The Paradox of Church and World: Selected Writings of H. Richard Niebuhr

Ultimately, or so H. Richard Niebuhr wrote as early as 1929, the problem of church and world involves us in a paradox; unless the church accommodates itself to the world, it becomes sterile inwardly and outwardly; unless it transcends the world, it becomes indistinguishable from the world and loses its effectiveness no less surely. In the same context he went on to state, The rhythm of approach and withdrawal need not be like the swinging of the pendulum, mere repetition without progress; i...