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opinion
Modern Christianity
Sandro
Schembri Adami reflects on today's changing world, the rat race,
its creature comforts and where Christianity fits into the equation
The world is moving at a fast pace. New inventions, new technologies
and new lifestyles persistently outdate what was previously considered
as traditional and, while they point to the future, they indirectly
compel us to forsake our past. It seems as though there was never
a yesterday, that traditions are no longer necessary in a hectic
world and that all that matters is living according to the latest
trend.
In this fast moving world, values seem at stake. Morality is apparently
subject to the fluctuating demands of the rat race. The dominant
worldview is secular: Life is short, so work hard and play hard.
In this scenario, religion unfortunately becomes just another type
of commodity that can be bought and used whenever it pleases and
when it is not demanding.
Church attendance seems to be on the decline, although the Church
building is still sought after as the ideal backdrop for ceremonial
events such as weddings, baptisms and funerals. Despite the fact
that many claim to believe in God, few seem to understand the need
to incorporate this into their daily lives. As a consequence, issues
of morality are veiled in confusion and subjectivity.
Like many other lifestyles, so Christianity entails some rather
unpleasant and difficult choices. Either conventional Christianity
is authentic and is a faith that faithfully represents its New Testament
roots, or else it is a pick and choose way of life, subject to the
whims of its adherents and the shifting sands of cultural interpretation.
It is hard to follow the teachings of Jesus Christ when we disagree
or feel that our way is easier. As a result, some Christians honour
Christ lip service, while they follow or teach other acquiescent
doctrines. Christianity is being continually reshaped to suit the
needs of modern life, and the truth of Christ's Gospel is being
systematically masqueraded under new forms of belief, practice and
worship.
The Gospel should be the source of faith and inspiration for the
daily life of Christians. Finding an acceptable method of understanding
and applying the biblical message to our contemporary culture is,
however, controversial.
We need to avoid the extreme of interpreting the Gospel so literally
that we make the New Testament cultures, rather than its timeless
principles, the norm for our lives. We must recognise that various
literary styles exist in the four Gospels as well as in the Bible
as a whole, and each must be interpreted appropriately. The Bible
was not given to us as an object to be worshipped, with our interpretation,
but rather as a guide to proper spiritual behaviour.
As we use the Bible to help us to come to the knowledge and understanding
of God, we also need to continuously apply some of the normative
and hermeneutics of the Bible in order to shed a better light on
the understanding and better evaluation of our modern culture. The
literal application of every biblical text without contextualisation
is a pitfall we all need to avoid. However, we also need to avoid
the opposite extreme of spiritualising the Bible away.
All this requires wisdom and understanding. We have to learn to
discern the word of God correctly. For instance, we cannot discount
the Bible's reports of the miraculous and the supernatural as unpalatable.
We cannot expect to understand the Bible without allowing the book
to simmer into our daily life with the consequent demands on us
not only as hearers of the word but also as doers. We are certainly
not at liberty to alter the essential teachings and doctrines of
the Bible in a misguided attempt to fit them to a morally decadent
culture.
For all the talk of a secular and materialistic culture, there is
still room for the spiritual. This is because the real important
questions that are the flesh and bone of religion still confront
us: Is there a God? Is there an afterlife? Why do evil and suffering
exist at all in the world?
While traditional Christianity claims fewer and fewer adherents,
Christian renewal communities at the personal and small-group levels
are sprouting up remarkably. Perhaps in a world that has become
too chaotic and identity-consuming, modern Christians feel the need
to belong to some group where one can find oneself, and be oneself,
and be felt in the other.
An authentic Christian life in the modern world is a truly demanding
daily struggle against self Christians should not be alarmed. At
the strategic centre of Christianity stands the supreme paradox
of the cross, of the crucified Christ, the theology of the cross,
the raison d'etre of our following of Christ, the hope and guarantee
of our final victory. We as Christians believe that Jesus displayed
his greatest powers in order to save us and reconcile us to God
and among ourselves... through a most humiliating and annihilating
death. These, however, stand in firm contradiction to the culture
around us, one which subtly tends to efface and avoid subjects such
as God or spirituality - bent on deriding and eroding life of its
real and true significance.
With the Golgotha in vision, Christians need not be surprised, but
rather fortified. There can be no real life without suffering and
problems. Yet these seemingly adverse conditions do not rob life
of its meaning as long as this is characterised by the paradox of
the cross and the subsequent resurrection.
Today's world alienates us with a comfortable life, while at the
same time it fails to provide us with a meaning to life. Christianity
does precisely this... He is come to give us life in its fullness.
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