Scripture as the Collision of the Sacred and the Mundane

I first became an intentional Christian my freshman year of college (making it relevant to my studies) and who took my first course in New Testament studies and Lehigh from a Yale-trained biblical scholar my sophomore year.

Being raised in a modern world and having taken high school courses in Earth Science, Chemistry, Physics, world cultures, and English, and lived in a pluralistic culture emphasizing tolerance for those of different beliefs, I had no problem scraping a year of fundamentalist Bible interpretation for the historical critical study of the Bible.,

I have always lived in a world with no "Berlin Wall" between my Sunday religion and the other six days of the week. God is in the details, whether it be loving one's enemies, running one's restaurant, or developing a more advanced form of machine learning.

I gave the secular cultural reason above.

The reason given in Christian culture is God in Christ crucified in the incarnation evident at Creation, Christmas (or Solstice if you wish), and the Eschaton.

Incarnation (Wikipedia)

AN "OLDE" APOSTOLIC REFORMATION: CHRISTIAN REALISM

 The modern representative of Christian Realism is considered to be Reinhold Niebuhr.

It is not the only flavor of the Christian faith by any means, but it portrays all creatures - including us Christians - as the frail, fallible people we are rather than as those to whom God has given divine authority to execute His "revealed" a plan for Christian dominion of earthly empires.

"I’m an Anglican by conviction as well as by birth, and that will inevitably influence the way I approach Christmas."

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"Meanwhile, Merry Christmas to those of you inclined to celebrate that holiday, and seasonal greetings to everyone else. Whatever your faith or lack of it, however you understand the meaning and purpose of your life, may the Christmas season be a time of rest, relaxation, and healing reflection for you that brings you closer to those you love, makes you more generous to those in need, and leaves you more in tune with that wiser, happier, richer, and more generous self that it’s your hope, your joy, your duty, and, with the help of a merciful God, your destiny to become."

<CONTINUE AT The Fourteen Posts of Christmas: 2024–2025 Edition>