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THE CULTURALLY SAVVY CHRISTIAN: A Manifesto for Deepening Faith and Enriching Popular Culture in an Age of Christianity-Lite
Dick Staub • Jossey-Bass • 256 pages • $21.95

How should Christians respond to a culture that has gradually declined into "soulless" pop superficiality? According to author and radio host Dick Staub, most tend to conform to it, combat it, or cocoon from it. The Culturally Savvy Christian offers an alternative.

Staub argues that the problems of Western culture are the problems of the Christian subculture. He calls this "Christianity-Lite," which he considers the "predominant energy in American Christianity." Unfortunately, he never specifically defines the term, loosely tracing its origins to the rise of evangelicalism in the '50s.

Staub devotes much of the book to encouraging readers to keep God present in daily living. We cannot hope to transform culture without first transforming ourselves through God's Word. Much of this comes across as Mere Christianity-Lite—half a chapter is devoted to why C. S. Lewis was the 20th century's ultimate culturally savvy Christian.

The final chapters show the most thought and personality, challenging readers to be discerning about culture while responding to it tactfully and creatively. Bob Briner's Roaring Lambs better explained how to affect culture, while Staub argues simply that we should become skilled in relating our faith to our culture. Excerpted below is part of the book's second chapter.

—Russ Breimeier
Online Managing Editor, Christian Music Today

Shrinking Christianity and the Image of God: Christianity-Lite
I want to make it clear that today, one can still find a robust remnant committed to reflecting the image of God through spiritual, intellectual, artistic, relational, and moral vitality in every movement within Christianity—Catholic, Orthodox, mainline Protestant, fundamentalist, and evangelical. Unfortunately, the predominant energy within American Christianity is in what I call "pop Christianity" or "Christianity-Lite." This brand of faith tastes great but is less filling, and wherever it prevails, it is a source of impoverishment of faith and culture. Christianity, when it takes on these characteristics, is an imposter. People are seeking the way home to God, but pop Christianity cannot provide it. Yet for many today, Christianity-Lite is all they know, and the consequences are serious for both the religious and the irreligious.

Christianity-Lite's cultural accommodation poses severe consequences for today's spiritual seeker. When seekers become disenchanted with a diversionary, mindless, celebrity-driven, and well-marketed but unsatisfying popular culture, if they turn to contemporary Christianity, they will often find those same qualities. We are witnessing the marketing of a Christianity-Lite that produces conversions instead of disciples. Dallas Willard reminds us of something anyone who reads the New Testament knows, Jesus never called anyone to be a Christian; he only called people to be disciples, individuals who would learn from him and obey all that he commanded. In place of Jesus' call to self-denial and promise of persecution and sacrifice, today's consumer-oriented, commoditized Christianity offers heaven in the future and fulfillment of the American dream now.

The sobering contrast between historic Christianity and Christianity-Lite is illustrated by my recent experience in China. There, I heard the testimony of an underground church leader who had spent eighteen grueling years in prison, where he was beaten, chained, and subjected to physical torture and psychological torment, all because of his profession of faith in Jesus Christ. His captors lied to him, fabricated stories about infidelity on the part of his wife and a suicide attempt on the part of his son, offering to release him if he would just denounce Jesus Christ as Lord. He showed us the purple grooves in his wrist where the chains had penetrated his rotting, infected flesh, rubbing it down to the bones.

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May 2007, Vol. 51, No. 5