A Non-Christian World

“The Christian Church seems to have lost . . . the capacity to speak about its beliefs in a manner which should convey the impression of something real and alive. The language of the theologians seems to have become so artificial, so self-centered and so remote from real life that one can only dream of the times when theology took the lead in the universities and was the most formative influence in the intellectual life of Western nations. . . . We do live, for all practical purposes, in a non-Christian world. . . . The mentality of modern man is colored by an all prevailing atheism, not anti-atheism. There is just no more room for the concept of God and, therefore, none for the Christian faith.”—Hanns Lilje, Lutheran Bishop of Hannover, as quoted in the New York Times.