The past few years have seen a rise in Christian Nationalism [1], which works off of the premise that society, especially the secular West is antagonistic to the Gospel. There is something that has been lost or abandoned, and we must do all we can to reclaim it.<\/p>\n
Tom Holland, in Dominion,<\/i> joins other theorists who think differently (Charles Taylor, Miroslav Volf). He names Christianity as the\u00a0defining cultural force behind the development of Western civilization. Holland, a secular historian, contends that even modern secular values\u2014like human rights, equality, and compassion\u2014are deeply rooted in Christian thought, whether acknowledged or not [2]. They bear the same Christian stamp. Holland posits \u201cThat human beings have rights; that they are born equal; that they are owed sustenance, and shelter, and refuge from persecution: these were never self-evident truths.\u201d [3]\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n So I want to interact with questions that lies behind these competing views of Western civilization. The tension between Christianity and secularism is often framed as antagonistic, but Tom Holland\u2019s Dominion<\/i>\u00a0argues that\u00a0secular values are deeply indebted to Christian moral frameworks. So why do many Christians see secularism as a threat rather than a continuation?<\/p>\n I see two possibilities:<\/p>\n Historical memory and identity is being lost.<\/b><\/b><\/p>\n Many Christians define their faith in contrast to the surrounding culture. Historically, this made sense\u2014early Christians were persecuted by pagan Rome, and later by secular ideologies. This oppositional stance became part of Christian identity, especially in evangelical and confessional traditions. Holland offers a threatening alternative \u2014 that apparent weakness is not the demise of Christianity, but its strength. He claims, “<\/span>Christianity introduced a radical inversion of values:\u00a0the weak over the strong,\u00a0the suffering servant over the conquering hero. The crucifixion, once a symbol of shame, became a symbol of divine majesty. This paradox lies at the heart of Christian ethics and Western morality.” [4]. I see this as critical to keep in the dialogue.<\/p>\n A Loss of Institutional Power.\u00a0<\/span><\/strong><\/b><\/p>\n Since the Western culture has been built on the values of the Christian tradition, Christianity has been afforded incredible privilege. But the shift towards increased secularism and the decline of church attendance and visible association with Christian faith can be felt as a rejection, leading some Christians to interpret secularism as a deliberate dismantling of Christian influence. The irony that Holland argues is that the very values of the West continue to protect religious freedom and human dignity, all of which come from Christian origin [5].<\/p>\n Holland has brought out a possible future of influence build not on antagonism, or on Christianity under fire, but out of the deep appreciation that the very fabric of the West is built upon Christian influence. That is a hermeneutic of culture that I believe will strengthen our future witness.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n _________<\/p>\n [1] Grace Ji-Sun Kim, and Graham Hill, Healing Our Broken Humanity : Practices for Revitalizing the Church and Renewing the World<\/i>, (Chicago: InterVarsity Press, 2018), 7.<\/p>\n [2] Tom Holland, Dominion: The Making of the Western Mind,<\/i> (London: Little, Brown, 2019),\u00a0532.<\/p>\n [3] Dominion<\/em>, 539.<\/p>\n [4] Dominion<\/em>, 394, 441.<\/p>\n [5] Dominion<\/em>, 504.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The past few years have seen a rise in Christian Nationalism [1], which works off of the premise that society, especially the secular West is antagonistic to the Gospel. There is something that has been lost or abandoned, and we must do all we can to reclaim it. Tom Holland, in Dominion, joins other theorists […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":203,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[2969,2627],"class_list":["post-42063","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-dlgp3","tag-holland","cohort-dlgp03"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42063","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/203"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=42063"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42063\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":42067,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42063\/revisions\/42067"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=42063"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=42063"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=42063"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}