Dear Sam,
Thanks too, for your reply to Bo. I had the same problems with
his posting as you had, but could not have stated them as good as
you do. (As a hireling minister you're supposed to be more
informed about these matters than I, of course (-; )
I'd like to add that even within "Latin Christianity" some held
and hold that it is not very useful to theologize. Pirsig quotes
(Lila ch. 30) Johannes Eckhart: "Wouldst thou be perfect, do not
yelp about God." I guess this is true for most mystics. Quakers
dislike theologizing too and would -just like Anglicans- "claim
to be a different strand again" and to be "closest to the
orthodox" (-:. (I would have thought Anglicanism -ignorantly-
just a kind of compromise between Roman Catholicism and
Protestantism: a kind of political compromise between Catholic
forms and not wanting to be subject to the bishop of Rome. In
what sense do you mean "at root it's closest to the orthodox"?)
The problem is, I think, that God/Dynamic Quality is valued in
any religion enough to be able to break through any static
pattern, including the boxes we put religions, branches, strands
etc. in.
Also, you pinpoint as fundamentalism: "God speaking (only)
through (literal interpretation of) holy scriptures". Would you
agree to speak about fundamentalism (in any religion) if it
limits religious authority to only one source?!
I think we do Bo & Watts a bit more justice by recognizing that
both bible and Hebrew-Christian tradition not only contain
prophets but also priests, who are (as hireling ministers...)
biased to preserve at least some religious conventions and
are -historically speaking- under the suspicion of supporting a
lot of worldly order, too.
As a Quaker I tend to agree that prophecy is the heart of
religion and that religion should be as free as possible of
outward forms to stay true to its prophetic, critical insights.
Are you sure you can -as an Anglican priest...- agree with that?
Don't you want "the moral and logical order of [Anglican]
convention" preserved, even if you don't identify it with the
Absolute -God -?
With friendly greetings,
Wim
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