There is much consider as the culture many of us live in secularizes, that is, divorces us from a tangible Christian perspective, manner of being, and how we live in a world with diverse opinions. Today, we have to ask about Christ or Christendom. It is said that Saint Augustine asked, what there is of Christian among Christians is Christ. He is orienting our attention not to an idea but to a person, a meeting, an encounter, with a person. Emphatically we all have to state that to be a Christian is to be in contact with a person, Jesus the Christ. Being Christian does not mean moral norms, cultural ideology, and precepts of the Church. Morality, culture and precepts within an ecclesiology are extraordinarily important, but they are secondary in accepting Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior and adhering to Him; it is also a firm belief in heaven (salvation).
Is Christ important, or are consequences of Christ? We all have to come to terms with how we let what and who we believe in impact the way we live. That is, does Jesus Christ really mean something to you and does said belief have consequences in the manner of how you live? As a friend of Jesus Christ, what does it mean to hold to an “economy of salvation”? How do we interpret history of the Christian era? What role does true faith play in this period of history? Where are we as Christians in this history? Does eternal life with the Trinity mean anything anymore? In order to do so we have to be as objective as possible; our ideological impulses have to be put aside so as to deal with reality without rewriting the past.
Start now in developing a more coherent, mature faith in Jesus Christ and then in His Church. You ought to read the following articles to begin (remember not to form conclusions yet) your thinking on the subject:
- Gianni Valente, “Christians and Christianists” (2004)
- Benjamin Mann, “The End of ‘Christianism‘” (2013)
- start reading everything by Joseph Ratzinger.