The Evangelical Universalist Forum

A Plea for Theological Diversity and plug for Randal Rauser

Theology
#21

Hi Steve - I think perhaps we hang/grow together or hang/grow apart actually I guess. But I’m glad we’ve had this chat. I think it’s the coffee call for both traditions here (if we want to think in binary terms I’m not sure what I’d call them - perhaps evangelicals and post evangelicals would be fitting and more fitting than conservative evangelical versus Broad Church). I think it would change things drastically if Tentmaker rules were enforced here because of the recent troubles - they’d favour one tradition over the other and I think both traditions were involved in the troubles actually. And I hope what I’ve written above is also very critical of the tradition/side people might naturally identify me with (and you and Cindy and have been very even handed too).

Anyway I received a lovely PM from someone who many would identify with the opposite side/tradition to the one people might naturally identify me with. It was so loving and gracious it moved me deeply. I think the issue is still as serious one :frowning: - but we must try harder :slight_smile: .

#22

Confession: I am ‘maudib’ - I wanted to keep a presence here without raising a ruckus, which is still my intention. :smiley:
Anyway, I posted James 4:1 because it gets to the root of a part of me which is not yet so 'sanctified".

In a PM to Dick, I mentioned that in this online family of ours we have those that need counseling, we have those that are troubled, we have those that are neither, that are looking to understand the scriptures better, as a way of knowing God better.

The former ask questions and want to be understood; the latter often try to ‘fix’ their understanding, but the emotional part is not addressed.
We are not all pastors, nor all evangelists, nor all exegetes, we all are partly conservative, partly liberal - we’re mutts, basically - don’t take that wrong! :smiley:

I almost feel like, if you’ve been deeply harmed and troubled, your concerns should be in a section of the forum - still in the family!! - where your hurts can be addressed on that level. Those that have the spiritual gift of healing can then be free to minister as God gives them grace. Those that are doctrinally-oriented could just stay away from there, because it would be a healing place, not a confrontational place. Perhaps one moderator could overlook that area, or a new one appointed if the others are wary - perhaps Dick?

In any case, I’m thinking James 4:1 (I like The Message translation I used above) before I post anything.

Still cannot beat St. Paul’s : Grace to you and Peace through God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen!!

#23

That’s an intriguing suggestion, Dave. (Sorry, I’m having trouble keeping the usernames connected to their real names; I mixed you up with Geoff.) I’ve forwarded it along to the other ad/mods for consideration; it might make better sense than a ‘controversial’ category. Members would post their threads, or have them ported, there, when they want (or seem to need) counseling?

#24

Good idea Dave (and welcome back!) :smiley:

I think this is key and wouldn’t really be addressed in the “counseling area.” I’m thinking of perhaps two areas on the board where say a “post-evangelical” to use Dick’s term could start a discussion about a book such as Thom Stark’s The Human Faces of God: What Scripture Reveals When It Gets God Wrong (And Why Inerrancy Tries To Hide It) without starting a firestorm ( I haven’t read the book by the way) and another area where a"conservative evangelical" could discuss, say…someone’s new book on Creationism without being ridiculed or maligned; where they would feel “safe”. These would not duplicate the board but just be “safe” areas for discussion from a certain point of view.

I do note that quite a few of the “post-evangelical”- type members have been absent lately which is a shame, and Dave just came back which is certainly good news. (Sorry to use labels, Dave, but it’s hard to get around it completely. :confused: )

Steve

#25

Steve - I like your idea as well. As to labels, well, as long as we are aware of them and what their limitations are, no harm done as far as I can see.

#26

:smiley: :smiley: :smiley:

#27

The term post evangelical comes from a book by Dave Tomlinson an English writer (James now attends Dave’s Church and loves it)

Id on’t have his book but I seem to rmeber that he deinfes a post evngleicla as -

Obviously someone who has been an evangelical and wants to be true to the tradition in some way by -

Being serious about the authority of scripture

Being serious about the need to communicate their faith to others

However a post evangelical will be -

Wanting to move away from prescriptive and authoritarian modes of biblical instruction
In no way wedded to biblical inerrancy
Positively worldly - wanting to identify and celebrate the good things in human culture rather than rail against it’s evilness
Ecumenical in outlook and eager to learn from the witness of the wider Church
Interested in issues of social justice
Ready to embrace the mystical and meditative traditions of Christianity and less interested in the logic centeredness of protestant scholastic orthodoxy

We get plenty of ‘posties’ on this site. They are often our colourful characters and creative ones. We often lose them - which is sad. I think despite the recent upsets we should still be thinking of about finding non confrontational spaces for them too as Steve has suggested. I will ponder too :slight_smile:

#28

Dick, would you do me a favor? Could you do a side-by-side comparison of those ‘posties’ characteristics with what is generally accepted as the ‘liberal’ characteristics? Kind of an apples to apples comparison?

Thanks. I’m confused, and I really don’t know if it’s me, or if the liberal side of things is just too multi-faceted to characterize. It’s probably me, dang it… :smiley:

edited to more precisely say what I meant.

#29

I guess I’m a postie. (Well, technically, I’m still a Catholic – I never made the “official” switch to evangelical.) To me, Dick’s description of a postie doesn’t sound too far from that of a liberal Christian, what with their interest in social justice issues and enthusiasm for meditation and mysticism. But maybe that’s just a communication delay, because the most liberal of Christians in Midwest America are conservative by British standards!

#30

It’s not necessarily a description of a liberal Christian in UK terms - not at all. This is interesting - and I think a subject of a worthwhile conversation here. How would you describe a liberal Christian Dave (and Kate) and close your eyes at my postie list which I don’t think necessarily does describe a ‘liberal’ unless liberal simply means everything and everyone that isn’t conservative (evangelical conservative too?) - and that’s such a big category that it’s not helpful :laughing: Just make a list of what characterises a liberal for you and then I’ll do a post in response to try and clarify what I mean. After this I’ll compare our liberalism with post evangelicalism - I wouldn’t call myself one of these by the way. I probably would have been one if it had been around when I was young - but I see myself mainly as universalist drawing on tow traditions. But young people and the young at heart here often are posties in a broad sense. :slight_smile:

#31

Hmmm… I’ll try my best to come up with a short list. Mind you, it is only based on simple observation and includes the general stereotypes of a liberal Christian, as opposed to a conservative evangelical.

A liberal Christian in the US:

  • Votes Democrat or Libertarian. (There seems to be a split whether they do this for economic or social reasons.)
  • Places greater emphasis on the social justice side of the Gospel.
  • Prefer to think of Jesus as a rebel. (I know Matt has said this a time or two.:slight_smile:)
  • Attends a more “liberal” denomination, such as Presbyterian, Episcopalian, or Methodist. They are also, ironically, often Catholic. They are not Baptist. :laughing:
  • Less emphasis on biblical inerrancy.

I’m honestly not sure how I would describe a postie. I think they are often similar to liberal Christians, but they more emphasize the importance of scripture in a traditional sense, rather than in the broad context of bettering contemporary society.

But I’m not sure if I’m the best one to give Postie 101, because I’m not really a true postie, myself! For starters, I always held onto a thread of Catholicism, even in my most evangelical Protestant days. I am still “officially” Catholic. So now I suppose I’m a Universalist Quanglo-Catholic Mennonite? :laughing: That’s a bit far from a typical evangelical!

#32

Nice one Kate - happy Thanksgiving; and I’ll see what Dave has to say too :slight_smile: (and any other takers)

#33

“Quanglo-Catholic” is a great term!

I think the religious scene is too eclectic for categorizing. Believer X will say he is “very convinced-to-completely convinced” in the truth of Scripture, but he is also big on social ‘justice’ (not redistribution of wealth; but true equality before the law). If there were two ‘slider’ bars, one for ‘do you believe in the truthfulness of scripture’ and ‘do you believe in social justice’, he would be far to one end of one bar and far to the other end on the other. And X might be extreme on a number of issues.
Then we would try to label him? Very difficult.
X is a spectrum, rather than a point. And I think American religion is like that. Education plays a part, because the larger the vision of reality, the greater number of choices become available; same with economic status etc. (that ‘etc’ keeps me from having to think :slight_smile:)
So as far as I’m concerned, someone saying, “Well I’m a liberal (or Conservative), so I think…” may not have thought through the issue on his/her own. Is taking a Party Line.
Same with “Well I’m a Christian, so I think…” - that does not work for me. All of us here know that the word ‘Christian’ has to be filled with content to be meaningful, and the content needs to be spelled out, because there is no common, throughout-the-culture, idea of what a Christian is. Same with “I am a follower of Jesus” - which one?
I’m saying things that all of you have already thought about, but it helps me to clarify my mind when I actually write stuff down.

Sadly, even “Just love God and your neighbor” is multi-vocal and ambiguous. There’s love and there’s love. Content is important.
I don’t think the old labels work any more. Maybe we could think up some new ones?

#34

I think I agree Dave – the old labels are not good ones; especially across cultures. In the UK conservatism and liberalism are more likely to be viewed as two traditions both with positive and negatives that need to dialogue together in one Nation (or in the C of E in one Church). Often in the USA – at least these days, although I’m not sure this has always been so – they are seen as creeds at war.

Theological liberalism has strong roots in the Reformation and in Renaissance humanism – it’s about freedom of inquiry away from the strait jacket of Papal authority. And initially this inquiry had an evangelical base – it was the quest to sniff out forgeries and define the best possible text for scripture. Come the Enlightenment liberalism attempted to put revealed religion on a purely rational footing and subjected the texts of scripture to exhaustive moral, historical and scientific sifting – and alter to demythologisation. This was not the only element in liberalism – it often had compensatory mechanism like the Romantic emphasis on feeling and religious sentiment in Schleiermacher’s theology and the immanentist existentialism of many 20th century liberals.

I guess ‘posties’ – if i can use a very vague label – are not anti liberal theology (like conservatives often are). However, they are more likely to see the Bible as having a coherent message that cannot be made useful if only dissected by reason. But they will tend to see it not as a mere text of propositional logical truths – but rather as a multi faceted text that engages emotions and imagination also. They will also be sensitive to the role that reader response plays in ‘creating’ the text.

‘The Positively worldly’ bit is a reaction against premillenial world rejection. Posties will be positive about human culture but will be critically engaged with it rather than passive consumers.

Posties will tend to be les sectarian than conservative evangelicals – and willing and eager to learn from other Christian traditions

They will be interested in issues of social justice – but this does not necessarily mean they will al be liberals in the American political sense. However there will be an openness to debate the merits of equity (equality before the law and individual responsibility) and decency (the responsibility of the collective to make sure no one lives in humiliation) in any given case.

Posties will also be interested in the more right brained meditative forms of Christian worship and in the theological idea of the mystery that is beyond comprehension. Per has their religious sensibility is informed by a shift from a text based culture to a more picture based culture with the internet.
Massive set of generalisations – but I think I’ve seen this in many of the younger ones here quite clearly.

#35

Martin Buber has a wonderful little book entitled “Two Types of Faith” - though I think he paints with a too-broad brush - contrasting Christian “mental acceptance of theological truths” and Jewish faith as “Trust, reliance, relationship”.
i have no particular comment to make about it other than the dichotomy feels very strained; more than that, actually, I think it is false. However, within Christianity, we do see a spectrum between those two poles.
There is little question that there are types of temperaments, and they probably drive a person’s religious outlook more than we would like to believe.

#36

I really like Martin Buber - but I’ve not read that book :slight_smile: