Should Blogs Be Used To Attack Other Christians?

After doing some randomn reading on the Internet, I became once again aware of the fact that Christians are fighting each other on Blog Sites all over the web (not to mention real web sites). Why would you do this? It is one thing to debate a point on which you disagree with someone (i.e. Calvinism, Charismatic Doctrine, Eschatology, et al.) but it is quite another to criticize other Christians personally in such a forum. I cannot imagine that Jesus is remotely pleased by personal attacks on other believers on the web.

Let me be clear. I am not saying you can't disagree with someone else's position by name. For instance, I disagree with (oh, let's pick somebody) John Piper on 5 point Calvinism. It is OK of me to announce that I disagree with him on that issue and he is perfectly OK (if he ever finds out that I exist) to announce he disagrees with me on the issue. We can even argue the merits of our individual positions in a respectful tone and tenor. I would cross the line of Christian behavior if I made personal attacks on Dr. Piper himself or call him an unwarranted name (heretic is a good example) or talk about how he is a bad person because of this. Even if the things I said in this way were true, it still would not be right to attack him. Let me remind you I only use Dr. Piper as an example here and I do not actually think he is a heretic or a bad person.

Ahh, you say, but what if a person has done something I disagree with (in fact it was an un-Christian thing the person did). The old cliche still holds: two wrongs don't make a right. In the book of Acts, Barnabas probably thought Paul was a complete jerk when he would not allow John Mark to go with them on the 2nd missionary journey. They couldn't reconcile their dispute and went seperate ways. Yet, we have no record of them ever cutting each other down in a public way over the issue even though it seems (to me at least) that Paul's action was completely wrong in this case.

I disagree with the views and actions of many Christian leaders and there are some well known Christian leaders I personally have no respect for because of things they have said or done. However, you won't find their names printed here in the manner of a personal attack. If you ever do, you may feel free to call me on it and I'll correct the error if it is done. Let's act like Christians fellow bloggers!