Making Sense of Christian Faith: Understood, Challenged, and Lived

Brian Burch is a teacher, writer and poet and author of Still Under the
Thumb.

Although Victor Shepherd and I would probably not agree on a number of theological points, I found the ideas and arguments put forward in his Making Sense of Christian Faith very powerful and well worth examining. His book is enjoyable, one of the most impressive works of conservative popular theology I have come across.

Shepherd’s book is divided into three sections. The first, “Christian Faith Understood,” looks at some of the common elements of the shared Christian faith, from creation to the second coming of Christ. While Shepherd does not deal with some of the major disputes in the Christian faith on such matters, he does a very good job in defining basic Christian doctrine in a traditional manner.

The second section, “Christian Faith Challenged,” is slightly shorter. Here Shepherd takes on the very demanding task of examining atrocities carried out in the name of religion and the nature of evil. His chapter on Freud is perhaps his best effort in this book and raises some very important questions on the relationship of the nature of faith to the work of Freud.

The third section, “Christian Faith Lived,” is the shortest section in the book. It is here, however, that Victor Shepherd shines. He neither glosses over the problems of living nor presents a saccharine deity. Here is presented a faith that is dynamic and challenging, that is very difficult to live but is worthwhile making an effort for — not for personal gain or some promised life after death that some fundamentalists claim, but because there is something within the Christian faith that Shepherd feels is really worth dying for.

While Shepherd and I would strongly differ on such matters as support for liberation struggles in El Salvador and Big Mountain, Arizona, and the ordination of homosexuals, I find his reasonable approach to conservative theological positions of value in my own understanding of the Christian faith and its place in the wider world.