The Specific Difference of Christian Civilization: Diem hominis non desiderverunt!
"...[T]he comprehension of the faith...was the ultimate spiritual inspiration of [the age the Middle Ages]. If that age was an age of faith, it was not merely on account of its external religious profession; still less does it mean that the men of that age were more moral or more humane or more just in their social and economic relations than the men of to-day. It is rather because they had no faith in themselves or in the possibilities of human effort, but put their trust in something more than civilisation and something outside history. No doubt, this attitude has much in common with that of the great oriental religions, but it differs essentially in that it did not lead to quietism or fatalism in regard to the external world, but rather to an intensification of social activity. The foundations of Europe were laid in fear and weakness and suffering--in such suffering as we can hardly conceive to-day [1945], even after the disasters of the last eighteen years. And yet the sense of despair and unlimited impotence and abandonment that the disasters of the time provoked was not inconsistent with a spirit of courage and self-devotion which inspired men to heroic effort and super-human activity.
"Diem hominis non desideravi--that is the essential conviction of the age, and it is one that it is difficult for the modern who views all history sub specie humanitatis to appreciate, since to him "the Day of Man" is the only possible object of a reasonable man's devotion."
Christopher Dawson, The Making of Europe, New York: Sheed & Ward, 1945, xix-xx.
What Mr. Dawson here says is that the Middle Ages were an age of faith because the people believed in Jesus Christ and worshiped Him and put their trust in Him. Foremost was their understanding of the faith. The primacy of Divine worship was the specific difference of that age. They regarded God as God! and saw the world and themselves under that perspective and attempted to build their lives accordingly, upon the worship of God in the Person of Jesus Christ.
