by Daniel S. Trout
For quite some time now, American Christians have been exhibiting the unsettling reality that they are hastening a disconnect between their belief and their behavior. If I may borrow the slogan for the Las Vegas advertising campaign, Christians have unwittingly adopted the mentality that “what happens in church, stays in church.” Not that Christianity is a secret too juicy to tell, but for too many Christians, it’s a banal Sunday duty (speedily performed please!) occasionally accented during the week with an interposed meeting or potluck. Like everything else in our culture, we are relegating religion to suit our own convenience, transmuting it into some kind of badge that announces that we are still in fact “spiritual,” despite our demanding schedule. What I am afraid few recognize is that our Faith, practically-speaking, has such little influence over our behavior, relations, and decisions that most Christians can no longer be identified as such. On Sunday, the liturgy just “happens” but doesn’t transform, prayers said with even a little intention are quickly forgotten, and Christ’s presence so quickly drifts by that the discipleship we need never grows. What other consequence should we expect afterwards but the gradual adoption of whatever social morals are in vogue? Meanwhile, Christian conduct becomes extinct.
For us Anglicans, our rich heritage compels us to resist this slide, which I will suggest, is nothing less than an identity crisis. In the Book of Common Prayer, the General Thanksgiving pleads at one point: “…and that we show forth thy praise, not only with our lips, but in our lives, by giving up ourselves to thy service, and by walking before thee in holiness and righteousness all our days.” This simple prayer of the Church confirms what the Scriptures and the lives of Christ and the Saints teach us—that God’s praise must unceasingly be sought through His people’s life and labor. Only we will see the Eucharist offered on Sunday; the Eucharist to the world must be the witness of every Christian walking in integrity—the life of virtue transformed into the image of Christ. The world’s ethics, now dominated by secularism’s compromising and permissive nature, exists merely for the sake of social order with minimal accountability; godly virtue that the Church exemplifies reveals God’s character and His will, besides ordering human affairs.
However, the world wants to make it easy for us—and on itself—to our forgetfulness and its own unchallenged wickedness. On the other hand, a commitment to virtuous living is very hard. In our private lives, our relations, and our jobs, demonstrating the so-called cardinal virtues of discernment, courage, justice and self-control requires the risk of being different from those around us and accepting the sacrifice of being rejected by people that hate the guilt they feel in the presence of a righteous man or woman. But this is how we are called to manifest Jesus to our society: we are the light to those whose hearts are soft to receive it, and the judgment to those that are hardened. Undoubtedly, this sounds like an uncomfortable mission, but as Christians, we also uniquely have been given the “theological” virtues of faith, hope and love: the faith to place ourselves in God’s hands, the hope to look for Christ’s appearing and eternity with Him, and the love to unselfishly bear the cross of our calling and share the good news of Jesus with others. As the family of the Church, we can do this! If we believe that we are inheriting a Kingdom better than the world’s enticements, we will conduct ourselves as citizens worthy to receive it. Sunday isn’t the end-all, but Christ’s personal promise that a virtuous life of radical dedication to things unseen will one day be rewarded as only He can.
