Jesus heals – but not cancer!

It’s really tough if you or a loved one has cancer – apparently even Jesus can’t heal you.

Glyn Carpenter poses in front of the offending billboard

Well that’s according to a survey of New Zealand “Christian leaders” by Glyn Carpenter, Director of the New Zealand Christian Network. He did this quick poll after widespread public condemnation of a sign posted by Equippers Church in Napier, “Jesus heals cancer.” There’s no indication of how many leaders were polled or what their religious affiliations were (I think Glyn Carpenter and the NZ Christian Network are “evangelical” – whatever that means).

Perhaps the bias of the pollster is shown by his declaration on the report of the poll results – “The message “Jesus Heals Cancer” is clearly true at face value!” It’s also interesting  that he has managed to see the problem of the offensive sign as an issue of freedom – for Christians to offend others (he describes his poll as a Freedom of speech survey.

So taking Glyn’s data at face value – apparently most (67%) of these Christian leaders were not happy about the offensive sign. And while 58% of them thought a billboard message “Jesus Heals Cancer” to be poor or impermissible, 91% thought so for the message “Jesus Heals All Cancer.”

I thought this was hopeful – but they went and ruined it by supporting the message “Jesus Heals” – 91% thought it OK or good!

Now where are all those theologians claiming there is no conflict between science and religion? Or that they operate in different spheres? What is their response to such a survey result?