In order to answer this question we must state what Christianity is.
Christians tell us that there are certain fundamental truths that must be believed.
We must believe in God, the creator and governor of the universe; in Jesus Christ, his only begotten son; in the Holy Ghost; in the atonement made by Christ; in salvation by faith; in the second birth; in heaven for believers, in hell for deniers and doubters, and in the inspiration of the Old and New Testaments. They must also believe in a prayer-hearing and prayer-answering God, in special providence, and in addition to all this they must practice a few ceremonies. This, I believe, is a fair skeleton of Christianity. Of course I cannot give an exact definition. Christians do not and never have agreed among themselves. They have been disputing and fighting for many centuries, and to-day they are as far apart as ever.
A few years ago Christians believed the "fundamental truths" They had no doubts. They knew that God existed; that he made the world. They knew when he commenced to work at the earth and stars and knew when he finished. They knew that he, like a potter, mixed and moulded clay into the shape of a man and breathed into its nostrils the breath of life. They knew that he took from this man a rib and framed the first woman.
It must be admitted that sensible Christians have outgrown this belief. Jehovah the gardener, the potter, the tailor, has been dethroned. The story of creation is believed only by the provincial, the stupid, the truly orthodox. People who have read Darwin and Haeckel and had sense enough to understand these great men, laugh at the legends of the Jews.
A few years ago most Christians believed that Christ was the son of God, and not only the son of God, but God himself.
This belief is slowly fading from the minds of Christians, from the minds of those who have minds.
Many Christians now say that Christ was simply a man—a perfect man. Others say that he was divine, but not actually God—a union of God and man. Some say that while Christ was not God, he was as nearly like God as it is possible for man to be.
The old belief that he was actually God—that he sacrificed himself unto himself—that he deserted himself; that he bore the burden of his own wrath; that he made it possible to save a few of his children by shedding his own blood; that he could not forgive the sins of men until they murdered him—this frightful belief is slowly dying day by day. Most ministers are ashamed to preach these cruel and idiotic absurdities. The Christ of our time is not the Christ of the New Testament—not the Christ of the Middle Ages; nor of Luther, Wesley or the Puritan fathers.
The Christ who was God—who was his own son and his own father—who was born of a virgin, cast out devils, rose from the dead, and ascended bodily to heaven—is not the Christ of to-day.