The Pharmakon Athanasias
S. M. Hutchens on Worshiping the Lord Without Lying About the Faith
I just received in the mail a glossy, color flyer for a startup megachurch wannabe in our area. It assures the reader "no church experience required," and is emblazoned with photographs of happy, active young people, including the pastor, in blue jeans and t-shirt, along with his cute little wife, similarly attired. "Remember when you were a kid and you had to take medicine that tasted really awful?" the flyer intones. "Even if somebody said it was good for you, didn't you just hate it? CHURCH SHOULDN'T BE LIKE THAT!" The message of this advertisement, which I am afraid is widely ratified these days, is that church should be entertaining, centered on the tastes of the young and the hip, and void of things that "taste really awful."
I wonder, really, what religion this is. The Lord on many occasions displeased—confused, scandalized, rebuked, and burdened—his disciples with his words and actions. As a result, many left him, the attitude of the ones who stayed being represented in the gospel by Peter's question, "To whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life."
THIS ARTICLE ONLY AVAILABLE TO SUBSCRIBERS.
FOR QUICK ACCESS:
S. M. Hutchens is a Touchstone senior editor.
Get six issues (one year) of Touchstone PLUS full online access including pdf downloads for only $39.95. That's only $3.34 per month!
Get a one-year full-access subscription to the Touchstone online archives for only $19.95. That's only $1.66 per month!
bulk subscriptions
Order Touchstone subscriptions in bulk and save $10 per sub! Each subscription includes 6 issues of Touchstone plus full online access to touchstonemag.com—including archives, videos, and pdf downloads of recent issues for only $29.95 each! Great for churches or study groups.
Transactions will be processed on a secure server.
more on apologetics from the online archives
31.4—July/August 2018
The Difficulty of Apologetics for Dead Souls in the Real World by R. J. Snell
33.3—May/June 2020
On Flight & Fight in the Present Tribulation by Douglas Farrow
31.2—March/April 2018
How Best to Face the Total War of the Anti-Culture by R. J. Snell
more from the online archives
32.2—March/April 2019
Flight from the Absolute: Cynical Observations on the Postmodern West, Volume II by Paul Gosselin by Louis Markos
35.4—Jul/Aug 2022
The Death Rattle of a Tradition
Contemporary Catholic Thinking on the Question of War by Andrew Latham
31.2—March/April 2018
The Transmission of Christianity Is Not a New Task by Nathanael Devlin
calling all readers
Please Donate
"There are magazines worth reading but few worth saving . . . Touchstone is just such a magazine."
—Alice von Hildebrand
"Here we do not concede one square millimeter of territory to falsehood, folly, contemporary sentimentality, or fashion. We speak the truth, and let God be our judge. . . . Touchstone is the one committedly Christian conservative journal."
—Anthony Esolen, Touchstone senior editor
