City on a Hill

When I lecture on The Expansion of the World Christian Movement (as I did half a dozen times this fall) I usually draw a couple of sly parallels between the Roman Empire - particularly at the time of its "fall" - and today's America.

Christians in Rome considered the resources, influence, and power with which their empire had been endowed sure signs that God was with them and had in fact raised them up and blessed them to be a light to the nations. As time went on they found this dream turned to ashes, and themselves citizens in a state that no longer represented (and exported) their values, but something else entirely.

The church and state (intertwined at this point) were plagued by both external pressures and corruption within. Roman Christians were horrified. As the greatness of their empire was threatened, they wondered if it was all over for Christendom.

Well, it wasn't, of course. Yes, there was a lot of brutality, a lot of suffering. But the fifth century also saw the biggest expansion of Christianity that would come for the next thousand years, and this time without the resources that had seemed so integral to its expansion to date. One of the points I try to illustrate throughout my talk is that neither suffering nor prosperity has a corner on the market for producing the best conditions for Christianity to flourish. God seems to use either.

"Has anyone written a book comparing America and Rome?" someone asked, as I kept alluding to similarities.

I did not know the answer - I didn't get this from one source I could point to and say, that's it. Any of you know someone who has written about this? I think a lot of it was from my "History of Christianity" professor in college. But as I looked through my background files I did find a printout of this article, which covers some of that territory. Here's a taste...

Theology for an Age of Terror: Augustine's words after the 'barbarian' destruction of Rome have a remarkably contemporary ring.

By Timothy George | posted 9/01/2006 12:00AM

September 11, 2001, is frequently compared to December 7, 1941, as a day that will "live in infamy." But a more appropriate analogy might be August 24, 410, when the city of Rome was besieged and pillaged by an army of 40,000 "barbarians" led by the Osama bin Laden of late antiquity, a wily warrior named Alaric. One can still see the effects of this cataclysmic event when walking through the ruins of the Roman Forum today. The Basilica Aemilia was the Wall Street of ancient Rome, a beautiful structure in the Forum with a marble portico. One can still see the green stains of copper coins melted into the stone from the conflagrations set by Alaric and his marauders.

Before then, Roman coins bore the legend Invicta Roma Aeterna eternal, unconquerable Rome. It had been more than 800 years since the Eternal City had fallen to an enemy's attack. In many ways, Rome was like America prior to 9/11, the world's only superpower. But in 410, Rome's military power could not prevent its walls being breached, its women raped, and its sacred precincts burned and sacked.

When Jerome heard about the fall of Rome in faraway Bethlehem, he put aside his Commentary on Ezekiel and sat stupefied in total silence for three days. "Rome was besieged," Jerome wrote to a friend. "The city to which the whole world fell has fallen. If Rome can perish, what can be safe?" The British monk Pelagius, who was in Rome when the attack occurred, gave this report: "Every household had its grief, and an all-pervading terror gripped us."