PastorSBC1303 said:
Wow - fascinating article. Makes perfect sense!
I ask the objective reader to pay attention to the salient points in the link.
A few key ones come to mind
Redding, who until recently was director of faith formation at St. Mark's Episcopal Cathedral, has been a priest for more than 20 years. Now she's ready to tell people that, for the last 15 months, she's also been a Muslim — drawn to the faith after an introduction to Islamic prayers left her profoundly moved.
...
Redding, who will begin teaching the New Testament as a visiting assistant professor at Seattle University this fall, has a different analogy: "I am both Muslim and Christian, just like I'm both an American of African descent and a woman. I'm 100 percent both."
Redding doesn't feel she has to resolve all the contradictions. People within one religion can't even agree on all the details, she said. "So why would I spend time to try to reconcile all of Christian belief with all of Islam?
"At the most basic level, I understand the two religions to be compatible. That's all I need."
Question: What do Episcopalians teach as "The most basic level" of fact that is actually true and reliable "in detail" when reading scripture?
Question - what Do Episcopalians teach that would allow for this level of "flexibility" in understanding the Christian faith EVEN if the person teaching was not inclined to be Muslim?
Question: What do you suppose is the "orthodox standard" view of the accuracy and believability of the NT text at Seattle University?
Answer: The Bible at it's most basic level is not factually true in detail but is true "in general principle" in that it is culturally and emotionally "uplifting" to the human spirit.
Throw out Genesis creation, fall, flood, Babel... stories since they are not factually accurate in their details - accept them as cultural myths that teach a more general yet basic spiritual moral.
Throw out any and all miracles found in places like the book of Acts since they are not historical truth - but rather historical myth designed to address cultural and spiritual needs of the human spirit. Declare that the "Fact" that IS reliable and true is that these writings are "
culturally significant literary works" allegory used to teach a basic general morality and principle. The only real question for them when reading that kind of liturature is "What MOVES you"? A painting, a poem, a curious reading from the NT?.
(Remember no respected humanist, agnostic, or atheist-darwinist-believing historian is going to accept the accounts of miracles in the book of Acts or NT writings as "factually accurate" in details).
(Note how similar this "what moves you" lingering motivator is to some of the pro-RC testimonies we have seen on this thread? How similar is the current RC view of scripture to the Episcopalian view of the accuracy in scripture? hmmmm)
Given this as the "starting position" for many Episcopalian clergy - what GAP is left when bridging that watered-down downsized view of the Word of God to Islam??
How much WORSE of a hatchet job COULD Islam possibly be doing to scripture??
Think about it!!
in Christ,
Bob