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On this understanding, the terms "God," "love," and so on – at least as they're ordinarily used in Christian witness and theology – are but the way in which one religion, the Christian religion, thinks and speaks about existence, or ultimate reality, in its meaning for us, for our understanding of ourselves and others as all parts of the encompassing whole, and so for how we are lead our lives, given this self-understanding. So I would not wish to say simply and without some such qualification that what different religions are, are simply different cultural expressions of the one reality of God and love, although the terms "God" and "love" are definitely first and foremost among the terms expressing the concepts and symbols through which I, as a Christian, think about the one reality of our existence, or, alternatively, the one ultimate reality with which all human beings have to do.

Wiki MarkupAn observation that I have long found helpful in thinking about this and other similar questions is that of the cultural anthropologist, Clifford Geertz. "\[W\]hat all sacred symbols assert," he says, "is that the good for man is to live realistically; where they differ is in the vision of reality they construct" (_The Interpretation of Cultures: Selected Essays_: 130). In other words, while all religions are indeed about the one reality of our existence in its meaning for us, and while each of them summons us to live realistically, in accordance with that reality, instead of at cross-purposes with it, how each of them understands ultimate reality is more or less different from the understandings of other religions. Nor do all of these differences appear to be simply verbal or conceptual; for some of them, at least, seem to be real -- – such as, for example, the difference between a theistic religion like Christianity, Judaism, or Islam and a nontheistic (some would even say, atheistic) religion like Theravada Buddhism or Zen. Subtle as they're likely to prove to be the more one carefully studies them, the differences between religions are hardly less striking than their similarities. Although they are all about the one ultimate reality of our existence, and are all addressed to one and the same existential question about that reality, they also express different understandings of it in its meaning for us -- – for how we are to understand ourselves in relation to it, and for how, in consequence, we are to conduct ourselves as human beings.

I should perhaps add that anyone seeking a more fully developed, and, I hope, proportionately more adequate, answer to this question may want to take a look at a little book of mine, Is there Only One True Religion or Are There Many? (SMU Press, 1992). There is also an essay-length answer to the same question under the same title in my book of essays, Doing Theology Today (2d ed.,Wipf & Stock, 2006): 169-184.

Wiki Markup_3. How does one express \ [one's\] faith to others when "Christian If has been kidnapped and no\[w\] means a very narrow view?_

I've taken the liberty of slightly reformulating this question, so as to make clearer what I take it to be asking. But if I'm mistaken in my interpretation, and the questioner would like to make the necessary corrections, I'll be more than happy to receive them trusting everyone to understand that my prepared answer, in any case, is to the question as I've understood it, not as the questioner asked it

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