Christianity and Modern ThoughtPeabody, Andrew P. (Andrew Preston)
Religion
Christianity and Modern Thought
Peabody, Andrew P. (Andrew Preston)
Unitarianism
Thus we see how the thought of Christ and the thought of the age need
and complement each other. The thought of Christ is spiritual, the
thought of the age tends to become material. In this world we are
neither wholly spiritual nor wholly material. And we must bear in mind
that the two elements should not exist over against one another in our
thought. We must not hold the two conceptions, however opposite they may
appear, as two. In life the spirit and the body do not exist as two but
as one. As soon as they exist as two, there is death. So must the truth
of Jesus and the truth of this present age be blended in one thought. We
must not say love and law, but love in law. We must not see the divine
power setting at work forces that by their natural operation shall
reward or punish the spirit. We must see the divine power working in and
through these forces. Then, as science makes us feel that we are
encompassed by law, the words will not need translating to us; for we
shall feel that we are encompassed by God.
The relation which we have found to exist between the intellectual
teaching of Christ and the thought of the age is no less marked between
the moral teaching of Christ and the life of the age. The moral teaching
of Christ is absolutely true. It is as true as his thought of God; yet
like that it needs its complemental truth. Further, the moral teaching
of Christ needs instrumentalities. Love, however strong, cannot work
without means. The heart needs the hands and the feet.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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