Halloween
never figured much in my childhood. The days surrounding Halloween were
focused on much more exciting prospects, with Guy Fawkes’ Day looming into
early November, and the opportunity to enjoy the mayhem of penny bungers,
throwdowns and Catherine Wheels were just some of the delights which entranced
the mind of a young lad. Guy Fawkes, as I understand, was often described
as ‘the only person to enter Parliament with honest intentions,’ and he
went in an attempt to blow it up! In our more terrorist-aware days, the
celebration of his (failed) actions now seem somewhat bizarre.
In more
recent years the church has turned its attention to All Saints Day, which
falls on November first each year. This might be a reaction to the Halloween
phenomenon which is derived from the evening of what was once known as
All Hallows Day, but more likely as a way of affirming the unity of faith
which all Christian churches share. All Saints provided a day of remembering
all who had been martyred for their faith.
The consequence
of this is that another important date has slipped from our radar: Reformation
Day falls on October 31, and commemorates the most dramatic shift in history
in the past 500 years. A Catholic monk named Martin Luther first publicly
challenged many of the practices of the Catholic church of the time, using
a theological foundation to repute the practices, and thus setting in train
the Protestant reformation. There are consequently over 39000 Christian
denominations throughout the world, a figure likely swell to over 55000
in the next 20 years, according to Joel News.
Luther
is famous for the catch-phrases, “by faith alone”, “by Scripture alone”
and by “Christ alone” – renewing emphasis on the responsibilities of the
individual Christian for their relationship with God, and severely diminishing
the power of the church. Luther argued that salvation did not belong to
the church but was open to all who placed their faith in the work of Jesus
Christ. It was a refreshing release from many of the exploitative church
practices of the time.
The only problem is that Luther opened the floodgates for endless debates about theology, and created an environment where one’s theology became more important than how a person lived. This was the complete opposite of Luther’s intent. A person could ‘do what they liked’ so long as their theology was correct. How we need to turn that around! What is needed most is a lived faith, a lived theology, which embodies the call to ‘do justice, love mercy, and walk humbly with our God’.
May it be that we are known to be people of faith because our lifestyles and attitudes declare it so! Theology – the ability to articulate the whys of faith – remains important, but secondary to a life well-lived.
Gary
October
21, 2007
|
|
|