From the heart

"If you declare with your mouth, "Jesus is Lord," and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved." Romans 10.9

Characteristic of religious language is that its assertions are more than dispassionate statements of fact or observation, they are expressions of personal conviction. Academics and commentators may enjoy playing with ideas but when religious believers talk about God, we do so with reverence and in the awareness that our words have implications - for ourselves and for others.

How should that awareness transform our self-expression? Does it compel us to enter more whole-heartedly into the public discourse about truth and politics and global issues, or does it summon us away into a safer network of like minds or to withdraw completely into ourselves? The Christian tradition embraces both responses, exemplified by hermits, monastic communities and social reformers.

There are plenty of options but one that is not available to the sincere believer is indifference. To confess faith is to put God on the throne of one's life and that not only changes our perspective, it changes our engagement with life. Life is now invested with eternal significance: from "coma co-dhiù" to "everything matters"!