In Counterfeit Christs, the author looks at eighteen phony versions of Jesus that we encounter today. Some are the creation of non-Christians: like skeptics who dismiss Jesus as a fictional composite of ancient myths, secular humanists who think he was just a Nice Man, or adherents of other religions who claim him as a prophet or guru in their own tradition. Others stem from Christian or quasi-Christian theology gone so far wrong that its founder is no longer recognizable. Think of the greed-affirming Jesus of prosperity gospel preachers or the sects that strip Christ of his divinity. And of course there are enthusiasts for ideological causes who make him a model Marxist (or Democrat or Republican), or enlist him as a convenient spokesman for tolerance of the thing they want to do or promote. In all these examples and more, the authentic Jesus of Scripture and Tradition is obscured by a pale imitator, and so is the saving power of his wisdom and grace.
