T he Revolution That I s Christendom I t was God who r e concil e d us t o hi m se lf t hr ough Chri st and gave us the work o f ha nd ing on this reco ncil i at ion. I n other words, God in Chr ist was r e co ncil ing the w orl d to hi m sel t not hol ding m e n’ s faul ts aga i nst the m , and he has entrusted to us the news that they are reconciled, -2 Corinthians 518-19 JUNE , 1781, wa s a Sunday, the first Sunday of the mont h when the “Holy Sacrament” was custom aril y distributed. J a mes Bos - well recounted h is going with Samuel J ohns on to Sou thill C hu rch n e ar M r. Dilly’s. When Boswell noticed that J ohnson did not recei ve Comm union, he inquired why. “I had not t hought o f i t,” was J ohn son ’ s curt rep l y. But Boswell felt that there were other and more spiritual reasons, tha t J ohnson “did not choose to approach the altar without a previous preparation. . . ’’ I Boswell next discussed the thr ee views about the types o f prepa- ration for th e Sacrament that were then controverted within the Church. Boswell went on to record the further conversa ti ons o f this da y. T he opini on o f a learned bishop whom both Boswell and J ohnson kne w-his vi e w about there being “merit in religious faith”-was brought up . J ohnson averred tha t there was indeed some merit in the good bishop ’ s po sition: “W hy, yes , S i r,” J ohn son went on, “the most licentious man, were hell open before him, would not take the mos t be u tiful strumpe t in his arms. We must, as t he A pos tle s ays, li ve b y f a i th, not by sight.” St. Paul, no doubt, has never been quoted in a more quaint context. This vivid conversation led Boswell and J ohnson to the top i c o f “original si n” and “the atonement made by our Saviour.” Further conversation ensued, whi ch J ohnson wante d B os well to re cord. “W ith re spe ct to ori gina l sin, the inquir y is not nece ssary,” J ohnson he l d, “f or what- ever is the cause o f human cor rupti on, men are evidently and confessedly s o cor- rupt, that a ll the l aws of hea ven and e arth are insufficient to restrain them from cri me s.” J ohnson ’ s fi na l comm e nt on such theological topics was succinct: “The peculi ar doctri ne o f C hri stianity is, tha t o f an universal sacrifice, and perpetual pro- pitiation. Other prophets only proclaimed the wil l and the threate nings of God. Christ satisfied his justice.” On the occasion o f the J e ffe rson L ec- ture, which he gave in 1989, the novelist Walker Percy was asked about using in public words such a s God, religion, sin, soul, and J esu s C hrist. He rem arked tha t the novelist has to learn t o speak of such subjects most circumspectly before an educated aud ience si nce toda y’s i nte l l i - gentsia can no longer even hear such words with comprehension or sympathy. “T he C a th ol ic novel i st ha s to be ve ry care- ful,” Percy cautiously maintained. “He has to b e underhanded, deceitf ul, and da mn careful how he uses the words o f rel i gi on, whi ch have f a l l e n into di suse and a l mos t be com e obs ce niti e s.”* Si m i l a r to Pl a to or to Leo Strauss, one must use “myth” or “secret writing” even to hint at the truth. At the end o the eighteenth century two learned men could talk knowingly and b e l i evi ng l y o f ori gi na l sin, at onem ent , and comm uni on wi thou t the sli ght es t hesi- tation. By the end o f the twentieth cen- tury, however, such topi cs m ust be sp oken
It was God who reconciled us to himself through Christ and gave us the workof handing on this reconciliation. In other words, God in Christ was reconcilingthe world to himselt not holding men’s faults against them, and he hasentrusted to us the news that they are reconciled, -2 Corinthians518-19
JUNE, 1781,was aSunday, the first Sundayof the month when the “Holy Sacrament”was customarily distributed. J ames Bos-well recounted his going with SamuelJ ohnson to Southill Church near Mr.Dilly’s. When Boswell noticed thatJ ohnson did not receive Communion, heinquired why. “I had not thought of it,”was Johnson’s curt reply. But Boswell felt
that there were other and more spiritualreasons, that Johnson “did not choose toapproach the altar without a previouspreparation. . . ’’ I Boswell next discussedthe three views about the types of prepa-ration for the Sacrament that were thencontroverted within the Church.
Boswell went on to record the furtherconversations of this day. The opinion of alearned bishop whom both Boswell and
Johnson knew-his view about therebeing “merit in religious faith”-wasbrought up. Johnson averred that therewas indeed some merit in the goodbishop’s position: “Why, yes, Sir,” Johnsonwent on, “the most licentious man, werehell open before him, would not take themost beautiful strumpet in his arms. Wemust, as the Apostle says, live by faith, notby sight.” St. Paul, no doubt, has never
been quoted in a more quaint context.This vivid conversation led Boswelland J ohnson to the topic of “original sin”and “the atonement made by ourSaviour.” Further conversation ensued,which Johnson wanted Boswell to record.“With respect to original sin, the inquiry is
not necessary,” J ohnson held, “for what-ever is the cause of human corruption,men are evidently and confessedly socor-rupt, that all the laws of heaven and earthare insufficient to restrain them fromcrimes.” J ohnson’s final comment on suchtheological topics was succinct: “Thepeculiar doctrine of Christianity is, that ofan universal sacrifice, and perpetual pro-
pitiation. Other prophets only proclaimedthe will and the threatenings of God.Christ satisfied his justice.”
On the occasion of the Jefferson Lec-ture, which he gave in 1989, the novelistWalker Percy was asked about using inpublic words such as God, religion, sin,soul, and J esus Christ. He remarked thatthe novelist has to learn to speak of suchsubjects most circumspectly before an
educated audience since today’s intelli-gentsia can no longer even hear suchwords with comprehension or sympathy.“The Catholic novelist has to be very care-ful,” Percy cautiously maintained. “Hehasto be underhanded, deceitful, and damncareful how he uses the words of religion,which have fallen into disuse and almostbecome obscenities.”* Similar to Plato orto Leo Strauss, one must use “myth” or
“secret writing” even to hint at the truth.At the end o the eighteenth centurytwo learned men could talk knowinglyand believingly of original sin, atonement,and communion without the slightest hesi-tation. By the end of the twentieth cen-tury, however, such topics must be spoken
of guardedly. It almost makes one doubtany theory of progress. Obscenities areblared almost everywhere in the modernworld with the protection of the law and
the promotion o the culture, while faithmust be obscured. In the eighteenth cen-tury, a strumpet could bring up questionsof eternal punishment in the mind of alicentious man, whereas in the twentiethcentury she is hardly recognizable asany-thing other than abearer of human rightsin an ancient and honorable profession.The licentious man, on the other hand,supports some of the most widely readand powerful publications in our society. It
might be concluded from this record oftwo hundred years that Christianity is in-deed in the process of disappearing, atleast in the souls of the more literate (andlicentious) members of our society.Whether this phenomenon is more of aproblem for society’s literate members orfor Christians-they are not always thesame people-remains to be seen.
Christianity does not claim to be
either a parochial or a time-bound faith,even though it began at an identifiabletime and in aspecific place, in the reign ofAugustus Caesar, when the whole worldwasatpeace. Indeed, Christianity does nothold that it ultimately began in “time” atall but that it came to be in time throughthe birth of a child, an event prepared byother events described in the Old Testa-ment. In Christianity’s understanding ofitself, the elements of time and eternityare essential, as well as proper and neces-sary. Christianity began as an event, notas an idea or as adoctrine. And when oneevent happens, others follow from it to theend, even to the end of the world. Christi-anity necessarily involves ideas and doc-trines because men must explain what theevents are about and what they mean. Anevent without a human word will neverappear within the human horizon. T he
results of events arewords. Words in turnlead to events: “In the Beginning was theWord. . . .”
Moreover, Christianity is intended tobe, as Samuel J ohnson recognized, a uni-versal faith. Christianity is expected to
reach, through the human and divineagency of its members, each human beingat the core reality in his soul, at the realityof the choice where each person makes
himself to be what he chooses to be withinthe initial givenness of his being. Christi-anity is designed precisely for one in what-ever kingdom or regime someone may befound in, in the best and in the worst, andin those in between wherein most menhave lived their days whether happily orsadly.
I f we estimate that some ninety billionpeople have already existed on thisplanet, and that only some five billion of
these are still alive, the fact remains thatexisting man on earth, in the Christianview, is to explain and direct himself tothe transcendent being, to God, fromwhich each person came and to which heis to return. This drama of choice is whatwe observe in the lives of each of themembers of the human race. Nothing elsereally matters; everything elseisthe back-ground and worldly context of this choice-
ful “cornmedia,” as Dante significantlycalled it. The this-worldly mission of Chris-tianity is wholly secondary to this essentialtask which, on its doctrinal and ritual side,is nothing less than its seeking to explainto each man his purpose and his destiny.
There are not, then, two classes ofhuman beings, one intended to reach Godand one not. All are indeed made for thesame purpose and destiny. But because ofhuman freedom, some may in fact choosenot to reach God. This central fact ofchoice was described already in the fifthcentury by St. Augustine in the “City ofGod.” Two cities in fact existed, not one,because the power of choice so radicallydefines what human beings ultimately are.Whether any individual human beings donot reach God, we do not know. The veilof death ever leaves mankind in doubt,and in hope, and, in some theologies, even
in despair.To believe that some, if not many, are
eternally lost, however, isnot required bythe orthodox tradition. It isonly necessaryto believe that if any are lost, it is by theirown choice. Essentially we must believe
that the possibility of man’s radical separa-tion from the reality intended for him byGod does exist. In a negative sense, herelies the ultimate foundation of human dig-
nity, the guarantee that man’s own actionsare not finally meaningless. Classic opti-mism maintains on its own premises-they are not Christian premises-that aGod may not even threaten the most direof consequences to free man because ohis own actions in the world. But this “op-timistic” view is precisely the most anti-human of philosophies for it removes anyseriousness from the human experience.
Doctrinally speaking, the denial of theteaching on hell is the other side of theelimination o any real significance forhuman action, for its ultimate seriousnessbefore being i t~el f .~
The first, second, and now the im-pending third millennium of Christianityunderscore in retrospect the improbablefact not of Christianity’s demise but of itsstrength, its curious lastingness in thisworld. Whatever elsemight be said about
Christianity, what is most obvious isthat itshould not still be here at all. Christianityis too old still to exist. By any secularnorm-scientific, historiographical, orsociological-this organized faith needssomething other than itself to remainwhat it is. Christian faith itself recognizesin the symbolic keys of Peter a guaranteethat the gates o hell shall not prevailagainst it.
The immediate thing to be explainedabout Christianity is not whether it willcontinue to survive, but why has it lastedso long, longer than any other organizedinstitution in human history. T here maybe scattered tribes and faiths perhapsolder than Christianity, to be sure, thoughtheir organization is mostly blood andfamily, not the product of a rational andwilled system. But all the institutionalized
nations themselves have come and mosthave gone or have been soradically trans-formed that they really are not continuouswith what went before them. Scientifical-ly, Christianity should not still exist.
The interesting thing about Christian-ity is not how much it has changed, but
how much it has not changed. Indeed, thisisthe most interesting and important thingabout it. For if Christianity actually“changed,” it would cease to be what it is,
which is what makes it worth knowingabout in the first place. And whatever wemight think of doctrinal development,doctrine does not, strictly speaking,“change.” Unless Christianity is in somefundamental sense the same as it wasfrom the beginning, then its universalclaim is simply non-existing. The claim oChristianity is also a claim of truth, of atruth that is the same yesterday and the
same forever, as St. Paul would have it. I fChristianity does not make this claim totruth, then it simply has no real reason toexist.
In one sense we can consider Christi-anity’s longevity to be caused by its adapt-ability. Continuation of principle and ritedo not militate necessarily against varietyof symbol or wording. But the more pro-found problem has to do rather with Chris-tianity’s constancy within time. The
Nicene Creed is still recited. Communionisstill distributed as in the time of St. Ber-nard of Clairvaux, or of Samuel Johnson,or of Walker Percy. The Gospel of J ohn isstill read. Sins are still confessed. The TenCommandments and the two Great Com-mandments are still there to be observedor broken by those who affirm their valid-ity.
Of itself, Christianity says that when
these rites and doctrines cease, it willcease. Christianity assumes that all otherinstitutions will pass away. The mostdangerous threat to universal culture isthat Christianity will adapt itself to its sur-rounding norms rather than remainingitself. The ultimate worth of Christianity isthat it maintains a newness and freshnessable to transcend each nation or peoplewithout denying its respective worth.Christianity does not consider that thiscapacity which it has demonstrated aboutitself in history as an existential fact arisesfrom the strength or genius of individualChristians themselves. Christianity’s per-sistence is not considered to be the prod-uct of the genius and tenacity of individual
Christians using their own unaidedpowers. Thus, in the seventeenth century,Blaise Pascal could write in his Pensees,“The Church is in an excellent state, when
it is sustained by God only” (#860).J ohn Paul I1 has often in recent yearsspoken of the coming “Third Millennium”of Christianity. Are we to look on it asapocalypse or hope, or both? I f we askwhether Christianity is a “success,” againwe have to ask whether it is a success inwhose terms? Those of that modernitythat has defined itself in opposition toChristianity? Those of Christianity itself?What would a “successful” Christianitylook like? St. Augustine seems to have sug-gested that as the world gets older, fewerand fewer believers will be found. AndAugustine did not necessarily think thatthis meant that Christianity was thereby“unsuccessful.” Christianity was to bewhat it was, and only then could it becalled successful in its own terms. Buteven if more and more Christians were tobe found, would that mean necessarily
that the ultimate purpose of Christianitywas being achieved? Faithand works-theReformation struggle was no slight matter.
What is the relation between the na-tions, cultures, and religions of the worldand Christianity? Again, is this the properquestion to ask of Christianity? Christian-ity is not, in itsown view, hostile to philos-ophy, except to aphilosophy that presentsitself as a humanly closed system, which is
in fact the case with not a few. Indeed,Christianity argues that it alone is compat-ible with a true philosophy of what is. Inthe thirteenth century, Aquinas also re-marked that it is impossible to err withoutembracing some truth in the process. Thistruth iswhy all religions and philosophieshave something in common, somethinguniversal, to talk about, if they will.
Does Christianity have an inner-worldly mission? That is to say, is there aright order of the world and is it the pur-pose of Christianity to establish it? A re thephilosophers not necessary and are thepoliticians and craftsman without theirown insight? So strongly has modern cul-
turebased itself on the condition of man inthe world, however, that it often can seeno other criterion but its own, presup-posed to nothing but itself, by which to
judge anything, including religion.Isthere a“K ingdom of God” on earth?And if so, is that what Christianity is pri-marily about, assomany, even Christians,seem to want to believe? IsChristianity in-tended to “improve the world?” Or, per-haps better, will it improve the world?And what might the criterion of this “im-provement” be? Does faith judge cultureor does culture judge faith? Could the im-mortal souls all be gained and the worldlost? And if so, would Christianity thenhave proved itself to be a failure?
Do Christians consequently still repeatthe disturbing words, “What doth it profita man to gain the whole world and losethe lifeof his immortal soul?” This was thequestion that St. Ignatius in the sixteenthcentury used to repeat to the young Pari-sian college student Francis Xavier, who,when he decided he did not want the prof-
it of the world, proceeded to go to theOrient because he wanted to see that thisreligion was known not merely in Europebut all over the world. Is it legitimate tochallenge the distant nations with a beliefthat is not theirs, not their own construc-tion?
Or do the nations, like the Atheniansat the trial of Socrates, have the rawpower to decide what adherence to their
own gods might mean? Was this Xavier afool? Or was what hebrought needed bythose to whom he came even if they didnot know it? Do the nations ever reallyknow the destiny of the citizens who makeup their structures? On the surface, therise and decline of nations and civiliza-tions seem continuous and without partic-ular significance. I f the purpose of man’sexistence on earth is that he live in someperfect, complete, self-sufficient regime,must we not conclude that the question ofhappiness and meaning for the vast major-ity of mankind who have ever lived hassimply been in vain? Most people most ofthe time have lived in terrible regimes or
terrible conditions, and even the bestregimes are few and their days are alsodistressed.
But it was probably not until the nine-teenth century, with its vast missionary
works, that Christianity reached the farcorners of the earth. Did it come there asan alien power, assomany think? Or did itcome, as it thinks of itself, to dwell withinevery culture because there are universalquestions that all people ask which are notat all culture-bound? Can nations be“saved?” Has the Enlightenment so influ-enced us that we can no longer ask anyquestions but inner-worldly ones? Near
the end of the Gospel of Mark, the disci-ples are told to go forth and preach to allcreation what they had seen and heard.
Christendom is itself invaded by theolder religions-by Islam, by the Chinese,by the Hindus. Science and democracy,what are these? What are their origins? IfChristianity is not universal, surely theselatter are? Can science and democracy ex-ist outside of Christendom? Are certainfundamental doctrines and practices im-plicitly or explicitly necessary in everycivilization? Did science and democracyarise in theWest by accident, as akind ofhistoric chance? Or did they arise therebecause of the peculiar nature of Christi-anity itself? Is faith necessary for science?And is there a natural law which even theChristians did not invent?
The most radical thing that one cansay today-radical in the sense of opposed
in principle to the commonly acceptednorms of contemporary discourse-is that,in the end, it does not make any ultimatedifference where one lives, in whatregime or society. True, some polities arebetter than others, that is, if there are rightand wrong ways of being human. If thereis no right way to be a human, then theprincipal question of political philosophy,of the way men organize themselves,
namely, what is the best regime, will notbe asked, because all regimes will be equalin principle. In such acase, we could notcompare or judge regimes, only describethem, celebrate their structures, whateverit isthey do. We could not go to all the na-tions with anything, the worst regime isas
legitimate as the best because there is noway to tell them apart.
Y et, it is true. The connection be-tween souls and regimes is not such thatregimes, though they too are of the soul,
answer the deepest questions of souls. TheK ingdom of God will also be populated bymen from the worst existing regimes.Grace abounds. And we must likewiseassume that the realm of hell will findwithin itsunhappy confines many of thosefrom the best earthly regimes. What doesthis mean with regard to Christianity inthe third millennium? It means that Chris-tianity must continue to speak to souls
over the heads of (or with the cooperationof) existing regimes. Would it not be best,then, as so many late twentiethcenturyChristians seem to maintain in their easyaccommodation with the aftereffects ofthe Enlightenment, to work to establishthe best regimes? Religion ought to bepolitics.
The effort to establish the best regimein this world has invariably been the locusof the most dangerous opponents to whatis human in the modern era. Christianitymaintains that it has at its disposal toolsthat are not available to or for the polity,even though, since creation and redemp-tion are a single whole, right order withthe divinity will entail right order with thepolity. Faith and reason do not contradicteach other. The fact is that good citizen-ship does not entail good belief, and with-out good belief one will not be saved.
Christianity takes the human intellect seri-ously, and the function of the intellect is toknow the truth. One can have good beliefand bad practice, sothat one must believeand act. In other words, everyone hasboth intellect and will and these facultiesconstitute our unique selves and relation-ships, the ones that are really ours.
Josef Pieper has made the followingremark about Christianity, about its com-
plexity and its simplicity, about what itessentially is, if it be itself:
According to the theologians, the essenceofthe Christian faith can be summed up in twowords. Those two words are Trinity and I n-carnation. The “universal teacher” [St.Thomas] of Christendom has said that the
whole content of the truth of Christianitycan be reduced to the dogmaof the Trinitar-ian God and the dogma that man partici-pates in the lifeof God through C hr i ~t.~
There is a modern reluctance to admitthat the purpose of man is, in part, to clar-ify what it is that he is,what God is, so thathis intellect becomes more of itself byseeking to know, even to know the divin-ity.
Behind the reluctance to acknowledgethe purpose of the human intellect onefinds both a skepticism and a kind of pur-ity that would have us give up the effort.
However, it is true that we will not be ableever to define what God is in exhaustivehuman terms. Spiritual beings have this incommon, that their capacity to know isthat faculty that they share in some fash-ion with each other, so that not to seek toknow and not to define the doctrineswould be to fail to exercise one of thegiven faculties. And since it would be pre-cisely thehighest faculty that is doubted, itwould mean that man fails in adignity that
most constitutes his being. The failure ofintellect thus is also a failure to followman’s natural way to God.
God transcends our formulas. Wewant not just a definition of God, but GodHimself. An existentialist theory of knowl-edge is not one that ignores this need. Infact, it is one that rests on it in its veryoperation. The same reality may indeedbe explained in different languages and
from different aspects rooted in the realityof its being. But contradictory explana-tions are not possible. The human mind isnot the infinite mind, but it is a mind, andin this sense it must confront what itknows of the Godhead. The argumentamong religions and philosophies aboutwhat is true even in logic must recognizethat not all positions are equally true. Asmall error in the beginning leads to a
large error in the end, as Aristotle hadalready observed. It makes a differenceboth to civilization and to each personwhich understanding of God is true. Thismeans that the Hobbesian effort in mod-ernity to remove from the public order adiscussion of the highest things in the
name of civil peace is itself a betrayal ofhuman dignity.
The city isnot the location of the dis-cussion of the highest things which we
know of the divinity. But the city canmake such discussions impossible or diffi-cult. This is why the problem of the rela-tion of poetry to philosophy and also topolitics is and remains the theoreticalbeginning of all human effort to relatedivinity to man. Since man does transcendthe city, then the city cannot and must notsubstitute itself for what transcends it. In-deed, the main alternative to God in the
modern world isthe state itself,particular-ly the statethat identifies itself as the in-strument or the completion of what isknown by man and of what is good forman. It is true that the wars of religionhave not resolved the problems that existbetween religions, each of which claimthe truth. This is why we have and oughtto have differing regimes in which at leastsome possibility of genuine philosophicalor religious truth is possible. The way of
persuasion, as Plato argued, remains forall polities.
In the twenty-first century, no doubt,the question of the relation of man to thecosmos and to the other beings of thisearth will arise in an acute form becauseof the problem of the transfer of at leastsome human and animal lifeoutside of thisplanet for a more or less permanent resi-dence. The problem of the twenty-first
century, moreover, will not be one inwhich the main condition of mankind willbe scarcity but abundance. Computers, fu-sion, further advances of knowledge andtechnique will freemore and more menand women for the leisured life to whichAristotle referred as the true end ofhuman earthly existence. Whether man ismore dangerous to himself in scarcity orabundance remains to be seen, though
Aristotle himself had already warned thatthe most probable answer would be abun-dance-would be, in fact, in philosophy.
The question then remains: What sortof existence is this which mankind hasbeen offered in this world? What is to bedone with it? I f we distinguish an individ-
ual existence which will itself transcendthe destiny of any earthly city or culturefrom the purpose of the world itself, wecan seethat the two questions are not the
same. Man is higher than the state, eventhough man isby nature a political animal.We must assume in Christian terms thatthe Incarnation will remain a permanentreality of the Godhead. Hence, St. Paul’sremark that creation itself is groaning forredemption suggests that the destiny ofthe world is related to the destiny of man.Man is not an afterthought of the world,but the world, in spite of its immensity, is
an afterthought to the existence of the ra-tional being, the image of God. The ulti-mate configurations of the world will de-pend on man, on his choice and tech-nique. But the world does not constituteman’s principal choice, which is that of thecity he chooses ultimately to join, the Cityof God or the city of man.
Each human being has a soul whichtranscends the world. The nature and thecondition of this soul are such that man-kind will always be disturbed by man’sbeing insofar as he is not devoted to theopenness to which this soul is directed.The twentieth century has seen the alter-natives to God elaborated in their mostperfect forms. Eric Voegelin has put itwell:
At the extreme of the revolt in conscious-ness, “reality” and the “Beyond” becometwo separate entities, two “things,” to bemagically manipulated by suffering man forthe purpose of either abolishing “reality”altogether and escaping into the “Beyond,”or of forcing the order of the “Beyond” into“reality.” The first of the magic alternativesispreferred by the gnosticsof antiquity, thesecond one by the modern gnosticthinker̂ ^
Christianity is not gnostic. It does notwant the reality of what is less than God todisappear into God or into nothingness.This is why it can assimilate the class’cdoctrine of the immortality of the soul intoits own doctrine of Resurrection. On theother hand, Christianity cannot accept theview that the purpose of human and cos-
mic existence is merely itself or its ownmaking. That spiritual coreo man, whichincludes his connection to all of thecosmos through his own body, longs for
that which will fulfill it. The civilizationalpurpose of Christianity in the twenty-firstcentury is that this longing should not beforgotten or unattended to, even thoughwhat man is transcends the world.
Jean-Marie Lustiger, the Polish-bornCardinal of Paris, has written:
All the world’s problems are basically spiri-tual problems and they stem from the temp-tations of Christianity. From this comes the
inevitable conclusion that if the world’sproblems are spiritual problems, then thereare Christian answers to the world crisis. Ido not derive a sort of spiritual imperialismfrom this but I point to the evidence for aparadox: the main problems which consti-tute our world crisis (starvation, underdevel-opment, wars, etc.) are capable of a tech-nical solution. We could, i f we reallywanted, feed the whole of humanity,develop all the Third World countries, and
stop the arms race. But in fact, if we do nothave the technical means for this at hand, itisbecause we do not really want these ulti-mately desirable objectives. Sowhat is mak-ing them impossible to reach now is some-thing in our own hearts and wills.
However correct in itsessential point, thisposition is perhaps too one-sided. Theproblem is not just in the hearts of Chris-tians. It is also in the hearts of those who
resist-individually, politically, or academ-ically-listening to its reality or living thespiritual means that it proposes.
Ultimately the real issue is found inthe reluctance to admit that the way to ac-complish the technical means for achiev-ing these laudable ends requires a denial,in whole or in part, of the validity andworth of certain historic ideologies andreligions. This latter spiritual confronta-tion is the real nature of the struggle ofChristianity in the twenty-first century.Ironically, this struggle over the inner-worldly purpose of Christianity is foundalso within the heart of Christianity aboutits own essence, about the Transcendentto which it first must be committed. “Seek
ye first the Kingdom o God.” The thirdmillennium of Christianity will, as in thefirst and second, have this purpose as themain criterion of what it is about.
Nietzsche wrote inThe Twilight of the
Idols:
The Christian and the anarchist are bothdecadents. When the Christian condemns,slanders, and besmirches “the world,” his in-stinct is the same as that which prompts thesocialist worker to condemn, slander, andbesmirch sociew.The “last judgment” is thesweet comfort of revenge-the revelation,which the socialist-worker also wants, butconceived as a little farther off. The
“beyond”-why a beyond, if not asameansfor besmirching this world (#34).
Christianity in the twenty-first century, asin the first and in the thirteenth, ought not“besmirch” this world-but it should recallthat “this world” is not our destiny, norour final purpose. “The peculiar doctrine
of Christianity,” to repeat the words ofSamuel J ohnson, “isthat of an universalsacrifice, and perpetual propitiation.” Thistruth, this “dogma,” is Christianity’s pur-
pose in any century. As Chesterton said,“Christianity has died many times andrisen again; for it had a God who knew theway out o the grave.”
-J ames V. Schall, S. J .
I BoswellS L ife of ohnson (L ondon, 1931), I , 422-25.21nterview,Crisis (J uly 1989).3ee J ames V. Schall,“On the Neglect of Hell in Political Theory,” ThePolitics of Heaven and Hell: Christian Themes fromClassical, Medieval, and Modern Political Philosophy(L anham, M d., 1984), pp. 83-106. 4J osef P ieper,“C ommunication of Reality,” J osef fieper-An An-fhology (San Francisco, 1989), p. 18. 51n Search ol
Order (Baton Rouge, 1987). p. 37. 6“T he World‘sProblems Are Spiritual Problems,” Dare to Live,trans. M. N. L . Couvre de Murville (New York, 1988),p. 30.
