This I Believe

The collision of COVID-19 and Christmas 2020 provoked Paul Dinter to try and make sense of Christianity's ancient narrative of "good news." Seeing the virus as a surrogate for many unseen perils confronting our world, he determined to revisit not only December's strange yet familiar story, but also the stranger beliefs built upon it. Examining the larger Christian narrative of salvation, as captured in the Apostles' Creed, makes up the body of the book in which Dinter delves into its symbolic and mythic character as the surest place to find what Christianity still has to offer a hurting world. For, beginning with Jesus' birth narratives through the book of Revelation, a through line runs along an axis that sees dilemmas about Christian faith resolved in doing justice. Brief sketches of racial, economic, ecological/environmental, gender, sexual, and reproductive justice spell out Dinter's case. When the Creed ends with the expectation of the "world-to-come," it captures the message of the prophets, Jesus' and Paul's expectations of the coming kingdom, and Revelation's culminating vision. It commits believers to contribute to a future human community where the justice of God will reside more fully.