MEDITATION ON THE SECULARIZATION OF CHRISTIAN SOCIETIES

Korean Fertility Gods in a Country that Refuses to Reproduce

By Bp. Joseph (Ancient Church of the West) 

Every time I come to Korea, I’m struck by a tension that speaks to the heart of our modern Christian civilization. On the one hand, Korea bears the marks of a profoundly Christian culture. Churches fill the skyline, and the language of faith is commonly used in the public forum. Historic sacrifice of Christian martyrs, missionaries, and social reformers still echo in the national memory. On the other hand, Korea is also marked by a deep secularism and increasing hatred of the traditional family: a society increasingly childless, atomized, and driven by hyper-individualism and material success. “All outward and no inward” as one of my friends said after a visit here. Even as Korea functions as a stereotypical East Asian nation, it is also a bellwether for the whole of the West, a “globe in miniature.” 

This paradox is not unique to Korea. It is, in fact, the mark of every society shaped by the Gospel: the very truth that elevates the human person - his infinite value as one made in the image and likeness of God (Genesis 1:27) - is the same truth that, when divorced from the passion of the Cross, becomes the ultimate weapon against God’s order and purposes. Humanity becoming god, not by grace and the shared life of the Trinity, but by strength of will and clarity of self-aggrandizing purpose. 

Christ uniquely proclaims that each human being is not a cog in a tribal or imperial machine, but an immortal soul with eternal worth, called into communion with God through the mystery of the Incarnation - a mystery that is at the core of the Church’s sacramental life. "There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female: for ye are all one in Christ Jesus" (Galatians 3:28). This radical dignity and agency, rooted in our divine sonship (Romans 8:15), transformed the world. It shattered caste systems, ended infanticide, and dignified the weak, the poor, and the unborn. This transformation can be seen all around the world: not just in Christian nations, but in Islamic, Buddhist, Hindu and Animist societies, where almost all of the hospitals and universities were started by Christian missionaries. 

Traditional Korean Culture Highly Esteems Big Families and Old Age, Two Things that the Youth-Obsessed, K-Pop Culture of Contemporary Culture Rejects, Showing How Unsustainable and Life-Hating the Contemporary Global Culture Has Become, Built Off of the Foundation of Massive Christian Conversions and Social Movements

But here lies the grave danger: human brokenness distorts divine freedom into selfishness, which is self-idolatry. What begins as love for our neighbor becomes love of our own autonomy and a magnification of personal goals for success. What begins as reverence for others becomes an excuse to avoid the demands of family, community, and sacrifice for the self. Our freedom becomes license. Our dignity becomes an insatiable ego. And as St. Paul warned, “Use not liberty for an occasion to the flesh, but by love serve one another” (Galatians 5:13). This liberty has long been abused. 

The Cross is the safeguard of Christian freedom. Without it, the Gospel is inverted. Instead of Christ crucified, we are left with Christ as a life coach and moralistic school marm. Instead of bearing one another’s burdens (Galatians 6:2), we are taught to “cut toxic people out.” Instead of laying down our lives for others (John 15:13), we fear inconvenience, pain, and parenthood. The Church is full of dysfunctional and hurting people. If we do not minister to them, share life with them, and love them, then we are not the Church. 

Thus, all these grand Christian truths - disconnected from Christian discipleship - can become the very foundation of apostasy. “Theology without prayer is the theology of demons”, as a famous desert father said. “Having a form of godliness, but denying the power thereof” (2 Timothy 3:5), many Christian societies unwittingly turn redemption into perdition. They idolize the self while speaking the language of grace, turn worship into entertainment, preaching into TED talks, and the whole thing becomes an exercise in moralistic therapeutic deism. 

Atheism and ethical secularism are only possible in a Christian society, as Nietzsche understood this better than many Christians. The modern world still runs on borrowed capital from the Christian past: dignity, justice, compassion, equality. None of these exist or hold sway without Christ. But these values, without their theological roots, wither and die. The fruit remains for a time, but the tree is dying. This is the status of the first world today, as demographics collapse and children are seen as a burden instead of a blessing. 

The only hope is repentance. A return to the Gospel - not just in name, triumphalism, and in hipster Konvertitis, but in sacrificial love. Not just in dignity, but in the Cross. As our Lord said, “Whosoever will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me” (Mark 8:34). This also means that we reapply ourselves to our societies and cultures, refusing to give up and retreat, but instead, re-evangelizing and re-appropriating our ancient Christian heritage. 

Christian civilization must become Christian again. Korea must become Christian again, if it is going to survive and thrive, and repair the huge demographic problem that is destroying their people and obscuring their future. We all must do the same. Not culturally, but spiritually. Not with slogans, but with saints. Not for the glory of ethnicity, but for the cause of Christ and the Blood of the Lamb.

Peace and Happiness Only Comes through Embracing Pain and Suffering, so that We can Live through the Cold Winters of Our Lives and Blossom Again by the Power of the Spirit. This is the Lesson that Bonsai Culture can Teach about Christian Virtue. 

A COLLECT FOR THE RENEWAL OF CHRISTIAN SOCIETY

Almighty and everlasting God, who didst send thy Son Jesus Christ to be the Light of the world and the Life of men: We humbly beseech thee to look with mercy upon the nations that have forsaken thy holy law and turned from the ways of righteousness; awaken in us a spirit of repentance, and rekindle in thy Church a pure and steadfast faith, that, being delivered from the vanity of worldly wisdom and the tyranny of unbelief, we may again be made the salt of the earth and the light of the world; through the same Jesus Christ our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Ghost, ever one God, world without end. Amen.

This Incheon Airport Art Installation Shows What Post-Christian Society Becomes  - Grand Houses Held Up as Models, Hanging Far Above Practical Use, Memorials to a Past that Can Never Return and the Aspiration of a Future that is Cold, Sterile and Empty