[She] called for Christians to begin proclaiming their religious convictions amid an increasingly secular culture, beginning at the workplace:
In some places to be a Christian by day is to be regarded as a dinosaur ”“ dangerous and clumsy, deeply stupid, a thing of the past. To avoid that label, and therefore professional stagnation, discipleship might well be limited to quiet though generous gestures in the dark rather than public witness to Christian faith.
In other work contexts there is a veneer of acceptance, but in modern professional culture Christianity is not particularly respectable and Christians are assumed to have a conservative moral outlook which flies in the face of diversity and polarity and self expression. Professions require putting our own preferences aside.
In the U.S., you’d expect such lines to be followed by a call to speak out against gay marriage or against the government’s attack on religion in the public square….
“In the U.S., you’d expect such lines to be followed by a call to speak out against gay marriage or against the government’s attack on religion in the public square….”
NOT JUST IN THE US WOULD YOU EXPECT THAT…!!!!
I’m slightly baffled by this piece. The sermon quotations seem to show that proclaiming christian convictions in the public square culminates in efforts to increase public spending. Whether one agrees with this view or not, it’s characteristic in the USA of many mainline social gospel ministers. In addition it’s surely not too surprising that the preacher doesn’t go on to speak out against gay marriage given that I think she’s a patron of Changing Attitude, an organization campaigning for “the full inclusion” of lesbian, gay, bi and transgender in the Anglican Communion.
One first glance, rather this seems a rather close replication of the the kind of views one might encounter in many mainline Protestant pulpits in the USA. Am I missing something?
Thank you for drawing attention to this sermon, Kendall. Throughout the world and history, the Church of Jesus Christ – whether corporately or each of His followers – has been most successful in the fulfilling Jesus’ Great Commission when we express God’s compassionate love and will for truly universal [i]shalom[/i] by modeling lives transformed and self-disciplined for mercy (over judgment) and social harmony (over angry division). Sadly, however, in our times too often the Church sabotages the appeal and invitation we are to make to the world either by judging the conduct of others like Pauline morality police, or by wrongly claiming that a prophet’s role as advocate for justice means provoking discord through sarcasm and passive-aggressive innuendo, rather than calling for the renewal of obedience to our covenant with God. It is not the ideological purity – whether “progressive†or “conservative†– that we imagine of what we preach and teach and of the statements we publish that wins inquiring heart and minds for Jesus. We win them by the integrity of our lives as faithful followers of Jesus and loving servants of His cause. The Church everywhere would do well, and perhaps find healing for itself, to keep this in our minds, hearts, and prayers.