What *WOULD* Jesus Do?

What would Jesus Do…. Firstly, I’m always so amused by the fact that the religious crowd that subscribes to this worthy but vague mantra think they know so well what Jesus would do in a given situation. Who can say with any degree of accuracy what a man would have done over 2000 years ago? Despite the reams of “documentation” surrounding Jesus’ life, I can’t help but feel that the spirit and intent of these eye witness accounts has been lost through half a dozen translations and the passage of so many years.For now, let’s put aside the lack of hard data on this topic and concentrate on the intent. Many people say that all of religion boils down to the Golden Rule, so let’s use that simple mantra as our starting point in a few examples. Let's say, hypothetically, that Mrs. Smith is cheating on her husband and the congregation at her church finds out about it. I can say with a high degree of certainty that Mrs. Smith’s indiscretion will cause a furor of conversation among all her acquaintances. Given the probable veracity of my proposition, let’s apply the popular What Would Jesus Do? question to this situation. I assert absolutely that the answer to this question is NOT “Jesus would gossip about Mrs. Smith to the Apostles.” In fact I’m hard pressed to come up with any situation for which the WWJD answer is to gossip about someone and yet gossip and scandal is common among all groups including religious ones.It has been proposed that religion is not so much a set or rules for its members to follow as a construct to allow the systematic dissolution of the guilt that results when a member steps outside the bounds of societal norms and expectations.