God Bless you surfnetter,

Benji

>You have publicly slandered my name…

Actually, you didn’t use your name till this post, so that’s a fail.

Nothing he said to you was personally insulting, but what you said to him was. You’re free to disagree.

Moderating my blog comments isn’t slander. I’m the umpire. You can argue balls and strikes as long as I want to put up with it.

But no one came to the game to listen to the argument.

ms

I am of the mind of Joseph Campbell on this, when he compares religion to a marsupial pouch “womb with a view”; the Goal is to one day leave the safety of the “pouch”.

Or, as is oft heard in 12-Step circles –

“Religion is for people who are afraid of going to hell; spirituality is for those who have already been there.”

One of the more recent posts really convicted me that, as I strive to understand the Catholic teachings and make them my own, I must continually strive to experiencing God both inside the Catholic Church and outside of it – to have an open mind and not…

As a young Christian. I have a really difficult time considering myself to be as worthy of God’s grace as many of you seem to be. Surely I cannot be as worthy as the Christian wordsmiths who have earned my respect throughout this blog.

Yet I continue to struggle in spite of the arguments. It seems to me that regardless of whether you are Young World, Old World, etc. The fact remains, the bible is for the educated and the uneducated, alike. It is written for the common person as well as for the uncommon person. The word of God does not come with a study manual. Interpretations of the bible, including ancient translations of the text are all creations of man, not of God. Our opinions are fallible and errant.

The bible is the word of God, to me. It was intended for me. It was intended for you. If the word of God causes me to repent, seek Christ, seek only to do God’s will, there is no manner of commentary that will come between me and my understanding of the word of God.

I have a lot to learn about the bible, yet I have hope in the promises God has made. I have faith in Christ, and I know what is required of me. I have faith that God will complete the work he has begun in me.

This being said I will probably never understand the entire bible. This is of no consequence to my salvation. God does not need to reveal Himself to me in order for me to have faith he created me.

Stay with me here. I am trying to bring it full circle. From my humble perspective, it would seem that many of you are so tied up with rhetorical positioning that you missed the point that even though man’s heart heart is always sinful all of the time, you were able to learn enough of God’s word to leap out into the world of this blog to boldly attempt to defend your understanding of God’s word it as if it belonged to you, alone.

The bible, therefore, may currently be your anchor, but at some point, you will fall, and it will become a starting place.

I, for one, thank God every day for this.

Unfortunately I need someone to explain to me, a common, confused wanderer whether this dog ever caught it’s tail?

T.O.

Does the guy who wrote that know exactly what kind of a pin that the myriad and precisely numbered angels were dancing upon in antiquity? %~)

Perhaps because Secular Humanism has become the Other that Protestants compare themselves to?

I’m probably butchering some of what I’ve read in Alistair’s “Christianity’s Dangerous Idea”, but it seems that Protestants at times have a tendency to identify themselves by what they’re not. In the early years, it was “We’re not Roman Catholics”. Nowadays, in Western Christianity, it’s “We’re not secular humanists” (which is perhaps why it is now easier for us to be friendly with the Roman Catholics). And given how integral Darwinism is to secular humanism, belief in YEC becomes a definite “I’m not a secular humanist” badge.

And if this is so, perhaps what is called for isn’t putting down the YECs, or defending them, but concentrating on putting our focus, not on the things on earth that we’re not, but on the One we’re called to follow.