Three teen guys were hanging out in my vicinity at the mall. The T-shirt of one said “Heavenly” and showed art of praying hands. Maybe these are youth group friends? Then the second guy turned around. His tee said only “anti social.” Ha! But wording on the third guy’s shirt jolted me: “Karma doesn’t miss.”
Let’s assume the message is supposed to convey that if you do something bad, something bad will come back and bite you—without fail. OK, sure, it’s good to be reminded to behave ourselves. My cringe is because of the “fun” use of the idea of karma; few seem to grasp the horror of the real thing, per Buddhism/Hinduism.
A couple of days before the mall visit, I’d chatted with a college guy who is fascinated with Japanese culture. Yes, Japan is cool in a number of ways! But I explained the burden of Buddhism when a person truly believes the karma aspect: that anything bad happening to you was caused by you (in this life or any one of a number of previous lives). You have no idea what you did or how many “bad points” that chalked up. Nor do you know how many “good points” you must earn to cancel that. And the creepiest part of all—at least, to me—is the fact that [imagine horror-film music here!] you don’t know who’s keeping score! You’ve no way to communicate with that scorekeeper to plead your case or ask for forgiveness. No grace.
The young man with whom I was speaking was stunned, had no idea.
I looked online for that karma T-shirt I’d seen. I should’ve known: all kinds of shirts with karma slogans! Here are some:
- “Karma: You get served what you deserve.”
- “Karma is watching you. Be kind.”
- “I am going to let karma fix it, because if I fix it I’m going to fail.”
- “My dream job would be the karma delivery service.”
- “In karma we trust.”
- One shirt had art of cupped hands with a lotus flower sort of rising above them and the word karma artfully overlaid. The lotus is a common symbol associated with Buddhism/Hinduism.
There were plenty more T-shirts. And of course—it had to happen—one featured Scripture, appearing to Christianize the concept of karma:
- “Karma. Galatians 6:7-9”
Galatians 6:7-9 is a “reap what you sow” passage. But looking at the first verses of that chapter, the full context is about Christians helping each other work through moral weakness/sin. With karma, you’re not supposed to help each other; you’re on your own. And the Bible’s repentance/forgiveness/God’s grace teaching is a totally different thing from how karma supposedly operates. (Thank God!) So this shirt displays an apples-and-oranges combo, incorrectly pairing the Lord’s Word with a pagan concept.
Karma not only isn’t true; it’s also no laughing matter. Tell your friends!
For more from me on this topic, see “No Religion Is Fair” or site-search the word karma.
