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One of my favorite novels. I just got a new copy so I could reread it at some point. I'm working on Blood Meridian, and it's kind of interesting how often McCarthy uses religious similes for these characters and their atrocities.
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Nov 30, 2023 13:39
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"6 Do not exalt yourself in the king’s presence, and do not claim a place among his great men; 7 it is better for him to say to you, “Come up here,” than for him to humiliate you before his nobles." Proverbs. Reminds me of "the first shall come last".
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Nov 30, 2023 14:47
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Proverbs also has a passage about loving your enemy, which Paul quotes at one point. I tend to think people underappreciate just how much New Testament teaching is drawn from the Old Testament.
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Nov 30, 2023 15:06
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On the topic of Paul and Romans, I found a supremely interesting paper called "Paul, the Goddess Religions, and Queer Sects: Romans 1:23-28" which I thought some of the scholars in here might enjoy also! If I recall correctly, the last time Paul came up we talked a little about how a lot of his more questionable edicts have been totally different messages taken pretty badly out of context. This seemed like a pretty good example of that! The article author theorizes that -- well I can let him tell you.quote:Romans 1:23-28 is one of the primary texts from the NT used to justify the contemporary condemnation of both male and female homosexuals by some religious groups and has been the source of significant recent discussion. This paper seeks to recontextualize the passage as a unified attack on idolatry by identifying the subjects of the “gay” and “lesbian” behavior[1] in Rom 1:26-27 as participants in the goddess cults that were widespread in Paul’s time and posed a direct threat to Paul’s ministry. These individuals violated patriarchal norms of masculinity, femininity, and sexuality in very public ways, as well as contemporary heteronormativity, and so I refer to them using the postmodern term “queer.”[2] Let me be clear here: regardless of my personal feelings on Goddess cults, it's beyond reasonable for Paul to be saying, "Hey, fellow Christians, do not do these things emblematic of Goddess cults." And when the other way to read it is the homophobic way then hell yeah Paul, you go fellow ace, you keep speaking your religious truth. Thrillingly for everyone, while it's not the exact copy as the paper I read a quick Google found a very similar version on the author's personal website. So I am not going to stitch together a giant quote-block post about it but here is a link for people whose attentions prick at titles like that the way mine does  https://www.jeramyt.org/papers/paulcybl.html
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Nov 30, 2023 18:18
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LITERALLY A BIRD posted:Let me be clear here: regardless of my personal feelings on Goddess cults, it's beyond reasonable for Paul to be saying, "Hey, fellow Christians, do not do these things emblematic of Goddess cults." And when the other way to read it is the homophobic way then hell yeah Paul, you go fellow ace, you keep speaking your religious truth. Thrillingly for everyone, while it's not the exact copy as the paper I read a quick Google found a very similar version on the author's personal website. So I am not going to stitch together a giant quote-block post about it but here is a link for people whose attentions prick at titles like that the way mine does Paul specifically mentions pagan orgies in Corinthians which I just read too, and within the broader context of the letter, he talks about eating sacrificial food or food left for idols, and he has an interesting take on the acceptability of it. He basically says that you shouldn't eat the sacrificial meat in situations in which it might give other people, non-Christians, the idea that Christians are down with worshipping other deities. But if you are invited for dinner and nobody would misunderstand your eating it for being an idolator, then whatever. It seems to be in keeping with his general idea that being Christian is far more about your relationships with other people, and how you affect their lives, than how pious and obedient you are. He even mentions that eating with idolators itself isn't bad because as Christians, we don't believe in the idols anyway. They're just pieces of wood. Where it gets weird for Paul is if you are misrepresenting yourself and your faith, and giving other people the wrong idea about you or misleading them. I don't know, this is my first time through, so I am just beginning to get an understanding of what is going on.
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Nov 30, 2023 19:14
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This one is also a shift from kashrut laws. I don't know if the full set of observances were the same as they are in the modern day, but "don't eat food that has been offered to an idol" is specifically called out (I assume it was fairly common; presumably, the gods took the part they wanted, and if you wanted to eat the remainder, hey, go nuts.)
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Nov 30, 2023 19:41
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hmm, talk of offering food to idols has me thinking of spirit plates which is not really the same thing but I guess I haven't thought about it much in a Christian context a number of cultures (I'm familiar with the indigenous american context but it's a Thing in many) will make a "spirit plate" of food to offer to spirits as part of a meal. say a blessing prayer over our food, here's the food for the living and here's a plate we set aside for the spirits. it's not idolatry because it's not worshipping spirits, it's simply welcoming them and showing hospitality.
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Nov 30, 2023 20:14
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Pellisworth posted:hmm, talk of offering food to idols has me thinking of spirit plates which is not really the same thing but I guess I haven't thought about it much in a Christian context there are tons of familiar echoes or instances of this sorta observance, from the sublime (fifth cup at a seder) to the folksy (plate of cookies for santa)
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Nov 30, 2023 20:32
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There's a Buddhist practice of making water offerings - obviously, gods would not need our gifts, and Buddhas even less, but developing the practice of gratitude is seen to have value. (Also, you can pour the water on your plants or crops later.) I'm told the kami take five-yen coins, though. Convenient!
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Nov 30, 2023 20:43
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LITERALLY A BIRD posted:On the topic of Paul and Romans, I found a supremely interesting paper called "Paul, the Goddess Religions, and Queer Sects: Romans 1:23-28" which I thought some of the scholars in here might enjoy also! If I recall correctly, the last time Paul came up we talked a little about how a lot of his more questionable edicts have been totally different messages taken pretty badly out of context. This seemed like a pretty good example of that! The article author theorizes that -- well I can let him tell you. On the subject in general, I'm of two minds. First, back projecting our modern understanding of sexuality back onto a different culture 2000 years past is bad form. They did not understand sexual orientation in anywhere near the same terms that we do today, and so just like you shouldn't try to say Jesus was capitalist, communist, feminist, chauvinist, antiracist, etc., one should be very careful about using the Bible to justify any stance on modern sexuality. Hellenistic culture, like a lot of ancient cultures, featured a lot more sexual activity that would today fall under the queer spectrum. Let's avoid any discussions of ages here by also acknowledging that Hellenistic culture had a lot of pederasty as well, but neither the Greeks nor Israelites were making much of the distinction. One of the ways that the Israelites maintained their cultural identity was by not engaging in Hellenistic practices, including their sexual practices. However, the cultural aspect is completely lost as modern bigots prooftext verses that may or may not even be talking about consensual non-heterosexual adult relationships. On the other hand, there's a lot of prohibitions in the Bible that we don't obey, and we can start with "slaves obey your masters" or the role of women in church leadership where one needs to be an Olympic-level mental gymnast to prove that what is being said is the opposite of the plain reading. Not saying plain readings are always best, just that the Bible contains contractions and on some level, we are always going to have to look at the whole thing and discern what of multiple different claims we are going to incorporate into our faith and what we are going to exclude. Also, I want to point out that such a level of explanation tends to presuppose a certain level of biblical inerrancy. That is, I don't believe in biblical inerrancy, so I can say that the passages where the author gets bigoted reflect the author's opinion about God, not that God literally took over their writing hand and dictated to them that passage. I can look at the hundreds of passages that talk about love, grace, reconciliation, etc. and weigh them against the surprisingly small number of passages that seem to talk about being anti-gay and decide that, even absent a nuanced exegetical analysis, I find the former to be a more authentic witness to God. Oh, and that isn't to say that I don't find these kinds of analysis interesting, educational, and even possibly useful, just that folks need to be careful of falling into the modern evangelical trap of literal biblical inerrancy.
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Nov 30, 2023 20:44
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NomChompsky posted:Paul specifically mentions pagan orgies in Corinthians which I just read too, and within the broader context of the letter, he talks about eating sacrificial food or food left for idols, and he has an interesting take on the acceptability of it. He basically says that you shouldn't eat the sacrificial meat in situations in which it might give other people, non-Christians, the idea that Christians are down with worshipping other deities. But if you are invited for dinner and nobody would misunderstand your eating it for being an idolator, then whatever. It seems to be in keeping with his general idea that being Christian is far more about your relationships with other people, and how you affect their lives, than how pious and obedient you are. Pellisworth posted:hmm, talk of offering food to idols has me thinking of spirit plates which is not really the same thing but I guess I haven't thought about it much in a Christian context Speaking of which, Fr. Michael Oleksa, who basically wrote the book on Alaskan Orthodoxy, just passed away. His book, Orthodox Alaska, both has a good history of Orthodoxy, including a great explanation of the ecumenical councils, and a look at how the missionaries tended to look for overlaps with native beliefs rather than contradictions. It was also an interesting part of Killers of the Flower Moon--most of the main Osage characters are Catholic, and also retain a lot of their pre-Christian traditions.
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Nov 30, 2023 21:44
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When we say queer, we do not mean literally, the post-Stonewall framing of a person as lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgender. We mean a socially deviant or othered sexual or gender-expressive experience. Paul is not identifying pagan cultic sexuality as being part of the post-Stonewall alliance, but he is possibly identifying people as using deviant sexual and gender-expressive practice to create a public identification with a particular pagan cultic religion. And obviously Christians can't do that! To put that more glibly, LGBT is new, but there have always been new and exciting kinds of fags and trannies. Don't overcorrect for hindsight by assuming he couldn't also be talking about an actual subculture with a religious bent, rather than just the socially normative Hellenistic pederasty we're all familiar with, or other socially normative same-sex hookups.
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Nov 30, 2023 21:46
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And there is evidence that a good portion of the earliest Christians were marginal folks. There was conflict between those marginal people and the Greek thinking groups. That conflict is often visible in the New Testament text where it has been edited. It is particularly visible in Paul’s letters ( especially ones he did not write) or where they have been partially rewritten. That editing happens even well into the Middle Ages (with Junia for example.)
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Nov 30, 2023 22:03
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Nessus posted:This one is also a shift from kashrut laws. I don't know if the full set of observances were the same as they are in the modern day, but "don't eat food that has been offered to an idol" is specifically called out (I assume it was fairly common; presumably, the gods took the part they wanted, and if you wanted to eat the remainder, hey, go nuts.) So in Wiccan practice, or at least, in my Tradition, a libation of wine is poured for the Gods before the chalice is passed around (or used to carefully pour into Dixie cups, in these COVID times), either into a small bowl on the altar if indoors or directly onto the ground if outdoors. If we should happen to have a feast of some sort, ie, a post-ritual potluck on Sabbats or some other festive occasion, a dish will be made up 'for the Gods' that contains a bit of everything present which will be left outside somewhere once everything is done. We wouldn't consume the libations ourselves, they're not for us, and if the Gods choose to consume them in the form of a raccoon or a bird or the microbes that break them down then that's what they choose to do. Conversely, in my Egyptian paganism side practice (for want of a better term?) the expectation is that the participants will eat the food offerings, presumably after the Gods have consumed their spiritual essence or ka. This feels very weird to me, I suppose because after decades of Wicca it just doesn't seem right. I rely almost entirely on offerings of incense at my Isis shrine because I don't feel entirely comfortable consuming any food offerings myself.
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Nov 30, 2023 23:12
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Keromaru5 posted:One of my favorite novels. I just got a new copy so I could reread it at some point. I don't subscribe to the view but the Judge as Gnostic Archon is a fascinating interpretation.
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Dec 1, 2023 03:07
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Ohtori Akio posted:When we say queer, we do not mean literally, the post-Stonewall framing of a person as lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgender. We mean a socially deviant or othered sexual or gender-expressive experience. Paul is not identifying pagan cultic sexuality as being part of the post-Stonewall alliance, but he is possibly identifying people as using deviant sexual and gender-expressive practice to create a public identification with a particular pagan cultic religion. And obviously Christians can't do that! What happened to your Utenas? You've been shorn of them.
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Dec 1, 2023 14:36
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Finished Proverbs.
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Dec 1, 2023 15:08
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Keromaru5 posted:Proverbs also has a passage about loving your enemy, which Paul quotes at one point. I tend to think people underappreciate just how much New Testament teaching is drawn from the Old Testament. this is why the rcl track 2 is so cool imo; the parallels and quotations are every frickin where
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Dec 1, 2023 18:11
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Pellisworth posted:hmm, talk of offering food to idols has me thinking of spirit plates which is not really the same thing but I guess I haven't thought about it much in a Christian context in a lot of communities that practice candomble there's still significant food and drink offerings to the orishas on big feast days
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Dec 1, 2023 18:13
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Pellisworth posted:hmm, talk of offering food to idols has me thinking of spirit plates which is not really the same thing but I guess I haven't thought about it much in a Christian context This was a long standing custom in northern Europe as well, though they didn't tend to conceptualize them as spirits but rather brownies, pixies, gnomes, etc. who were physical-ish creatures who would either help protect them or at least not make trouble for them if placated.
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Dec 1, 2023 18:32
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I love that the world over we wanted there to be more Little Guys
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Dec 1, 2023 18:34
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Noted theologian David Bentley Hart is on the record as believing faeries are real.
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Dec 1, 2023 21:06
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the universal human drive to check if any nearby wondrous entities would like a snack
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Dec 1, 2023 21:08
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Keromaru5 posted:Noted theologian David Bentley Hart is on the record as believing faeries are real. The Bible clearly says that intelligent, nonhuman entities are real and interact with people, it isn't that far of a jump.
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Dec 1, 2023 21:09
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Prurient Squid posted:What happened to your Utenas? You've been shorn of them. got into fights in cspam lol
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Dec 1, 2023 22:18
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Killingyouguy! posted:I love that the world over we wanted there to be more Little Guys
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Dec 1, 2023 22:38
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for a text that comes down very tough on polytheism, it is surprising how clear the Qur'an is that the little guys are real. i guess it's just obvious,
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Dec 1, 2023 22:41
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I don't know if it's that surprising; it's also clear that God made them, we're not supposed to worship them, and they themselves are expected to worship God.
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Dec 1, 2023 23:18
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Neon Noodle posted:Everyone knows the little guys steal your poo poo when you definitely left it right here like ten seconds ago Yeah, northern European folklore around them is more that they're the methed-up neighbors who will steal anything that's not nailed down and wreck anything that is, but if you bring over a six pack now and again and drink one with them, they'll go gently caress with someone else.
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Dec 1, 2023 23:22
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around there the little people are especially associated with protecting springs (as in, springs where water flows from) and are mostly sort of aloof nature spirits that guard clean water. they're not mischievious really, but you're supposed to show them respect. they sometimes help people lost or stranded due to the weather
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Dec 1, 2023 23:27
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So my church every Thursday night is doing an advent series which is just people gathering to sing through the Holden Evening Prayer and boy that is an incredible series of hymns, and the atmosphere of the church at night really brings the entire atmosphere home. Very much enjoyed that and I am gonna do it every week for the next couple.
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Dec 1, 2023 23:47
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NomChompsky posted:So my church every Thursday night is doing an advent series which is just people gathering to sing through the Holden Evening Prayer and boy that is an incredible series of hymns, and the atmosphere of the church at night really brings the entire atmosphere home. Very much enjoyed that and I am gonna do it every week for the next couple. That's awesome! In a similar vein, you might see if there are any Christmas Vespers (or similar) music performances in your area. Some of the larger Lutheran churches and especially colleges had Christmas Vespers performances where I grew up and they were fantastic. That may be somewhat particular to the Upper Midwest in the US though. edit: Lutherans love to sing. Pellisworth fucked around with this message at 01:46 on Dec 2, 2023 |
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Dec 2, 2023 01:33
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Reading Ecclesiastes. Did Charles Bukowski write this? edit: Ecclesiastes coming right after Proverbs is a trip. You thought wisdom was worth something? Nope. edit: In conclusion, the Bible is a land of contrasts. Prurient Squid fucked around with this message at 14:16 on Dec 2, 2023 |
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Dec 2, 2023 13:57
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I haven't gotten through the wisdom books but the gist I got of them from my reverend was Proverbs: Here's how to live with wisdom. Ecclesiastes: But life is random and not everything goes the way you expect. Job: Here's an example.
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Dec 2, 2023 19:24
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Nessus posted:There's a Buddhist practice of making water offerings - obviously, gods would not need our gifts, and Buddhas even less, but developing the practice of gratitude is seen to have value. (Also, you can pour the water on your plants or crops later.) There often seems to be a similar type of practice in venerating icons in Orthodox churches on significant days associated with the subject of an icon. Sometimes an icon will be brought to the fore during that week and be adorned with flowers in front of or around it. Maybe a special candle/oil lamp too. I like this kind of stuff; it's cool they are recognizing people who actually lived and it adds to the lore.
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Dec 2, 2023 23:17
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Azathoth posted:Oh, and that isn't to say that I don't find these kinds of analysis interesting, educational, and even possibly useful, just that folks need to be careful of falling into the modern evangelical trap of literal biblical inerrancy. So Az, I was going to let your thoughts in this post stand without comment from me because I really did just share that article because I thought some people might find it interesting, rather than trying to make a greater point with it; and the one part of your post I did think deserved a bit more scrutiny, that historically attested sex and gender deviance in ancient near-East Goddess cults was pretty widespread and common and displacing that to assume Paul was only speaking about routine Hellenistic sexual attitudes is itself skirting ignorance of historical context were already addressed by others. But after coming across yet another modern news article calling the US House Speaker a "Christian nationalist" who does believe in Biblical inerrancy and uses that to forge his political policies -- I must ask if I was correctly interpreting some of the tone of your post as "I don't believe in Biblical inerrancy, so I simply won't engage people who are thinking like that"; and further, do you really believe it's wise to just ignore such rhetoric rather than developing an understanding of it and being able to push back effectively against it when it crosses your path? This Guardian article is titled "Mike Johnson, theocrat: the House speaker and a plot against America." Dramatic, I know. https://amp.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/nov/04/mike-johnson-theocrat-house-speaker-christian-trump posted:The new House speaker, Mike Johnson, knows how he will rule: according to his Bible. When asked on Fox News how he would make public policy, he replied: “Well, go pick up a Bible off your shelf and read it. That’s my worldview.” But it’s taking time for the full significance of that statement to sink in. Johnson is in fact a believer in scriptural originalism, the view that the Bible is the truth and the sole legitimate source for public policy. It has seemed probable to me that I have been more concerned about the political "religious right" than a lot of people in America have been, both having grown up in their environment and having therefore a strong sense of the damage they can do / want to do / believe it is their mission to do, as well as having a woman's rights to her body and use or disuse of her reproductive system, something most conservative Christians have strong differing feelings about, as my personal number one issue on a political party's agenda. When he was elected I actually made a conscious decision not to think/worry about Mike Johnson, there are plenty more pressing things to worry about in the world right now. But more and more journalism pieces have been published over the last several weeks discussing Johnson's religious views and that they are one with his vision for the country and every person living within it; the authors insist this should not be dismissed or underestimated, and I do wonder if, being "the good kind" of Christian, it is easier for you to say "Biblical inerrancy, I don't believe in that" and go about your day than it is for people for whom his views appear to pose a clear and present threat. The author observes, "Religious truth is neither rational nor susceptible to reasoned debate." However, she also adds that "a scriptural originalist is by definition incapable of public policy discussions with those who do not share their faith." Even if you choose to reject Biblical inerrancy, a paper such as the Paul one is clearly written at least to some degree with a mission: to meet those using literal translations of Biblical verse as close to where they stand as possible, and then yanking the rug from beneath them by proposing a very different, but equally or even more historically plausible alternative translation for verses used to justify oppression and suffering. I suppose what I am trying to inquire of you here, as non-judgmentally as possible, is do you not think as a Christian who believes in a more loving, accepting, and forgiving truth than Christians like that do, that part of your ministry should be defusing rhetoric that is used to justify hate? It is worthwhile to remind the people around you "not to fall into the trap of literal Biblical inerrancy," certainly. But then I ask you what is to be done about those already in that trap? It cannot be the job of non-Christians alone to try to confute the attacks, attacks made in ways both personal and institutional, of those with literalist beliefs; I would actually argue it is not our place, and therefore our job, in the common discourse at all. A person that holds the beliefs of a Christian nationalist could not care less about a queer polytheist panentheist woman's thoughts on his Bible, regardless of how compelling my rhetoric. Indeed, as I quoted above, as a thoughtful, educated Christian man and thus one that at least nominally shares that faith, are you not in one of the most privileged positions to push back against Biblical inerrancy? True, as I also emphasized above, that the religious truth of a true believer is not necessarily susceptible to reasoned debate. But if the tides are shifting in such a manner where religious literalism is re-entering mainstream discourse, spewing forth from the mouths of enormously visible, enormously powerful, enormously influential government figures, should you -- you, the mindful Christian who truly does love his fellow man -- not be versed in ways to meet it? These things do not stay in government discourse alone. To say otherwise is ignoring the last seven years in America, every part of them from the balloon of hate crimes to the dissolution of Roe v. Wade. You may never personally change Mike Johnson's mind. But he will be changing the minds of others, and those are the people with whom you could make the difference, by understanding that way of thinking and shifting the rhetoric in the ways that can change their minds back.
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Dec 3, 2023 15:49
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I was only speaking to the people here with that comment, not suggesting bringing my point up to someone who currently believes in biblical literalism. The problem is that we need to be able to acknowledge that the Bible is written by humans and there's things in there that come from the biases of the human writing. That doesn't mean that the Bible isn't the inspired word of God, it just means that just as copyists and translators are not divinely protected from error, neither were the authors. If God wouldn't do that, why would God bother doing it for the author, since God clearly knows what is going to happen. The Bible is the book God wants us to have, and we need to wrestle with why there are 1001 translations and millions of manuscript variations. Going beyond the Bible clearly condoning slavery, the passages in Paul's Epistles about women being subservient to men (note I don't think most are authentically Pauline, but that's neither here nor there, it's in the Bible no matter who wrote it). One can engage in a complex analysis of customs and time and make the passage say the exact opposite of the plain reading, but anyone with a literalist interpretation is going to bounce hard off that because the human being that wrote those passages clearly did not mean women are equal when he wrote that they're subservient. At some point, we need to be able to say that the authors of the books of the Bible were not supernaturally taken over by God, their free will was not removed when they wrote what they wrote, and poo poo made it in that we have come to understand is sinful (slavery, misogyny, etc.) but we can read the books in totality and context and get an authentic witness of God, but we don't need to explain some things as anything more than "the author was incorrect" just like when the author of Mark names the wrong priest in Mark 2:26. As for what to do with people who have a literalist mindset, well, you can't get them out of that mindset so long as they are part of a Christian community that espouses such beliefs. So, instead of just asking how to disabuse them of the notion of biblical inerrancy, you need to think about how to get them into a community that professes different beliefs. Unless they can be a part of a healthy, supportive community, no amount of nuanced exegesis from a single person is going to overcome a whole community professing the opposite. So that then brings up what to do in the wider culture, and the answer is for existing communities that aren't full of fundamentalists to be more open and welcoming, and to be way better at sharing their message. Somewhere along the way, liberal Christianity got really nervous about evangelism and most liberal mainline Protestant denominations now are happy if someone comes in and wants to join but have not figured out how to share the Gospel without screaming about hellfire and damnation like fundamentalists do. It's a massive dereliction of duty on the part of many churches, my own included. There's a lot of interesting stuff happening but I suspect that it's going to require a massive denominational realignment beyond what is happening now in the UMC or what happened in the ELCA in 2009. These denominations highly prize church unity and so voices arguing for less conservative theology end up getting vetoed by a coalition of conservatives and milquetoast liberals who for a variety of reasons don't want their conservative wing to leave. Ultimately, I think this is going to end up with some variety of Protestant realignment from which an explicitly theologically liberal church will emerge that is not afraid to criticize the Christian right but it's anyone's guess how long that will take.
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Dec 3, 2023 19:44
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Azathoth posted:So that then brings up what to do in the wider culture, and the answer is for existing communities that aren't full of fundamentalists to be more open and welcoming, and to be way better at sharing their message. Somewhere along the way, liberal Christianity got really nervous about evangelism and most liberal mainline Protestant denominations now are happy if someone comes in and wants to join but have not figured out how to share the Gospel without screaming about hellfire and damnation like fundamentalists do. It's a massive dereliction of duty on the part of many churches, my own included. I'm unsure how to break this particular one but it does seem like a deep-rooted habit of thought that in my opinion ought to get uprooted and thrown out.
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Dec 3, 2023 20:27
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LITERALLY A BIRD posted:
My spouse comes from a very fundamentalist family. They'd rather I be an atheist, or any other religion, than being a liberal Christian. They look at other beliefs as of the world, and just regular old sinful and confused, and simply in need of saving... but to them someone who's Christian and doesn't believe like them is spreading false teaching, and leading children away from the true Christ. My beliefs are abhorrent to them. I've spent many nights wondering how to counter that, and I have nothing, except continue to stand my ground against it when it comes up, but that's occurring less and less. That community is becoming more and more insular; they've all but left the mainline churches (at least those churches in large cities). I mostly talk to my kids and nephews nieces about how nutty their view of God is. I mean, if any Christian has actually changed any of those views in others, I'd love to know how. Azathoth posted:Ultimately, I think this is going to end up with some variety of Protestant realignment from which an explicitly theologically liberal church will emerge that is not afraid to criticize the Christian right but it's anyone's guess how long that will take. Theologically liberal and socially liberal don't go hand in hand. There's certainly some correlation, but I don't think there's going to be a whole Death of God denomination sprout up. I see young people coming to church who are very leftist, but theologically conservative.
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Dec 3, 2023 20:50
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it's really really difficult to "deprogram" or however you wanna describe nudging people gradually away from biblical literalism and other bad stuff like thread boogeyman prosperity gospel. I think it's particularly hard to do in a deliberate way, and it's not fast, it's something that takes a long time and a lot of gradual exposure to slowly change peoples' minds. they really need some sort of personal life experience that pushes them to realign their thinking. I'm hardly a psychologist but it seems easy and comforting for many people to just go with the simple, un-nuanced answer as opposed to the complex heavily nuanced approach that requires you to spend a lot of time doing critical reading and thinking etc. there's also the fact that a lot of people have authoritarian personalities or mindsets and are going to feel more comfortable with a sort of blunt force literalism. trying to destroy biblical literalism with your powers of debate and historical criticism is not gonna work and is likely to backfire spectacularly. you can't logic someone out of a worldview they didn't arrive at by logic themselves. like Azathoth said, it's not just theology, liturgy, exegesis etc you're fighting against it's much moreso human psychology, sociology, and culture.
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Dec 3, 2023 21:27
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