From Christendom to Apostolic Mission: Pastoral Strategies for an Apostolic Age

by University of Mary

In a Christendom culture the Church as a whole is tempted to lose its spiritual and otherworldly character and to become merely a this-worldly body, a department of state or a promising career path, a center of civilized activities rather than the mystical body of Christ. Because in a Christendom society to profess Christ leads to respectability and can bring power and wealth, because Christ is a name to conjure with and by which to gain influence, greedy and power-hungry people prey upon the Church and use its influence to further their own selfish aims. Sins of buying Church offices, of absentee bishops and priests, of avarice and the hoarding of wealth, of a general creeping worldliness among those whose task it is to lead others to Christ can become rampant. Even for those who avoid such glaring sins, the message of Christ can become overlaid with the categories of success originating in the temporal order and can cease to be a liberating force. Priesthood can become merely a job rather than a mission. Attending to the moral and ritual life of the Church can become perfunctory, valued only for immediately tangible effects. This is the sort of concern that sparked the reforming spirit of the sixteenth century, both Protestant and Catholic. To reform the Church truly in such times is no easy task.