Engaging Culture is the Mission of the Church. How do Christians interact with the world around them?

Pluralism in America has never been as strong as it is today and deep cultural change over the past several decades has caused the doctrinal sanctity of the Christian Church to be skewed and altered in response. Pluralism in America has crippled the Church and her mission, rendering those left to conform practices to contemporary standards and values. This change has occurred through the evolution of deinstitutionalized liberal-spiritualism, causing a homogeny of cultural, ethnic, and religious traditions. A quieting of faith convictions has emerged by the Church at large in an attempt to create peace from religious rivalry and societal wounds evolving from the establishment of a historical Christian-republic statehood. Christianity’s response to liberalism is the start of healing for our country and our world.

A History of Pluralism in America

John Adams, in his letter to Thomas Jefferson, wrote that the foundation of America was commonly known as residing in general Christian principles (Silk, 2007). Despite the de facto establishment of general Christianity in America’s nineteenth-century system of jurisprudence (Gordon, 2003), religious pluralism has found its way into the nation (Silk, 2007). Being more than a set of legal or religious prescriptions and diversity, in practice, religious pluralism entails the makeup of multiple faiths which embody shared conceptions of commitments to values and their relation to each other.

Despite the vast beliefs of those in the early American community, non-Christian faiths, such as Mormonism and its polygamist views, were suppressed in its legislative system (Flake, 2004). True religious pluralism found its way into America post World War II, where the Middle Atlantic region, receiving an influx of immigrants in New York, saw a multitude of Protestant, Catholic, and Jewish immigration (Silk, 2007). President Dwight D. Eisenhower recognized this pluralistic nation in his statement that America’s government,

Religious pluralism continued in America through the acceptance of liberal openness and integration of faith and tradition by new immigrants and previous native meta-philosophies (Silk, 2007).

Influence of Pluralism on American Christian Culture

The liberal philosophy of life, ingrained in America’s pluralism, has brought about a post-modernist national identity centralized in ethnic, philosophical, and religious diversity (Chan, 2007). The all-truth claims made under this post-modernistic meta-philosophical ideology has brought about social problems within the Christian movement where the divine truth of Christian ideals, given by deity, has been slowly attacked and chipped away, affecting the power and method in communication of the gospel.

Christianity’s response to liberalism has been shown weak by the ill-prepared state of western churches in responding to their challenges faced through the formation of religious and cultural pluralism (Gibbs, 1985). Church leaders were trained to be pastors and teachers, lacking education and experience as cross-cultural missionaries, causing an extreme struggle to relate to the popular secular and globalist culture battling the Church. The multicultural and varied-ethnic movement of the liberal philosophy of life brought about cultural hesitation of intrinsic, absolute Christian-values, causing a polarization of the plurality of thought and shifting the prior absolutism of views into a unified, coexisting, and egalitarian religious country-wide view (Carson, 2012).

The New Liberal State

In a nation where Christians were once able to make truth claims of morality and good, the evolution of a liberal approach to pluralism has brought hostility and a state of victimhood by non-Christian, societal members (Willard, 1992). This new state of American culture brought about a wounded aggression towards Christianity in the realm of religious pluralism and tolerance, a tolerance seemingly intolerant of absolutism.

In the new, liberal state of American pluralism, churches aimed to dodge the cultural wound of Christian-past and minister to society through abandoned theological doctrines which were replaced with consumerism and contemporary liberal thought (Kaikowski, 2014). From this new liberal thought, the concept of missiology was replaced with ecclesiology, compartmentalizing the Church’s Mission away from this missional purpose of the community into one aspect, or department, of its outreach (Chan, 2007). Without the Mission as the foundation of the ecclesiological state of the Church, its priorities were shaken and redirected towards a new state of consumer-oriented affairs.

Engaging Culture Today – Christianity’s Response to Liberalism

Christians anticipate a heaven with every tribe, language, people, and nation (Revelation 5:9), and thus the multicultural movement is scripturally desirable (Carson, 2012). This Christian multiculturalism must clash with the liberal multicultural agenda of equal cultural values and religious claims, many opposing Christian doctrine of life. Niebuhr’s “Christ against culture” typology is a method which could be used to defend this liberal onslaught against the goodness of Christ’s multiculturalism offered in Jesus. Christians must be aware of the cultural changes occurring in their communities and how subcultures react to these changes in different manners.

Carson states that the patterns of cultural diversity within Christian subcultures are highlighted by Niebuhr’s view of justifiable relationships between Christ and culture, and these patterns must be recognized by Christian leaders seeking to impact change in pluralistic environments (2012). This approach must be, as Carson states, deeply rooted in attempts to integrate major biblical turning points of redemption through Christian histories, such as Creation, the Fall, the Torah, the Incarnation, the death and resurrection of Jesus, and the continual return of the kingdom of God.

The Power of Relationships

An accurate understanding of this narrative provides the leader, follower, and Christian community the knowledge of God’s place in personal and communal living, the individual’s place in that community and relationship, and the Christian community’s role in these relationships. As well, these turning points must be accurately balanced together in narrative, and the whole message of the Bible must be articulated in the relevance of the issues pertaining to the locale in which it is preached.

Christianity’s response to liberalism, in the globalist, 21st-century world, requires cross-cultural training in missiology and emphasis for the birthing and reproduction of faith communities who are equipped to engage with post-modern cultures in pluralistic societies (Gibbs, 2007). Church leaders need equipping on strategies for critical engagement within their cultures, exercising risk-taking through times of transition and re-visioning. These leaders must act in humble and respectful recognition of the inadequacy of former community messengers of the gospel, faithfully witnessing Christ’s vision for the world.

The Future is Bright – If Action is Taken

In today’s American state of dissension, Christianity’s response to liberalism must be a focus of church leadership to work together with those of other faiths for progression towards moral living. This moral progression is brought about by witnessing God’s goodness through these relationships and in so creating meaningful conversation on socio-relevant topics of interest. Cross-fertilization of ethical perspectives in culture can help bring about the deep inherent awareness of the inner human convictions of people’s conscious, what Paul states as inherent and common in all people (Romans 2:14), to emerge mutual, fundamental values and shape ethical worldviews towards Christ (Bretzke, 2013).

Religious pluralism may not be the ultimate good for people, but in a fallen world, it is, for now, the reality of peace, freedom, and life against violence (Carson, 2012). In knowing God’s Word is truth, preaching His good news to people in pluralistic societies is an efficient ministry for growth. Recognizing that multiculturalism can be a positive resource for ministers of faith can help formulate objective understandings of morality and goodness and their discussion in public realms (Bretzke, 2013). Through awareness of the brokenness of society and the Church, ministers of the faith can act as healers, and not just problem solvers (Greenleaf, Fraker, Spears, 1996). It is through this healing that ministers can bring Christ to their culture.

Learn the Mission, form, and function of the Church by viewing this related article! Or, find out how Evolutionary thinking has ruined the west. If learning is your thing, visit to learn how morality, law, and ethics, are dead without God.

References

₁ Bretzke, J. T. (2013). Teaching cross-cultural ethics in a context of pluralism and multiculturalism: Teaching where religion and ethics intersect. Journal of Ecumenical Studies, 48(3). 369-376.

₂ Chan, M. L. (2007). Following Jesus as the truth: Postmodernity and challenges of relativism. Evangelical Review of Theology, 31(4), 306-319.

₃ Gibbs, E. (2007). Church responses to culture since 1985. Missiology, 35(2), 157-168.

₄ Gordon, S. B. (2003). The Mormon question: Polygamy and constitutional conflict in nineteenth-century America. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press.

₅ Greenleaf, R. K., Fraker, A. T., & Spears, L. C. (1996). Seeker and servant: Reflections on religious leadership. (Vol. 157). Jossey-Bass Inc Pub.

₆ Flake, K. (2004). The politics of American religious identity: The seating of Senator Reed Smoot, Mormon apostle. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press.

₇ Henry, P. (1981). “And I don’t care what it is”: The tradition-history of a civil religion proof-text. Journal of the American Academy of Religion. 49(1). 35-50.

₈ Kaikowski, G. A. (2014). Local minister writes about the state of religion today. Times Leader, The (Wilkes-Barre, PA).

₉ Silk, M. (2007). Defining religious pluralism in America: A regional analysis. The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, 612(1), 62-81.

₁₀ Willard, D. (1992). Being a Christian in a pluralistic society. The Student. 1-3.