The August 23^rd issue of Rolling Stone magazine featured a story on the hardcore punk rock scene in the Boston area. These angry white guys commit random acts of violence against preppy, suburban white kids, emo kids, frat boys, neo-Nazis, and Confederate Flag lovers and even each other.

Youtube.com hosts video trailers for Boston Beatdown, a new documentary on hardcore culture, where viewers are invited into a world where guys move from slinging each other around in concert mosh-pits to walking the streets encountering preppy frat boys to 'beat down.' I don't know why they hate the emo guys so much.

One Boston gang called "FSU" (Friends Stand United), with chapters extending from Chicago, Seattle, New York, Los Angeles, Arizona, to New Jersey, draws guys with similar backgrounds--absentee parents and families troubled by drugs and alcohol. Anger, pain, and abandonment fuel their resentment, nihilism, and violence.

Ronin Morris, a producer of Boston Beatdown, defends the documentary:

"I am not asking you to embrace the hardcore culture nor am I asking that you accept it. But, for so many kids, hardcore is something for them to hold onto – it is something to help them get through the rough patches of their lives. And you may not understand it, you may not like it, and you may not agree with it, but those reasons are not enough to condemn it."

A friend of mine gives a recent account of his experience with hardcore culture in Philadelphia last summer, "This summer I witnessed an emo guy get completely thrashed by two punks for showing up at the wrong house party. This emo kid unwittingly walked into The Halfway House, a mecca for Philly hardcore punks. The only reason I ever make it through the front door of this house is because I have known most of the house's residents the better part of my life."

These hard core guys dragged this emo kid into the street and beat him until he was bloody and completely unconscious. Everyone scattered when they heard the police sirens.

Can Christianity reach this awesome sub-culture? Not without a new brand of leaders. Most Christian men today are too soft, passive, and fearful to have any credibility with this growing movement. American Christianity often produces the kind of men that 'the hardcore' detests. Hardcore needs to be embraced, not condemned by the church.

Hardcore culture can be reached by a new brand of hardcore missionaries--men who have 'salt and light' fortitude and move toward human brokenness instead of away from it. This is where missional men come in.

For example, I can't think of more a bold, fearless, gospel-driven, fully masculine, evil-fighting, heresy-fighting, group of men in America. Scott Thomas, Director of Acts 29, says "we won't water down our theology to reach more people and we won't attack the culture in the name of Christianity. We are planting churches that are missionaries in their respective communities sent by Christ with the gospel (John 20:21)." This is what hardcore needs.

The members of FSU need an encounter with gifted, fearless men who will point them to the risen Christ who calls them to "fight the good fight." Fighting is not a problem. What these guys need is to have their fighting directed at the right kind of evil in the right way. They image a God who battles. Fighting is normal.

From a poor Philadelphia neighborhood, Joe, who grew up without a father confesses, "If I wasn't in hardcore, I'd be in jail or dead. . . I have four cousins in jail. Three more are dead from overdoses. When I went to shows, I felt like I had people who gave a [freak] about me. Nothing has touched me the way hardcore has."

The great tragedy of American Christianity is that it has no idea how to reach men like Joe. What do guys like Joe need? Answer: salvation, healing, restoration, mission, fortified in genuine love because Jesus died for guys in hardcore culture but few men have the vision to tell these men the story.

Why can't Joe's testimony read, "If it wasn't for Jesus I'd be dead. . .When I went to [insert your church here], I felt I had people who gave a [freak] about me. Nothing has touched me the way the church has." Meeting the guys in FSU would be a dream-come-true for me!

Here's the real problem: Jesus cares about hardcore culture, it's Christians who don't. So guys like Ronin and Joe are left to the power of the devil. Hardcore missionaries are desperately needed. These white dudes are pissed-off and dying. "It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick"--Jesus. Who will go?