden meanings and the rest of the world who doesn’t. Even American Catholic denominations, like the one my hometown friend was a part of, are largely excluded. Speaking Christianese affirms the collective identity of the American evangelical movement, as well as the collective goal of proselytization. If the outside world is labeled a ‘mission field,’ then proselytizing becomes the natural way to engage with it, and conversion becomes a success on your ‘mission.’

Along with creating this evangelical in-group, Christianese is used to regulate discontent within its ranks. ‘Thought-terminating phrases’ are used to end difficult conversations or silence opposition. When someone expresses doubt, give it to God, when someone is struggling, put it in God’s hands. In the vein of the infamous hate the sin, love the sinner, there is a similar phrase which addresses fellow Christians: speaking truth in love, referencing Paul’s assertion that “speaking the truth in love, we will grow to become in every respect the mature body of him who is the head, that is, Christ” (Ephesians 4:15). Speaking truth in love denotes a rebuke of a Christian’s sinful behavior, nevermind that its original context nowhere references the practice of correcting another Christian’s sin (although this is sometimes dis

cussed by Paul). The vague but encouraging phrase has become a cover for homophobia, misogyny, and an array of hate within the church, and the unchallenged expression of that hate, because how could it be wrong if we say it is all out of love?

Is it possible, then, for Christianese to be reimagined beyond these harmful misunderstandings? If Christians studied the Bible alongside all of its historical context and translational controversies, together in community with other Christians from all walks of life, would we be able to finally understand the love that is asked of us? Could we use this language to express that to each other?

The question of whether or not Christianese should be encouraged comes alongside a slew of other questions. Is language central to identity? Are those identities, and therefore languages, sometimes exclusive? Didn’t Jesus focus his love on outcasts and the lost? Why, then, have we developed a language inaccessible to those on the outside? In her essay “Lessons Learned from 30 Years in Ministry,” theologian Kathy Keller writes against what she terms ‘piousbabble,’ pointing to both its inaccessibility to non-Christians and its unnatural adoption into the mouths of converts. Keller writes that she was disturbed when a radical leftist friend who had recently converted began to parrot the language she heard used by Christian celebrities and radio hosts. Christianity should not, she argues, expect people who seek community to put on linguistic habits that don’t represent their life experiences and authentic selves. 

Christianese demonstrates the strengths and dangers of evangelicalism — the strength of communal support and the danger of minimizing bigotry, the strength of uniting across diversity and the danger of exclusivity. As hard as my Catholic friend rolled his eyes once I explained ‘heart posture,’ Christianese can facilitate genuine connection when used among fellow speakers. Once in a while, while we’re rattling off prayer requests (anything bad happening) and praises (anything good happening), I think about what I’m saying and appreciate it a little more. The people beside me are my brothers and sisters, and maybe I do feel full of the Spirit, whatever that means.