The Australian Church, a church without martyrs

It is just that our demise will not be marked by bloodshed but by the almost imperceptible erosion of all that is good and true. The only thing that will be valued is what the market values. There will be no solid place we can place our foot.

Our only hope is the church, staggering, struggling, confused and fearful but bearing the only source of hope, Jesus Christ before whom kings will shut their mouths.

The church lives by those who are convicted of the truth of the gospel. There can be no Constantinian establishment of Christianity, the church must make its own way in the world. Whenever it receives money from the lotteries commission to repair buildings it cannot afford to maintain, whenever church agencies receive money from government and whenever any denomination sees itself as having a privileged relationship to the secular powers it loses its character as an alternative community. Such arrangements preclude the very idea of martyrdom and the church loses its proper place in the world.

It is no wonder that the church is failing in Australia and was perhaps set to fail right from the beginning.