Believers in an increasingly secular world face the challenge of responding to the cultural changes that have taken place in the past generation, as Christians become a ""cognitive minority,"" especially in the West. Some attempt to restore the Christian culture of the past with political activism, and others accommodate to the cultural changes. Christians in a post-Christian world can learn much from believers who lived in the pre-Christian period. The New Testament demonstrates that, in a pluralistic and syncretistic world of religions, Christian identity exists neither through absorption into the culture nor through total withdrawal but through dialogue and critique.

James Thompson is a professor of theology at Abilene Christian University.