Discipleship and Christian character

Abstract

This essay considers an aspect of the recent and welcome introduction into the mainstream of the Church’s life of the concept of ‘discipleship’ as something to help guide the lives of Christian people. It suggests that the notion that discipleship is something that can be taught and learnt, especially in courses and programmes, potentially obscures the reality that discipleship is grounded in a mode of living that is open to learning from all observations and experiences. It proposes that a modified form of the virtue of humility – passionate humility – might be understood to be at the heart of genuine Christian character. The consequence of prioritizing such humility in the hierarchy of Christian values is to relocate our ambitions for discipleship in a practical and childlike attitude of limitless learning. This in turn inclines the disciple to discover that the whole of life can teach the him or her of both the presence of God and the absence of God’s kingdom.