A Crisis Can Be An Opportunity

20 October 2026  Ephesians 2:12-22  

“…[T]hat He might create in Himself one new person in place of the two, thus establishing peace….” (Ephesians 2:15)    

Roman and Greek paganism began to collapse due to what historians call the “crisis of the third century,” when continuous civil wars, foreign invasions, hyperinflation, and epidemic disease destabilized the Roman Empire. Many citizens lost faith in traditional civic polytheism, feeling that the old gods had failed to protect the people and the state. In the early fourth century they decided to give Christian leadership a try under Constantine. By the end of the fourth century Theodosius had made Christianity the official religion of the Empire.

In the sixth century Justinian closed the Neoplatonic Academy and disenfranchised the remaining non-Christians, marking a legal and institutional end of polytheistic public life.

Crisis, in other words, can be an opportunity for forward-thinking Christians. By identifying crises in our time, and by pointing out how the Gospel is a resource for dealing with them, Jesus can appear more clearly as the Savior that He is

Crisis, in other words, can be an opportunity for forward-thinking Christians. By identifying crises in our time, and by pointing out how the Gospel is a resource for dealing with them, Jesus can appear more clearly as the Savior that He is, uniting people estranged by struggle and suffering to each other and to eternal life in Him.

There is a crisis of meaning and purpose in our time, that leaves many, especially the young, feeling alienated, anxious and alone. The gospel proclaims, however, that we are not helpless. In fact God Himself, in Jesus the Savior, has descended already into the very darkest places of life, where suffering and death seem to be the only rational options, and in His resurrection has raised them all up. Those who have run from God the Father into that darkness are actually running toward God the Son who has redeemed it. There are already signs (e.g. increased Bible sales, increasing conversions to Christianity) that significant numbers of young adults in the U.S. have spotted that resource and embraced it. The crisis is becoming an evangelistic opportunity.

There is a demographic crisis in our time – many young adults are so alienated from themselves and each other that they are deciding not to marry and have children, which only deepens and darkens their alienation and loneliness. But we are not helpless. The Bible’s primary metaphor for talking about our relationship with God is marriage, how the two – literally, not metaphorically – become “one flesh.” Christians act this out at every Mass by receiving in the eucharist everything that makes Jesus who He is, and this spiritual food does not become what we are, but we become what it is. Our lives actually become the life of Jesus. Christians act this out every time they marry and start families – it is not insignificant that study after study reveals how the very happiest people in the country are believers who are married with children.

Even science is turning up clues about all this, how there are signs of the interposition of a Divine Mind in the very smallest places. The existence of encoded information in every protein, in every strand of DNA is best explained by the existence of a Mind to do the encoding. It isn’t too much to read this to mean that Jesus is still reaching into the very smallest places, and declaring there, “I am here!”

The Chinese word for “crisis,” weījī, is made up of two characters, one which means “danger” (weī), and the other (jī) indicating a crucial moment, when things can begin to shift. Whether things shift in ways that increase the danger, or open prospects for hope, however, depends entirely on what we bring to those crucial moments.

How about we bring Jesus? We’ve done it before.