Recovering the Sacred In a Secular World

What does it mean to be sacred? To be sacred is to be set aside or forbidden. It is contrasted with the "profane" (or normal mundane). Examples include: sacred holy anointing oil (Exodus 30:25), sacred income dedicated to the poor (Deuteronomy 26:13), sacred gifts (1 Kings 15:15), sacred songs (1 Chronicles 16:42), sacred people and officials (1 Chronicles 24:5), sacred valleys and mountains and buildings (Jeremiah 31:40, Ezekiel 20:40, Ezekiel 43:21), and sacred writings (2 Timothy 3:15).

We live today in a non-sacred society, secular society, where things have been de-sacralized. Things once considered special and holy are now regarded as unimportant and unworthy of spiritual significance.

We can helpfully contrast our secular society with that of premodern China. When riding a train through the Chinese countryside one notices the many shrines dotting the landscape. I attended a four day traditional funeral for my Chinese friend's grandfather. The Taoist monk prayed over every ritual action, and the funeral culminated with a procession of villagers carrying the casket up a small mountain as snow and firecracker smoke filled the air. The mountain was sacred, closer to heaven, and the firecrackers were meant to frighten off any evil spirits that might take advantage of the grandfather's weakened state. Later, the family members burned mounds of fake money blessed with sacred Taoist water and danced around the fire at night to scare off thieving spirits seeking to steal the money before it rose to heaven.

These behaviors might seem superstitious from our secular Western perspective, but the Chinese villagers believed their physical acts had spiritual consequences. They burned the fake money because they believed their energy in doing so would positively affect their dead relative's outcome.

Few Chinese now believe in these rituals. Few understand them at all. The younger generations see them as absurd relics of their grandparent's era. They're now simply a task to be completed for the sake of the old folks who haven't yet worshiped the latest iPhone. In one particularly memorable funeral episode, a Taoist monk prepared a last meal with the dead that included pig's fat and beer. The grandchildren had to eat as fast as they could and act like they were enjoying it. One young boy, probably no more than seven years old, stumbled away from the meal after being stuffed with pork and beer. He screamed back at his mother: "I won't eat more fat even if you're going to kill me!" The mother pretended to scold before giving up, I laughed in the background, and nothing happened. The sacredness of the ritual had already been lost. It had become little more than an empty form. 

Western society, including America, once had a Christian version of the sacred. Our lives were imbued with it just as the fading rituals of Chinese villagers. Our churches, our marriages, our work, our food, our bodies, and our social hierarchies were more than mere physical or practical necessities in the mechanical process of life. They once had transcendent significance.

Increasingly, Westerners don't attend church, don't invest in church, and don't see themselves as part of God's church. The gathering of the saints, the taking of the Lord's Supper, and the singing of hymns were once viewed as moments in which we contacted the divine. Today, even the most sacred events, like the Lord's Supper, have been reduced to a crude process of remembering. Remembering Christ's death has become like remembering one's math equations. Christ is no longer literally in our presence eating with us, he's just an image passing through our brains in the same way we recall the events of some horrible football game we watched while scrolling Facebook on the couch.

Marriage was once seen as a sacred representation of God's unity with the church. Sex was imbued with spiritual meaning as "two people became one." In our modern society, however, sex is just a recreational activity, and half of marriages end in divorce. My generation increasingly doesn't even feel marriage is important enough to be involved in. Marriage and sex no longer carry any meaning whatsoever. They've devolved into practical legal arrangements and frivolous activities.

Christians once viewed all kinds of wholesome work as being directed towards the Lord. Colossians 3:23-24 says "Whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord and not for men, knowing that from the Lord you will receive the inheritance as your reward. You are serving the Lord Christ." This passage was taken seriously, and it remade even the most mundane labor into sacred work.

Eating and consuming food was once seen as sacred. 1 Corinthians 10:31 says "So, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God." Jesus gave thanks and blessed the food when he fed the four thousand. Mark 8:6-8 says "He took the seven loaves, and having given thanks, he broke them and gave them to his disciples to set before the people; and they set them before the crowd. And they had a few small fish. And having blessed them, he said that these also should be set before them. And they ate and were satisfied." From Christ's example we've inherited the practice of praying over our food before meals.

Our bodies were once sacred. We Americans are notorious for abusing our bodies with drugs, promiscuity, and gluttony; but we should regard ourselves as more sacred. 1 Corinthians 3:16-17 says "Do you not know that you are God's temple and that God's Spirit dwells in you? If anyone destroys God's temple, God will destroy him. For God's temple is holy, and you are that temple." Paul expanded this truth in another passage when he wrote that through fornication we defile our temple bodies. No devout Israelite would have entered the Holy of Holies with an unclean animal. Similarly, we should take the holiness of our temple bodies seriously. 

The political leaders of our societies and churches were once seen as sacred via their appointments by God. Romans 13:1 says "Let every person be subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been instituted by God." It was from this idea of God appointed hierarchy that rebellion against authority was condemned. Now, however, most of our society doesn't see hierarchy as sacred. Our society often lionizes professional rebels like Che Guavera. Movements like the Chinese Cultural Revolution, Black Lives Matter, and antifa have been reinterpreted as "fighting for justice."

None of these elements of life can ever be regarded with much seriousness again until we resacralize them. We need to call our brothers and sisters to action. We need to think of our lives as participating in the divine. We're not just stuffing food in our mouths when we eat. We're not just "going to church" when we fellowship as a sacred community in the Lord's Supper. We shouldn't regard our leaders, and they shouldn't regard themselves, as holders of mere bureaucratic posts. We should perceive them as sacred place holders appointed by God and responsible to him. 

CONCLUSION 

Nothing is more sacred than sacrifice. Paul wrote in Romans 12:1-2 "Therefore, I urge you, brothers and sisters, in view of God's mercy, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God - this is your true and proper worship. Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is - his good, pleasing and perfect will." We should strive to sacralize our lives. We should avoid being secularized, and remember that everything we do has spiritual significance. If we strive to make our lives living sacrifices than we'll be able to discern God's will and live as holy temples.