Babel produced different languages calling on different gods; Pentecost produced the firstfruits of a re-united humanity, every tongue confessing in its own way that Jesus is Lord (51).
Contextualization be damned. The Church’s mission is not to accommodate her language to the existing language, to disguise herself so as to slip in unnoticed and blend in with the existing culture. Her mission is to confront the language of the existing culture with a language of her own (52).
I just finished reading this book. What an excellent piece of work! The Church as a counter-culture, intended to supplant the world system. Beautiful!
I have now begun reading Alexander Schmemann’s For the Life of the World, I was told that AC is a Leithartian version of Schmemann’s work.