There’s been a culturally successful campaign to erase the traditional language of sin. On the one hand, it has been made a medical problem to be treated by drugs and therapy. On the other hand, sin has also become a primarily social problem to be addressed by fixing social structures….the idea of personal culpability is at least minimized and often completely denied.

In the words of writer Hilary Brand, “It is clear that the word ‘sin’ is in trouble”.^[1] Brand is not alone in observing that we might call the ‘classic’ or ‘orthodox’ Christian language of sin simply does not register with a 21st-century view of the human person or in contemporary ethical reasoning.^[2]

I notice this when performing infant baptisms (when it is just unthinkable to parents that their innocent child needs a spiritual bath because they share in the human condition of spiritual uncleanness); and when I read the 1662 Book of Common Prayer which addresses us as ‘miserable offenders’, ‘not worthy so much as to pick up the crumbs from under thy table’, because ‘there is no health in us’. This language seems so sharp and unfamiliar, even in my Christianised ears. I often wonder what an unchurched person must think when they hear it. We don’t speak like this—at least not without irony—anymore.

It is my purpose in this series of posts to suggest not only ways in which the concept (and the language) of sin might be recovered for contemporary disciples but also to say that it must be if we are to communicate how good the good news is.

As we will see, erasing the word does not take the reality of sin away from human experience. Initially, I will further analyse the observation that sin is a ‘lost’ doctrine and inquire as to why. Secondly, I will note that this has left a secular world with some difficulties when it comes to speaking about human morality. Thirdly, I will return to the Scriptural sources for an account of sin that will prove far richer than the one rejected by our contemporaries. Fourthly, we will see that though sin has been suppressed, it is very much alive in modern tragedies like Breaking Bad and Bojack Horseman. Lastly, I will present some suggestions as to how an account of sin might prove to be an asset rather than a liability for a presentation of the Christian gospel.To return to my opening observation: there’s been a culturally successful campaign to erase the traditional language of sin. On the one hand, it has been made a medical problem to be treated by drugs and therapy. If I ‘sin’ (or imagine myself to have sinned), then I don’t need to be forgiven so much as healed.

On the other hand, sin has also become a primarily social problem to be addressed by fixing social structures. I sin (if I do) because I am a creature of my environment or a victim of oppressive systems. In both cases, the idea of personal culpability is at least minimised and often completely denied. Punishment is not the required response, but therapy, or revolution. ‘Sin’ has been trivialised—made into ice creams, or something fun also but a little bit bad for you.^[3]

Read More