You plop down on the beach, the kids go spiraling off to the water like dolphins in a boat’s wake, you take an overdue deep breath and stare at the horizon, and that’s the point at which you realize a thought has been hitchhiking in the boxcar of your prefrontal cortex. It’s been there for a while, but you haven’t noticed it until now.
I remember in the 80s watching the scandals of the Bakkers and Jimmy Swaggart ripple through the late night comedians and into the minds and mouths of my schoolmates. I was fairly cognizant of the fact that Christians were generally getting smeared. I read Elmer Gantry for the first time back then. And I remember saying, “We’re not all like that!”
Since then I picked up a little hitchhiker.
Now I listen to a rising generation dismissively writing off the church with the under-thought branding, “hypocrites.” But I know that the more they study history and the more they look in the mirror, the more they will regret holding anyone else up to that righteous standard. Now I hear people accuse Christians of hypocrisy, and I’m inclined to answer, “Absolutely. We’re all like that.” Inside the church and out. We’re all like that.
Proves we need a savior.
Hardwired 
You lost me at the hitchhiking thought. Original metaphor – love it. I think I’ll keep that one, as I have many ‘hitchhikers’ and they are lobbed (intentional pun) throughout my brain.
Amen. In his book “Orthodoxy” GK Chesterton said original sin is the most provable part of Christianity.