Does the Church have a good history or a bad history? The answer is yes. The Church has included some of the worst and some of the best. Thus, John Dickson’s new book, Bullies and Saints, is aptly named.
Many of the histories of Christianity are written with either of two aims: to make the church look as good as possible or to make the church to look as bad as possible. Dickson avoids either extreme.
Bullies and Saints is not an apologetic that attempts to gloss over the ugliness and evil of the church’s history. Nor does Dickson allow the skeptics get away with the urban legends that are often used to attack the Church.
In the end, some atheists and some Christians might be both disappointed with the book. Dickson stubbornly sticks to the facts, whether for good or for bad, being honest about his biases but attempting to defend what is indefensible.
Bullies and Saints is not written for academics looking for a scholarly analysis of the sweep of Christian history. Bullies and Saints is written for the average person, skeptic and Christian, who want to know what really happened apart from specific agendas.
As a Christian reading this, I found the description of the Church’s history to be refreshingly agenda. While this book is not written as an apologetic, Dickson’s honesty may serve as an unintentional apologetic for those sick of Christian propaganda.
