Recently in Theology Category
Despite the fact that I'm not a big fan of the Ontological Argument, I scored as Anselm in this interesting online quiz matching responses to the views of prominant theologians through the ages. Here are the details of my results:
 | You scored as Anselm, Anselm is the outstanding theologian of the medieval period.He sees man's primary problem as having failed to render unto God what we owe him, so God becomes man in Christ and gives God what he is due. You should read 'Cur Deus Homo?'
Which theologian are you? created with QuizFarm.com |
Check it out and let me know how you score. Since most readers of this blog are of the evangelical tradition, I'm curious if the quiz will produce any variance amongst us.
Are you a Red-Letter Christian? These Christians believe that Evangelicals should focus on the actual teachings of Jesus (hence "red-letter"), especially when it comes to social issues. The movement was started by Tony Campolo and Jim Wallis in response to the Religious Right's heavy emphasis on abortion and homosexuality--two issues that Jesus did not address directly. Campolo has a short piece on Belief.net that defines the Red-Letter Christian movement.
Campolo and Wallis fall into the category of Progressive Christians. Campolo is a professor emeritus of Sociology at Eastern University in Pennsylvania, and a popular Christian speaker. Wallis is head of the progressive Christian magazine Sojourners and author of the recent book God's Politics: Why the Right Gets It Wrong and the Left Doesn't Get It (2004). According to Campolo, the reason for creating the Red-Letter Christian movement "was not to create a religious left movement to challenge the religious right, but to jump-start a religious movement that will transcend partisan politics."
The social issues valued by Red-Letter Christians are the issues that Jesus spoke of directly, including caring for the poor, evangelism, and loving one's enemies. They believe that these issues should be the political priorities of Christians rather than other issues like homosexual rights, abortion, and war. They argue that these issues are important but over-emphasized by both liberals and conservatives. This last point is an important one as I suspect many Christian Republicans accuse the progressive movement of being soft on abortion and homosexuality. Campolo addressed this point in a recent podcast by stating that they don't want to minimize these two important issues, but that they shouldn't be the only issues as they often are for many Evangelicals, especially when it comes to voting. Jesus spoke about poverty more than any other issue. Why isn't that the main social issue for Christians? What about peace? What about the environment? Red-Letter Christians are pushing for a more holistic approach to political issues. Dobson and Colson balked at this notion, arguing instead that Evangelicals must remain focused abortion and homosexuality as their primary social issues.
As you might expect, the Red-Letter Christian movement has been accused of shaping its belief around politics rather than the other way around. I think that criticism is a straw-man argument that attacks Christians who want to let abortion continue and support homosexuality. That's not what the movement advocates. They are anti-abortion and are very concerned about homosexuality (though they are certainly softer on this latter issue than most conservative Evangelicals). Those of you who know me can immediately see that I fit very nicely with the Red-Letter Christian movement. I must say, however, that I think that name is a bit unfortunate because it could be interpreted as taking only what Jesus said with disregard for the rest of the Bible. That's not the case, of course, but it sets up an easy mischaracterization by idiots like Falwell and Robertson.
What would it take for you to be convinced that Floyd Landis is not guilty of using performance enhancing drugs (or other cheating techniques)? Would you have been convinced if the sample B test had come out normal? What about now that his sample B confirmed the results from sample A? This current controversy brings up an important consideration when talking about matters of science and faith (or anything, really). What is your standard of evidence for believing or disbelieving something, or even abandoning belief?
Naturally, we have different standards for different beliefs. Sometimes it doesn't take much, and other times a mound of evidence may be required. For example, it would require a tremendous volume of evidence for my friend Jeff to believe that Barry Bonds didn't cheat. Meanwhile, it doesn't take much to believe that someone is a cheater. How many times do you need to observe someone cheat to know he or she is a cheater? Once.
The above examples are behavioral, but consider deeper belief systems that people hold. I have to ask myself, what would it take for me to abandon my Christian faith? Is there anything that could do it? Such a standard of evidence tends to be exceptionally high for people of dedicated religious conviction, be it Christian or otherwise. Likewise, the standard can be equally high, if not higher, for non-believers to be convinced.
For example, naturalists typically have an exceptionally high standard of evidence for accepting non-natural explanations of phenomena. I suspect that even directly witnessing a miraculous or supernatural event would leave the dedicated naturalist in search of a natural explanation, unwilling to accept a supernatural one. As scientists like to say, exceptional claims require exceptional evidence. (By the way, this heuristic generally applies in science across the board, and rightfully so.)
In terms of the intersection between science and faith, standards of evidence become critical when discussing the evolution/creation/ID debate, miracles, the resurrection, etc. I wrote about this issue to set the stage for later posts. In the meantime, think about what beliefs you hold that you would be hard pressed to abandon, and those that you would easily abandon. Is there anything that would require enormous evidence for you to believe? (see Barry Bonds example above.)
I must refer anyone reading this blog to Christianity Today's excellent book review publication Books & Culture: A Christian Review. Although unweildy in size (it's big, not thick), the range of topics covered and the quality of the reviews are excellent. The highest praise I can give B&C is that it is a genuine book review publication, not simply a bunch of Christian reviewers saying nice things about Christian books. The thoughtful reviews are writtten mostly by scholars and writers (including a review in the latest issue by an Economics professor at my institution, George Mason University) who bring depth and breadth of expertise and disposition to their critiques. I particularly like the inclusion of evangelical and Catholic reviewers and books, and every theological variant in between. A broad spectrum of topics are covered, both Christian and secular, though the emphasis is on Christian-oriented books. For example, the July/August 2006 issue has reviews of books on how container ships "changed the world", on lying and Augustinian theology, and most importantly, on Why we no longer believe in sports but should. I have discovered several books through this publication that I might not have otherwise found. I cannot commend B&C to you strongly enough--go subscribe now.
