[Minor mistakes of grammar and spelling have been fixed. – Funky]
Theomorph, my resident atheist gadfly, seems to be losing his cool. His latest tirade against Christianity lacks the kind of logical consistency and civility his previous posts had. Continue reading
Some commentators on Funky’s
blog have complained that pro-life Christians have found themselves
voting Republican
whether they wanted to or not. Mr. Bush’s actions in Iraq had me
wondering if we
could somehow find a pro-life Nader, but unlike Nader, who would have
the Democrats
become more liberal (at least with economic issues), perhaps our
pro-life Nader
would help pull the Republicans to a more moderate set of social and
international
policies–i.e., maybe tug them to the left. Or, this pro-life Nader
could rally
pro-life Democrats and even encourage that party to get a little more
open-minded
about its abortion plank.
Well, with that in mind, check out this article in Wired.com about the
still-undetermined
role of blogs
in elections, and the Washington
Post article on how Evangelicals often campaigned for Bush
independently of
the GOP or Bush’s own staff. The latter is comforting, since it means
that many
Christians are not in lock-step with the Republicans so much as they
thought that
the Republican candidate was a better pick. They worked independently,
behold, here
is an
NY Times article about how the Dems can woo the church-goers yet
again. Of particular
note are the candid comments from Fr. Richard Neuhaus, editor of the
influential
journal First Things
(and a personal
favorite of this contributor!).
So with this in mind, we should draw some hope that pro-life Christians
may use
their leverage to get a better candidate. The trick is now to work on
finding and
supporting some good ones.
Dawn Eden, of the Dawn Patrol describes herself as "a nondenominational, small-'e' evangelical Protestant" who takes essentially "a sola scriptura approach to moral issues". She believes "that the Bible is the inerrant word of God". Why do I mention these things. I want to grab the attention of evangelical and fundamentalist readers.
Dawn has written an interesting piece about Christians and contraception. There's a lot of disagreement among Christians about the appropriateness of contraception, or lack thereof. I'd like my Protestant readers to read another Protestant's support of Catholic reproductive teachings and comment.
I don't read my Bible nearly so often as I should. I suppose I could use the typical Catholic excuse that I get a dose of Scripture every time I go to mass, but I think that's a cop out. Catholics may not believe in sola scriptura but that's no reason that we should be scriptura ignara. But I digress.
During Tuesday's RCIA class, I opened my Bible to follow along with the lesson. Out of curiosity, I looked at the pages I had marked. Have you ever had the experience of opening the Bible to a random spot and finding something that seemed to speak directly to you in your current condition? Well that happened to. I found the following to be very comforting in my frustration dealing with people on both sides of the Red vs. Blue battle.
"He who corrects a scoffer gets himself abuse,
and he who reproves a wicked man incurs injury.
Do not reprove a scoffer, or he will hate you;
reprove a wise man, and he will love you.
Give instruction to a wise man, and he will be still wiser;
teach a righteous man and he will increase in learning.
The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom,
and the knowledge of the Holy One is insight. For by me your days will be multiplied,
and years will be added to your life.
If you are wise, you are wise for yourself;
if you scoff, you alone will bear it."
After contemplating those verses, I thought of this bit from the Gospel According to Matthew that seemed appropriate. It also has broader application to God-blogging.
"Judge not, that you be not judged. For with the judgment you pronounce you will be judged, and the measure you give will be the measure you get. Why do you see the speck that is in your brother's eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye? Or how can you say to your brother, `Let me take the speck out of your eye,' when there is the log in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother's eye. Do not give dogs what is holy; and do not throw your pearls before swine, lest they trample them under foot and turn to attack you."
This evening I wrote an email to Evangelical Christian talk show host Marty Minto. I anxiously await his response. In the meantime, I’d love for my Protestant readers to give me their take.
Marty,
I mean the following as a serious question, not just some anti-"sola scriptura" taunt. I honestly want your answer to this, so please be open minded to it.
You repeatedly make reference to "rightly dividing the word of truth" (2 Timothy 2:16) If there is a right way, there must also be a wrong way. My concern is that there seem to be so many ways. For nearly every belief you hold and defend with Scripture, I can find someone else who holds an opposing belief that they can defend with Scripture.
All who claim Scriptural support believe that theirs is the "right division" of the Word. Obviously, someone must be wrong. In fact, several must be. Is one necessarily right? Unless God’s Word returns void, there must be. Who is it? How can we know? When many reputable and born-again faithful hold differing interpretations of Scripture, who is to be trusted and believed? Does majority rule? Does one person or group hold the authoritative interpretation?
The Catholic and Orthodox churches believe that apostolic succession places interpretive authority with patriarchs (the bishop of Rome being the head patriarch according to Catholics). When the apostles, including Paul, were alive, they acted as supreme earthly authorities in disputes among the faithful. Before they died, they appointed successors to hold that authority. Until the Reformation, that succession of leaders was unbroken. Even the split between East and West did not break that. Once the Reformation began, it did not take long before very disparate interpretations and teachings arose. One need not be a trained scholar of the Reformation to know some of the differences between Luther, Zwingli, Calvin, Wesley, and Fox, to name but a few. In the 400 years since that pivotal century, the number of denominations has grown exponentially. As soon as someone disagrees with the beliefs held by the majority of a denomination, they leave, often forming splinter groups of their own, where the process can repeat itself. While there are some constants between at least the mainline denominations, there are almost as many Evangelical interpretations and teachings as there are Evangelicals. With no central authority to appeal to, everyone can say theirs is the right reading of Scripture. Even among the mainlines, there are major disagreements and there is no final authority for them to appeal to. So I cannot help but ask this question of you:
Why should anyone trust your interpretations of Scripture over others? Perhaps you could answer this during Theological Thursday.
Eric