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What
is the heart of Christianity?
For
me, the heart of Christianity--Christian fundamentals for our
time--would be, first, the reality of God. Without a robust affirmation
of the reality of God, Christianity makes little important sense.
Secondly,
the centrality of the Bible. To be Christian is to be in a continuing,
ongoing conversation with our sacred scriptures.
Thirdly
is the utter centrality of Jesus. Christians are people who find
the decisive revelation of God in Jesus, in a person. That means
when Jesus and the Bible [contradict] each other, Jesus trumps
the Bible.
The
fourth fundamental is that a relationship with God is known in
Jesus. Christianity
is not primarily about believing; a relationship involves a much
deeper part of ourselves than simply the content of our minds.
The
fifth fundamental is a concern for the transformation of ourselves
and of society. I'm convinced that the Bible from beginning to
end is both personal and political, concerned with both spiritual
matters and social matters, and the life of Christian faithfulness
involves both of those.
--Dr.
Marcus Borg
To
me, the absolute center of Christianity is embodied love. In
my reading of the Bible and in my experience, that's it...hook,
line, and sinker. In Genesis it is God's love embodied in Creation,
with every part dependent on every other part for perfect function.
When human beings couldn't seem to keep their part of the harmony
going, God embodied love more specifically in human form, in
the person of Jesus. Jesus thus becomes both the embodiment and
the revelation of God's love. Christians consider themselves
to be the Body of Christ...those who try to continue to embody
God's love in and for the world. If it is not done in love, it
is a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. It matters even more than
faith, Paul says. When Jesus is asked in Luke 10 what must be
done to inherit eternal life, the answer is to love. Love is
at the center of Creation, because God is love. Embodied
love is at the heart of Christianity because that's who Jesus
is.
The
Rev. Anne Robertson
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