Submitting to the “wise and fatherly disposal” of God “in every condition” is distasteful in our secular age, where the prevailing bourgeois ideal is the right of the sovereign self to determine its identity and destiny, free from any “rules” or requirements. Denying yourself and submitting to King Jesus, then, is true countercultural living.

What does countercultural Christianity look like in America today?

First, let’s be clear on what it doesn’t necessarily look like. Countercultural Christianity today isn’t defined by tattoos, craft beer, beards, and pour-over coffee. These are fine things, but they are in no way subversive, whether inside or outside Christianity. If they ever were countercultural, they aren’t anymore. They are mainstream, the majority, the megachurch, the Man.

Countercultural Christianity is also not defined by embracing brokenness, “authenticity,” doubt, and skepticism. These things are as pervasive and acceptable (even celebrated) in American suburbia as are iPhones and ESPN.

Nor is countercultural Christianity defined by spiritual mysticism, liberal (or conservative) activism, LGBT-inclusion or worship that sounds like Coldplay. Whatever else you think of such things, they are certainly inoffensive. Lucrative industries and entire television channels (not to mention churches in every city) are devoted to them. In Gramsci’s terms, these things are the “ideological apparatus” of the hegemony—certainly not underminers of it.

Defining Countercultural 

So what would define truly countercultural Christianity in today’s world?

Countercultures are, by definition, subcultures that develop in opposition to prevailing norms of mainstream, bourgeois, “polite” society—whatever those may be in a certain time or place. The freewheeling “mad ones” of the Kerouac/Ginsberg generation were countercultural in the midst of the Howdy Doody suburbia of 1950s America. Martin Luther’s questioning of the norm of indulgences was countercultural in 16th-century Europe. Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s refusal to join the throngs of “patriotic German Christians” in Nazi Germany was too. And of course, Jesus of Nazareth, the rebellious rabbi who scandalized the Jewish religious establishment of his day, was the epitome of countercultural.

But not every countercultural figure is a hero. ISIS is countercultural. Rogue and retrograde leaders like Kim Jong-Un and Vladimir Putin are countercultural in their own ways. Politically incorrect (and proud of it) Donald Trump is too.

Countercultural behavior isn’t inherently good. The one who goes against the grain isn’t always more valiant than the grain. Similarly, many who consider themselves subverters of bourgeois society are actually just reinforcers of it. This is why Vice Magazine, Pitchfork (recently purchased by Condé Nast), and Rob Bell (recently acquired by Oprah) are boundary-pushers only in the safe, Urban Outfitters sense. They are simply speciality products in a much bigger store.

Countercultural Christianity in America

“If cool Christianity exists,” I posited in Hipster Christianity, “it will not be because that is how we have packaged it and sold it. . . . It will be an outgrowth of the nature of the gospel itself—which is certainly counter to the prevailing mainstream values of the world.”

This brings us back to the original question: What defines countercultural Christianity today? What are the “prevailing mainstream values” Christianity subverts?

I’d suggest a truly countercultural Christianity in America undermines the idols of consumerism, comfort, freedom, and individualism. But really these four are all offshoots of one umbrella value: the autonomy of the self. It’s the sin that’s plagued humanity ever since Adam and Eve refused to bow to the good rules God established. And never has autonomy been more widely celebrated as a virtue than it is today.

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