Intro: Greetings and welcome to Contextualize This, a Podcast that attempts to provide a diversified and contextualized perspective on today’s relevant topics. I am your host, Norlan Hernández. 

This is EPISODE 2 titled Faith Impacting Culture. In Today’s episode we will talk about: 

• The Christ transforming culture typology

• Three sub-points that help us understand how to accomplish the goal of this category, mainly

  • Converting individuals who then act christianly in the world

  • Creating christian institutions as wholesome alternatives

  • Conquering existing institutions

Last episode, I described a typology that Richard Niebuhr offered. As a reminder, he offered 5 categories that can explain how people of faith have seen and interacted with culture: 1) Christ against culture 2) Christ of culture 3) Christ above culture 4) Christ in paradox with culture, and 5) Christ transforming culture.  I also provided an example that exemplified the first category - Christ Against Culture - through my pentecostal background. 

For this episode, I want to take a closer look at the fifth category - christ transforming culture and the subsequent subpoints explaining how this can be done. 

The purpose of this episode is not to push forward any kind of agenda. More than anything, I simply want to generate thoughts and provide a perspective. I am by no means arguing that this is the right way to understand the relationship between faith and culture. Clearly, there is much more to this that can be discussed concerning the relationship between the two and the historical development that has transpired. 

Take, for example, the Constantinian era and its influence on Christianity. Or Christendom and its impact on Latin America, or as some indigenous people groups call it in their Guna language  - Abya Yala, which means “land of vital blood”. These are clear examples of how faith has clearly had a role in the formation and experience of culture. In fact, one scholar even made the claim that during the apex of Christendom,  Christianity slowly began to dichotomize its engagement with the world. Christianity served, in many cases, to perpetuate the status quo of the government that, in return, provided security to the religious establishment. What the church once had to wrestle with, that of speaking to the social realities of the world, was no longer necessary. The church and state became a partnership. The result - the church allowed itself to become removed from the social, cultural, and political concerns and be limited to spiritual matters. This understanding of the church’s role in society is still present in some places, groups, and denominations. 

At any rate, Niebuhr’s fifth category presents many opportunities to evaluate how faith impacts culture. Let’s take a brief look at each of these subpoints: 

Converting Individuals

Although I mentioned that my pentecostal background aligned most with the Christ Against Culture typology, there are aspects of the other categories that resonate with my experience. Converting individuals is one of those. 

For as long as I can remember, I have heard the message that proclamation of the Gospel to unbelievers is the most important mission of any faithful Christian. It had eschatological underpinnings. Jesus would return when everyone was exposed to the good news. Unfortunately, the message never included an explanation of the effects of the gospel on people’s lives and culture. It is as if proclaiming the gospel only had spiritual repercussions. It is a dichotomization of life as the sacred and the profane. Proclaiming the Gospel, it would seem, did not have anything to do with the concrete, historical, and real lives people experience. Proclaiming the gospel did not influence life on earth. An ahistorical,cultural-less gospel was being preached. What this position demonstrates is that we are unaware of the depth and meaning of being a disciple of Christ - who came within a specific culture, at a specific time, lived, talked and moved through this world in a specific context. Yet being Christians means we are in a relationship with this Jesus. 

So, how can one expect to convert individuals to be in a relationship with Christ - a Palestinian Jew that spoke Aramaic? How can new believers to go out to the world and act Christianly without understanding this reality? How will they Speak Christianese? Relate Christianly? 

Rather than converting individuals, one should speak of discipling individuals to live a life that brings honor and glory to God. By doing so, new Christians will truly ask “What would Jesus do?” in every scenario of their lives - at work when presented with an ethical dilemma, with their spouse when thinking through important decisions, with rhetorics that deny the imago dei in all people of all skin colors, with systems that perpetuate injustice and inequity. Being Chrsitian doesn’t mean one is no longer part of this world. In fact, it means that we have a better understanding of what it means to be “in this world but not be of this world.” 

So, while converting individuals is a strategy that can help impact the culture, this can only be done through intentional, deep, and meaningful discipleship. 

Constructing Christian Institutions 

Does converting and discipling individuals automatically lead to the construction of Christian institutions? Maybe in some cases. Maybe the question should be - should we always strive to create new Christian institutions as alternatives? I don’t think the answer is a simple yes or no. 

On one extreme, creating Christian institutions may continue to dichotomize the world into sacred and profane. Less chances for engagement, dialogue, and collaboration will be available. Take the film industry, for example. I have enjoyed the many Christian films that have been created as alternatives to some of the more explicit films that Hollywood puts out. However, let’s be real now - the quality is not nearly as high as that of Hollywood. As it currently stands, Chrsitians aren’t creating the Marvels of the industry. How much better could Christian films be if there was collaboration! 

I use Marvel because it serves as a great example. Why? Well, most people enjoy Marvel films and they are not Christian per se. However, we know that Scott Derrikson, who received his undergraduate degree from a Christian University, directed Marvel’s 2016 film Doctor Strange. Does this make the film Christian? Of course not. It does, however, illustrate my point of what could be missed should this be the only option we pursue. 

This begs the question - should we stop at constructing Christian institutions or take it one step further and also conquer existing institutions? 

Conquering Existing Institutions 

By conquering, I don’t have in mind a mass of Christians overtaking companies by force. You know, with pitchforks and torches. That is preposterous! What is meant by this, however, is Christians achieving excellence within any given industry and enterprise to the point of earning the right to lead it. In that sense, being presidents, CEOs, and being on boards is the goal. This way, existing institutions will be influenced by leaders that hold Christian values. Furthermore, these institutions will make decisions guided by Christian ethics, morals, and values. 

It all sounds so good! Right? Is there something we should consider before sending everyone to conquer the world for Christ? Yes. There is a possible assumption made about institutions and their leaders. The presupposition for taking this stance is that non-Christian leaders cannot make ethical or moral decisions. There is also the presupposition that Christians are best positioned to take on leadership roles. Lastly, we must wrestle with our understanding of the imago dei that everyone is created with. If these are, indeed, the presuppositions we have - what are we saying about God? We must understand that every human being has been intentionally formed by God (Jeremiah 1:5; Psalm 139:13). Each one of us has received gifts and talents from the Creator. Our gifts are not “turned on” the moment we accept Christ. They are on full display from the moment we are born to the moment we say confess Jesus as our Lord and Savior and beyond. 

Rather than "picking and choosing" which parts of culture are good and which are bad, we recognize that all the particularities of culture are enhanced or destroyed or enlivened when they are brought under the lordship of Jesus Christ.” (Tennent, 2010) 

Conclusion 

To bring it all home, the fifth typology Neigbuhr proposed can be accomplished through individual conversions, creating Christian alternatives, and by taking leadership roles on existing institutions. I do not think one of these is necessarily the sole solution for the transformation of culture.  As the Kingdom of God approaches the hearts of more individuals, our culture will inevitably be transformed. This will be in the form of more individuals moving through life in a Christ-honoring way, some will be inspired to unleash their creative imaginations within a specific Christian perspective, and others, through the gifts God has already given them, will excel to the point of leading existing organizations. In the end, these three sub-categories of Niebuhr’s fifth typology are dealing with the transformation of culture for the purpose of reflecting the kingdom of God. 

Outro: Thanks for listening to Contextualize This with Norlan Hernandez. If you like the show subscribe! I also encourage you to write a review, this is your way of helping make this podcast better. If you want to know more or wish to connect with me, check out my page - NorlanHernandez.com. 
Join us next time when we talk about an approach to communicating and relating to others cross-culturally called Cultural Humility.