I have served in churches in Texas, New York, West Virginia and Ohio.  In every state I have encountered church leaders who could not define the Gospel of Jesus Christ as it has been defined by protestant churches since the reformation nearly five hundred years ago.  R.C. Sproul claims to have helped survey Christian leaders at one conference and found roughly 1 in 100 definition to be Biblical.  I attended a pastors conference where a the associate minister of a large church responded to my question of what he would say Christianity is to a person unacquainted with the faith with, “I guess I would tell them we are about being different.”

Yikes.

According to Avery Cardinal Dulles’ fine work A History of Apologetics (Ignatius 1999), the earliest apologetic works outside of Scripture can be divided into two categories–religious apologies designed to win new converts and political apologies intended to earn civil tolerance from the Roman Empire.  Indeed two of the most important Christian works of the second century were apologetic works by Aristides and Justin Martyr.  Aristides addressed his Apology to the emperor Hadrian (76-138) and Justin addressed his First Apology to the emperor Antonius Pius (86-161) and his adopted son.  Both were intended to show the powers that be that they should refrain from attempting to eliminate the church or even drive it underground.  Most of the early defenders of the faith followed in their wake until Constantine granted Christianity toleration in 313.  Early apologists did not rest in ivory academic towers but were on the ground attempting to save lives.

While you all were trying to figure out how even the French could think that an interpretative dance of the storming of Normandy was a good idea, I was compiling the Three Things You Need to Read this Week:

I worked in politics for five years including two congressional campaigns and a two-year stint as a legislative aide on Capital Hill.  So, I know how the system works but that doesn’t mean I still don’t roll my eyes when watching news shows.