by Dave Roberts » Sun May 05, 2019 4:13 pm
I have been thinking lately about a reality focused in my lifetime, the privatizing of religion and especially of Christianity in our US culture. As we have journeyed through the twentieth into the twenty-first century, it seems that our Christian faith has been transformed, often by Baptists, into what is regarded simply as a private concern. Earlier incarnations in this country of the Christian faith seem to have been focused much more on societal transformation like prohibition, abolition, dealing with, supporting, or fighting integration, working to further education, and investing worldwide in mission endeavors. During the last century, Christianity became more and more focused on a "personal relationship with Christ." It seems that this has come to mean having one's ticket punched for heaven, often meaning that the professed faith has little to do with anything beyond a place in eternity. Indeed, I wonder if we have transformed "eternal life" from being a present reality lived out in many way now and then continuing into eternity into "pie in the sky by and by when you die." What are the thoughts of others in the BL family?