Posted on 10/22/2005 9:40:52 AM PDT by sionnsar
Christ Church Cathedral, one of the oldest and most important Episcopal churches in Missouri(the great Jacksonian Thomas Hart Benton was one of its founders), has this study group that meets on Wednesday evenings.
Living the Questions is a study for the many people of faith
In nothing in particular.
who have suffered in silence as the voices of fear and false certitude claim to profess the unchanging truth of Christianity.
Those would be people who actually believe the tenets of the Christian religion.
It may even be helpful for those who Jack Spong
And we're basically done here. You probably know how the rest of this is going to go so why don't you pop on over to Kendall Harmon's? He always has interesting stuff up.
calls “believers in exile” – those who have left the church because of its refusal to take their questions or life’s situation seriously.
Also its refusal to stop going on about that "sin" stuff.
It is not intended to spell out new doctrine or create new dogma
It's intended to dynamite old doctrine and old dogma.
but to serve as a catalyst to perhaps crack open the door to the future.
When we finally work up the intellectual courage to admit that we're atheists.
Many of us know that at its core, Christianity has something good to offer humankind.
Uh...eternal life?
At the same time, many have a sense they are alone in being a “thinking” Christian
Meaning a "Christian" who decides for himself just which sins Jesus died for so he doesn't have to feel guilty about last Saturday night. See Gene Robinson.
and that “salvaging” Christianity is a hopeless task.
"Salvaging" meaning reducing the number of sins down to the Episcopal nine(racism, sexism, "homophobia", not recycling, not doing the required three prostrations in front of the United Nations flag, supporting Israel, thinking abortion is the taking of a human life, voting for conservative politicians and refusing to stop believing that nonsense about Jesus having to die for the sins of the world)
What is needed is a safe environment where people have permission to ask the questions they’ve always wanted to ask but have been afraid to voice for fear of being thought a heretic.
Because you know how those Roman Catholic fundamentalist Protestant Orthodox Pentecostals are. Those people will burn you at the stake if you look at them funny.
To make the implicit explicit, this study is not for:
• those whose personal faith requires them to believe that the Bible is the inerrant and inspired word of God.
• those who believe that the doctrines set forth by the early church are sacrosanct and not to be questioned.
• those whose eternal salvation depends on their unswerving commitment to the above.
In other words, actual Christians need not apply.
Art and Soul Café and Christ Church Cathedral would like to provide a safe environment to explore some questions. Please be aware that the issues and concepts discussed in this study may challenge many people’s worldview and understanding of the divine.
If you believe in God, we'll all laugh at and make fun of you.
For some it will be radically new information. For others, it will be an affirmation of what they’ve known deep down for a long time.
That they're atheists and they can start sleeping in on Sunday mornings.
The theme of each session is a broad area of thought and is not designed to “prove” a point or make specific conclusions.
Kind of like an ECUSA sermon.
I'm way past the point where this sort of thing shocks me. I could probably post dozens of items just like it from other ECUSA cathedral web sites. It does make me wonder once again, with no small amount of embarrassment, why I stayed in ECUSA so long.
Around here, this sort of thing has been going on for a long time. My old parish used to jump from spiritual fad to spiritual fad. An associate rector there was heavily into Matt Fox for quite a while. Then it was "Celtic Christianity" and other inanities followed that.
But there is one good thing that stories like this accomplish. Every time I get an urge to revisit my old parish, if only for a day, stories like this kill it.
Traditional Anglican ping, continued in memory of its founder Arlin Adams. They are fortunate. The rector of a church I once belonged to shows up on the Anglican blogs from time to time -- and not favorably.
A gorgeous church.
My grandmother's family were settled in Missouri at the time of Thomas Hart Benton, but they were Hardshell Baptist :-).
bttt
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