An Alternative Culture in His Back Pocket

Each religion, and especially each civic religion, also enacted a particular way of life. To be Spartan meant living out of Spartan myths and being shaped by Spartan rituals, but also meant engaging the world as a Spartan. Being Athenian meant learning to “lean into life” in a particular manner. Being Roman was a matter of maintaining dignity and avoiding shame, as well as knowing the Roman myths and performing Roman rituals.

Now – when an apostle showed up at a synagogue in the diaspora, he preached the gospel into a culture, the Jewish culture, that already had its own myths and rites and rules of behavior…

…

And when the apostle came, he came with an alternative myth (which he called the “gospel”), taught his converts to perform rituals of initiation  and conviviality (which Christians eventually called “sacraments”), and called men to an alternative way of life (which he called “becoming a disciple of Jesus”).

The wandering apostle may have no money in his kit; but he came to town with an alternative culture in his back pocket.

-Peter Leithart, Against Christianity, 50.