mirror-of-these-ten-years

Mirror of These Ten Years Only through complete refusal to compro­mise with the forms and forces of our society can we recover the hope of human freedom. JACQUES ELLUL + IN THE FIRST PLACE, we must admit that it is difficult for a Christian to talk about himself. Not that it is difficult to lay oneself bare (especially in these days of literary exhibitionism). But a Christian ought to know how little interest attaches to him as a person. And he ought to know that it is better to talk about Jesus Christ than about himself. If never­theless he is led to talk about— as I have been here — he must do so not only with strict hon­esty but above all objectively, in detachment, exam­ining himself without romanticism, as a different object; always aware of the promptings of old hu­man nature and always remembering the warning, "Do not be conformed to this world." development and creation, the second was above all A second preliminary remark, as banal as the first. a matter of crises and renewed questioning. So it is Obviously, my thinking has developed under two mainly the second that I shall speak of. Let me say influences. On the one hand, I kept to the same path only a few words about the first. as before, sharpening and widening my ideas and in general pursuing the native bent of my mind. On I the other hand, my thinking changed under the In these ten years I have come to a progressively impact of external events, of sociological, political, clearer ...