The Myth of Christian Beginnings

In this challenging and vividly written book Dr. Wilken shows that there never was a golden age in the Christian past. Christian hope did not come to fulfillment in the age of apostles nor in the time of Constantine nor in the Middle Ages nor during the Reformation nor in the revivals of the 19th century nor in the movements of renewal in our own time. The history of Christianity is a story of imperfection and fragmentation but also a history of hoping and striving for an end that cannot be seen yet bears on the present. With lively examples from the Christian past Wilken shows that change has been an abiding feature of Christian tradition. Often those who proposed new ways of thinking and acted in unexpected ways turned out to be more faithful than those who repeated the old formulas. As much as the past may give specificity and concreteness to renewal in the present Christian hope is set on things that are yet to be.