Their anti-clericalism has become an atmosphere, an atmosphere of negation and hostility from which they cannot escape. Compared with that, it would be better to see the whole thing as something belonging to another continent, or to another planet. It would be more philosophical to stare indifferently at bonzes than to be perpetually and pointlessly grumbling at bishops. It would be better to walk past a church as if it were a pagoda than to stand permanently in the porch, impotent either to go inside and help or to go outside and forget.
G. K. Chesterton, 1874-1936, The Everlasting Man, Introduction, (Dover Publications, 2007, p. 8)
Is there truth to this? Would it help if critics could see Christianity completely from the outside?
No comments:
Post a Comment