Christian identity does not demand us to create a supplementary organization parallel to the secular society. To be a Christian is a clarion call to closely follow Christ’s life as it is unveiled by the gospel. Though Jesus was fully divine he did not remain outside the humanness except in sin. Religiously and culturally Jesus was a Jew but these features did not obstruct him from sharing the ‘human commonalities’ with others. We have to live our identity in the same logic of Christ’s incarnation. Are there before us any models other than Jesus to live the Christian-ness in the varieties of cultures? Yes, there are. St. Peter and St. Paul are two great milestones who fruitfully enfleshed the gospel amidst the different cultures at the beginning of Christianity.

The first test-case of the encounter between Christian faith and culture happened when Cornelius, a Roman officer in Palestine wished to receive baptism. Until he sought membership, the followers of Jesus were Jews who practised ardently the Law of Moses including circumcision. Cornelius was an uncircumcised pagan living at Rome. The question that troubled Peter was whether Cornelius should get circumcised as prescribed by Torah or can a Gentile become a disciple of Christ without adopting the Hebrew way of life.

The first Pope resolved the issue in the light of the revelation received from God through a dream. Till that time Peter ate the meat of only those creatures mentioned in the Mosaic Law. But with the advice ‘what God has made clean you have no right to call profane’, he understood that all the creatures on earth are clean as they are created and blessed by Yahweh. Later Peter declared in the house of Cornelius as follows: God has shown me that I should not call anyone profane or unclean … I truly understand that God shows no partiality, in every nation anyone who fears him and does what is right is acceptable to him’ (Act 10, 28. 34-35). Consequently Cornelius did not undergo circumcision. Receiving baptism, he lived like a Christian within the context of Roman culture and way of life.

St. Paul gives us some definite clue as to how to express the Christian identity in different cultural milieu. Paul was bicultural. Though he was citizen of the Greco-Roman city of Tarsus he was a devout Jew trained in the rabbinic literature. These two contexts did not impede him from living at peace with peoples of diverse views and styles without abandoning his discipleship in Christ. He appreciated the good elements in other cultures, though they were differing in many ways from his own and without surrendering his Christian identity. Paul’s discourse at Areopagus (Acts 17, 22-31) shows his benevolence to recognize the living God in the unknown God they were seeking for. Not only he lucidly tolerated other cultures but also induced his co-apostles to recognize the positive aspects in other cultures for the greater glory of Christ. He asked Peter: “If you, though a Jew, live like a Gentile and not like a Jew, how can you compel the Gentiles to live like Jews?” (Gal 2, 14).

Morris A. Inch draws from Paul’s attitude towards Athenians two directives for those who are engaged in doing mission across the cultures. i) There can have a certain continuity between one’s past and the Christian message. If Paul had asked the gentiles to abandon the whole of their past culture to embrace Christ that would have been a disrespect to Holy Spirit who had been actively involved in their life. In the same way, the culture of the recipients of gospel is not to be as such dropped; it needs to be only interpreted in the light of Christ’s saving experience. ii) There has to be a discontinuity between one’s past experience and the good news of Christ. It means the outcome of gospel-culture encounter must not be eclectic in nature. The Christian way of life cannot be an amalgam of elements that are borrowed without any logic from the different religions or cultures. We have to become all things to all men provided they enable us to experience the salvific grace of Christ.