Welcome to Breakpoint, a daily look at an ever-changing culture through the lens of unchanging truth.

For the Colson Center, I'm Shane Russ.

It's odd how many people these days are coming to appreciate Christianity for everything other than

the Lord and Savior at its center. Even figures who don't exactly believe in

Jesus's claims to be God, like psychologist Jordan Peterson, have made careers out of applying the stories and values found in

scripture to people's lives. Peterson has even embarked on a teaching series mining

the book of Genesis for psychological insights of which there are, of course, many.

Quite a few unbelievers have also come to appreciate Christianity's contribution to civilization.

Longtime atheists, like historian Tom Holland, have argued persuasively that the West as we know it

with its values of equality, human rights, and love of neighbor and even its science and

art is the product of Christian influence.

Holland does seem to be wavering on the edge of belief lately,

due in part to an apparently miraculous healing from cancer

that he experienced.

But he was still a staunch atheist when he argued in his book,

Dominion, that Christianity midwifed a good civilization.

Or take outspoken new atheist, Richard Dawkins, who recently called himself a cultural Christian

and admitted that despite not believing a word of the Bible he likes hymns and cathedrals and would choose to live in a Christian society over an Islamic one.

All of these figures have come to appreciate some aspect of a Christian worldview

and the benefits it has for individuals and cultures but stop short of affirming the beliefs

behind those benefits. The argument they've made is essentially that we can like all of the earthly blessings

that come from the Gospel of Christ without saying, as the Apostle Thomas did, my Lord and my God.

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