"To be a Christian means to have Christ possess you. We usually think of possession as a negative word. That’s because if anything else possesses you, it’ll drive you crazy. But if Christ possesses you, he’ll drive you absolutely sane."
Today evangelical piety is often characterized by the old adage, "so heavenly minded no earthly good". Such lifestyles are often "individualized" and "over-spiritualized" to the point that they have no incarnation in social structures. A philosophical division between the secular and the sacred, the material and the spiritual lies behind these tendencies of modern evangelicalism. Stereotypical behavior includes: 1) An emphasis upon evangelism while almost completely ignoring issues of social welfare and justice. 2) An indiscriminate acceptance of the materialistic values of modern culture. 3) Some form of a "prosperity gospel" which dulls one’s senses to the poor, the oppressed, the hungry, and the ravaged state of the earth.
On the contrary, we believe the Gospel "brings you down to earth." It makes you intensely practical and full of "salt and light". It also provides in a paradoxical way the very things promised by modern culture and "bought into" by the evangelical diversion. The foundation of the Gospel’s power to change is that it provides in its incarnation in the individual and in community the very things we seek in the promises of modern culture. Pursuit of the promises of modern culture cost me a great deal of time, effort and money. Theoretically, if the incarnation of the Gospel produces what modern culture can only promise then a significant amount of my time, effort and money will be freed up to serve the needs of society.
Money doesn’t become the goal of the promises of modern culture or the avenue to the promises of modern culture. In either scenario money takes on god-like qualities. Again because the Gospel provides what only money can promise, money loses its power over us. For the first time, money becomes an instrument of our purposes and we become stewards of the abundance of God’s provision. Note that this position prevents wealth from becoming a virtue, but it also prevents poverty from becoming a virtue. Money is viewed with "sober judgment", as essentially a means to accommodate the lifestyle to which God has called us.
Some people over-work. Some people over-play. Others do both. And in the words of Jesus many do so "for the bread that perishes." In other words, many people work hard and play hard for a kind of bread that cannot satiate their hunger. Often the result is more frenetic activity with a similar outcome. Christians don’t work in order to satisfy their hunger, they work because their hunger has been and is being satisfied. This addresses the motive behind work and play and therefore has direct implications for how you work and play, where you work and play, and with whom you work and play.
All these things taken together will begin to exert a tremendous influence upon the very fabric of society. It goes without saying, that something has gone wrong in a culture where more people profess Christianity than ever, yet where societal degradation continues to increase at an alarming rate. Part of our vision at St. Patrick is to begin to reverse this trend not by separating ourselves from the culture but by going to the culture with lifestyles truly changed and being changed by the Gospel.