Lux Lucet

The preaching and belief of the Gospel changes not only individuals, but whole societies.  As Christians we understand the former, but often have a poor grasp of the latter.  As a youngster, I was taught nothing by my public schools about the great debt modern civilization owes to Christianity.  Ancient Greece and Rome, I was told, were the basis of modern science, democracy and civlization as a whole.  It’s safe to say no one in my classes, including me, had ever heard of E. C. Wine’s The Hebrew Republic or Max Weber’s The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism.  Our history books, however, did give us one or two paragraphs on a minor event that took place in the 16th century, something called the Protestant Reformation.  

Perhaps the best treatment I have ever read of the contrast between Christian and non-Christian civilization is John Robbins’ book Christ and Civilization.  In it, Robbins paints a stark picture of just how unjust and brutal “glorious” ancient Greek and Roman societies really were.  This should come as no surprise to anyone who has read even a little history.  The enormities of communism and fascism in the 20th century occurred, not in a Christian contex, but in an atheistic one.  Our own nation is rapidly sinking under the weight of similar foolish ideas, and unless Christ grants widespread repentance, we will surely experience the same sort of oppression as did the people of those societies.  Brutality is both the result of and the punishment for the rejection of Christ.  

Without further delay, I give you the opening paragraphs of Robbins’ book.  

Each December 25 and January 7 nearly two billion people celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ.  The celebration is doubly ironic, for the dates are not his birthday, and most celebrants have forgotten – or, more likely, have never learned – the meaning of his birth.  One of the most enthusiastic celebrants of Christmas I have known was an atheist.  She loved the colorful decorations, the intoxicating smells, the cheerful songs, the plentiful food and drink, the smiling faces of children, exchanging gifts, and the feeling of goodwill, however fleeting.  She, like hundreds of millions of others, was a devotee of Christmas, but not a disciple of Christ.

Hundreds of millions of churchgoers, unlike my atheist acquaintance, add religious feelings to their list of things to like about Christmas:  They seek and find feelings of awe and wonder from visiting cathedrals, listening to choirs and oratorios, observing rituals and processions performed by gaudily attired priests; and they think those feelings of transcendence are somehow Christian.  The churchgoers are more deluded than the atheist.

This profound ignorance of Christ – an ignorance that does not even realize it is ignorance – is a tragedy of eternal proportions, for the life of Christ – his birth, life, death, and resurrection – is not only the most important event in the history of mankind, but far more important, the only way to Heaven.  In fact, if Christ were not the only way to Heaven, his earthly life would have no importance at all.  Christ’s life is the point from which we date all of world history, and it is impossible to understand history and Western civilization,  especially the United States, without understanding Christianity.