Listening to the radio this morning before taking Jessica to her church and then going on to my own, I was struck by something about the atheists who were talking. Radio 4, one of the few justifications for the BBC, has a Sunday morning programme which deals with religion. You can tell it is for religious people because it starts at 7 a.m.; you can tell it is the BBC because it is always packed with people who don’t agree with orthodox Christianity. Some find this irritating; I am in the minority who find it illuminating.
This morning it dealt with the findings of the census, and it also interviewed the new president of the British Humanist Association. Both spent their time sniping; both mentioned religion being a ‘crutch’. Perhaps this is what they are taught in ‘Atheism 101’? If so, then like the other things about which they opine, it shows the shallowness of their knowledge.
There is no point to Christianity other than that it is true. If you want comfort, watch the TV, eat chocolate, take to sex, drugs and rock and roll (many do); but don’t go near Christianity. If you want to look after the poor and the neglected, do so. It is a good thing to do so, and many Christians do; but that is not the point of Christianity. If you want to stand in judgement on your fellow men, well, become a Humanist, they have the smug tone once common among certain types in the churches. If you want power, influence and position, go into politics; you won’t find any of these in Christianity any more. The point of Christianity is that it is true; it points us towards God; it helps us to understand the self-revelation God has made. That should have an effect on us, but that effect depends on our relationship with God.
Tertullian noted: ‘ For all love those who love them; it is peculiar to Christians alone to love those that hate them’. In his Apology he wrote:
[7] But it is mainly the deeds of a love so noble that lead many to put a brand upon us. See, they say, how they love one another, for themselves are animated by mutual hatred; how they are ready even to die for one another, for they themselves will sooner put to death. [8] And they are wroth with us, too, because we call each other brethren; for no other reason, as I think, than because among themselves names of consanguinity are assumed in mere pretence of affection.
Is that us? If not, why not?
For nearly forty years I have worked with University students. I have not noticed a lack of interest in spiritual matters; indeed it may be that youngsters now are more prone to an interest in ‘spirituality’ than they were back then. So why does that interest not take them towards Christianity?
It is not for want of evangelisation. This present ‘Year of Faith’ is one of many through which I have lived; their effect is evident from the recent census. We say ‘God is love’ and yet we are what we are in our churches. Perhaps if we were more like the Christians of Tertullian’s day, we should enjoy something of their success?
All Along the Watchtower 
Christianity in our day seems to want its cake and eat it too. Parishioners and churchmen alike seem to espouse a comfortable, relaxed Christianity and a comraderie of nice people, saying nice things and being nice to one another. The discomfort of ‘Truth at any cost’ is lost on most who want to both be loved by the world and be comforted in the knowledge that they are ‘saved’ because they are of a particular church. GK Chesterton’s assertion that just like standing in a garage doesn’t make you a car and that sitting in a church doesn’t make you a Christian seems lost to most people of our modern era. Once you leave your comfortable pews and view Christianity in many 3rd world countries where they are persecuted and killed for their faith, it becomes clear that comfort has nothing to do with true Christianity. We may get the opportunity in our lifetime to see how many true Christians we have in our churches as we continue to inch toward a world view that Christianity should be condemned and even eradicated from society; a real persecution of ancient proportions.
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I agree. Those Copts I know in Egypt are amongst the best adverts for our Faith I know – and they do not know it.
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Indeed they exhibit the faith of our fathers in an age when we are lucky to even get a news report on their plight these days.
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They have set an example to us which we shall do well to imitate should our turn come. We have grown fat as a people and we have neglected the ways of our fathers.
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I don’t, for the life of me, understand why our Bishops and Priests are not challenging us to imitate their faith in every Mass we attend. It is the best examples we have. We should be praying for them and that their persecutors are given a “change of heart”, yet we are met, at least here in America, with silence on their plight; no sermons, no calls for assistance, no prayers. Do they think that if we did so, it would just exacerbate the persecutions? It is a great mystery to me.
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They fear persecution? They will get it, however much they appease the lord of this world.
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Very true, and they will not have steeled themselves or their flock for what is coming; a great mistake in my opinion.
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It was so in the fourth century, and the great persecution cleansed the stables; it may do so again.
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Let’s hope and pray that it may be so once again, C.
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Tertullian wrote that the blood of the martyrs was the seed of the church; alas that it should need to be so – but it is.
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Dying to self is even a hard concept for most Christians. Maryrdom is a death that we can see and understand no matter how daft we might be. The trick is to allow Christians to see what is going on when we have complicity with the world in keeping the truth from the people.
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Very much on the mark, Servus.
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I think, SF, that like many in our congregations, they think that God is love, Christianity is about going to church, and what is a Copt, anyway?
It falls to us laymen, the ‘universal priesthood’ to carry the ball until the churches figure it out.
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God is, indeed, love, the love of which St. Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 13. When we try that, we shall make headway; until then, well we see, alas.
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I couldn’t agree more, util then, alas, indeed
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Servus is correct, as you are. We must steel ourselves for what is to come.
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We must, indeed, the sad part is that so few recognize the signs, or will join us. Mostly, I am afraid, they will be of our generation, who remembers.
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Seems as if Christianity thrives when it is the real ting and there is oppression in the air, then we win an backslide. Time to get it together again.
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That seems to be the case. Well, we shall soon have ore practice, I fear.
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I do as well.
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A crutch is necessary equipment for the lame and injured. amongst whom I number myself.
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It is, as is the spiritual hospital which is the Church.
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We’ve abandoned Judeo-Christianity, seems to me, for free sex, relief of responsibility and government benefits. Not of course, for the first time.
That piper is coming now for his pay; the bill is mounting and will be taken out of our hides, as it always has in these circumstances.
Islam won’t, I think, survive the interregnum; Judeo-Christianity may, in considerable revision. But as always, the eventual dawn will illuminate a bleak landscape needing to be cleared of its dead legions.
The curious may reread (or read) Jeremiah…we seem slow learners. Maybe it’s our DNA?t
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Hi Jessica. I wanted to come by and say thank you for the like. Now, I wish I’d come by sooner, and I’m going to read some more of your posts. This is fine writing, and it’s truth is very evident.
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