"The fact is that we are living in a time of the most extraordinary paradoxes. Never have we had so much in our society and yet never have people had so little. Never have we had more affluence, despite some economic ups and downs, and yet seldom have we felt so empty. We have brilliant technology but disconnected, fragmented families. Never has so much talk filled the air through radio, television and the Internet, and yet never before has so much talk been left unheard. We are connected to everyone, potentially, in every place, and yet never have we felt so alone. Ours is a world of extraordinary opportunity but one that is also littered with many broken dreams and forgotten hopes. It is a world dark with hatreds but one in which, for so many people, evil is no longer a part of their vocabulary. If the church cannot become the place where all these issues are given their deepest and truest treatment, then the church will have lost its reason to exist. These are the questions now facing us. If we fail, Christianity may well stumble and falter throughout the West (italics mine)."
