About

About The Author

Zack Hunt - I’m a writer, blogger, and youth ministry veteran living in Bristol, CT with my beautiful bride, Kim. We’ve just moved from Tennessee to Connecticut where she is doing her OB/GYN residency and I’m continuing my graduate studies at Yale Divinity School, focusing on the history of Christianity.

Writing – I’ve done a little bit of freelance writing and am getting ready to publish my first book, The Scandal of Holiness, through CLC Publications this September (2013). Until then, you can find most of my writings and ruminations here. I am represented by Blair Jacobson from D.C. Jacobson & Associates.

About The American Jesus

No, I don’t think I am the American Jesus. Yes, I do get asked that on fairly regular basis. The American Jesus is a satirical take on how we in America tend to remake Jesus in our own image. This blog, then, is dedicated to all the silly, absurd, serious, crazy, depressing, hopeful, tragic, and strange things that make up the peculiar phenomenon of American Christianity. If you come across anything that fits that description, please don’t hesitate to share it with me.

Loren

Reading Donald Miller’s “Searching for God knows What” right now.

He talks a lot about the phenomenon of American Jesus.
http://saylovely.blogspot.com Emily Newlin

DUDERS…you totally have to invite me to be a guest blogger…ya?
http://www.churchcandy.net churchcandy

Just found you guys through Jesus Needs New PR. Good stuff! Looking forward to more…
David

You might be right that American Christianity is very “have it your way”. But there is a church in America that Jesus spoke and created. Called Catholicism. Not the way many Americans practice it, but the way it should be practiced. Come and see. http://www.catholicscomehome.org
- Thin-ice
  
  The Catholic Church? The one where priests are free to rape kids? The one that invented The Inquisition? Really?
  
  After 46 years as an evangelical with a Bible college degree and years as a missionary, I’ve finally been set free! For me, Bible-god is a farce, and even Jesus (the REAL Jesus was lost in the hundreds of verbal re-telllings of stories handed down through 60 years before “Mark” (not Mark) got the bright idea to actually write it down!) is incredibly inconsistent in the four gospels. I’m not commenting to upset anyone. It’s just that “American Christianity”, that you lampoon, is what got me to re-examine all that I believed and put it under a microscope. What I discovered was a mangled web of man-made concepts about who god is. At one time I thought that Donald Miller, the Emergent Church, and similar might save Christianity for me, but soon realized that those were just efforts at sanitizing concepts that really ARE found in the Bible.
  - David
    
    Did you know that child molestation is a bigger problem in protestant churches than it is in the Catholic Church? And who says that priests are free to rape kids? Not the Catholic Church.
    
    Invented the Inquisition…tell me-what’s so wrong about having a judicial system? Are you against the Supreme Court, too? Really?
    
    For your information, we have proof that Mark dictated his gospel. Why are the gospels different? Because they were written to different audiences. For different purposes. But what you’re stating is the case FOR the Catholic Church-Jesus founded one Church. ONE. When people started disbelieving what he actually taught, his church began to fragment. One Church exists which was there from the day Jesus spoke it. It’s not holy because of popes, or men, it’s holy because of it’s founder.
  - Darwin
    
    Judicial system? Really? A committee of people that has the sole purpose of rooting out Christians who aren’t Christy enough and non-Christians and killing them in horrible ways? That’s your judicial system? There are summary executions which were less biased than the Inquisition.
  - David
    
    Really? Is that why people committed heresy when they were in trouble with the secular law because the Church judges were more in their favor and less likely to kill them?
    
    I understand that there were some abuses, but your sources are way off track, whatever they are. I suppose you think that Pius XII was Hitler’s friend, too.
  - Revyloution
    
    Wow, Hitler in only 4 posts. Not a record, but definitely a contender. What is it about Catholics and Hitler Turrets?
    
    I don’t know anything about a friendship between Pius and Adolph, but I do know that Adolph was a Catholic.
    
    http://uncompromising-rhetoric.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/09/973501.jpg
    
    Catholicism is just an offshoot of the Coptic Christian tradition. They took the bits they liked from the Copts and formed an official religion of Rome under Constantine. Your religion is just one in a long line of ‘borrowed faiths’ that steal a little bit of their predecessors dogma.
  - David
    
    I’m not accusing anyone of being Hitler, but most people who believe all that junk about the “Evil Inquisition”, the Crusades, and all also believe that the Catholic Church aided Hitler. Which is totally bogus. Look, there were abuses in the Inquisitions, there were abuses during the Crusades. The Church is a human organization.
    Offshoot of Coptic Church??? Hardly. The Catholic Church began at Pentecost in 33 AD, the Coptic church shot off after the Council of Chalcedon in 451. The Catholic Church was legalized by Constantine in the early 4th century, but it was an official religion long before then. And what actually happens is that people slice of what they don’t like about Catholicism to create their own faith.
  - http://gandollo.weebly.com Gio Andollo
    
    Jesus did initiate a church after he was resurrected. To say that it was the “Catholic Church” is a misnomer at best, a flat-out lie at worst. The Catholic tradition, like all other denominational traditions, is just that – a tradition. And a tradition with unfortunate – not to mention distinctly anti-Christ – history, marred by extreme statism, marriage with the principalities and powers (thus the accusation of incest on this here “about” page), violence, war, and corruption. To be clear, I’m not talking about child molestation (individual crimes and sins obviously not sanctioned by the leaders of the church); I’m talking about systemic crimes against people of other faith traditions (including other Christ-followers), oppression of the poor and illiterate (even up to today), and so on. Systemic, unjust, unloving, anti-Christ.
    
    Think what you want about the aforementioned crimes. One thing is clear: the Catholic church is NOT the blessed community that Jesus had in mind. No denomination is. Even the first-century church – you know, the ones that actually walked alongside Jesus – couldn’t get that right. Catholic, Methodist, Presbyterian, Lutheran… these labels and associations don’t matter. All that matters is Christ.
    
    Be careful not to idolize denomination, ’tis a slippery slope.
    
    And yes, I’m against worldly judicial systems. There is only one righteous judge, I care not for the pontifications of the rest. Pun intended
- Zach
  
  well put, David
Charis

Just found you on Jesusneedsnewpr. As someone in love with Christ who hates what the church has become, thank you.
Erin

It’s funny; the message I’ve always gotten from Christians where I live (in the American Deep South) is more “have it our way” than “have it your way”.
- http://www.jimmyspencerjr.com jimmy
  
  this might be the best comment I have read in years. classic.
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http://lenorediane.wordpress.com Lenore Diane

Oh goodness. I’m not sure where I have been, but I have just stumbled across your blog. I have officially subscribed, and I look forward to future musings. Thank you.
- Wes
  
  welcome!
http://thechurchinthemirror.wordpress.com thechurchinthemirror

The Church is in real trouble, but at least there are some people that “get it.” Thanks for this site.
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Kristi

Love your website! Hilarious and moving all at the same time. It’s refreshing, keep the words coming.

Kristi from Texas
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http://www.steverobertz.net/ Steve Roberts

Love your blog – just noticed you have a book with CLC publications. I worked with them for 12 years in Australia! haha – Just released my book Soulshift also – as an eBook. Grace and peace bro…
http://www.walkingindestiny.com/ Paul Anderson

Just came across your blog and am enjoying the readings. Great teaching video as well! Good message!

Blessings!

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