tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5449677811690616608.post1686891338204017316..comments2023-12-15T21:49:46.651+01:00Comments on Pluralist Speaks: PS All Liberals are Not Quite So LiberalPluralist (Adrian Worsfold)http://www.blogger.com/profile/01922153724523820866noreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5449677811690616608.post-63258442523960217082009-04-27T16:52:00.000+02:002009-04-27T16:52:00.000+02:00I do not know where Mr. Fraser falls in the conven...I do not know where Mr. Fraser falls in the conventional conservative-to-liberal spectrum. But I'm pretty sure he doesn't understand Anselm. That, I think, anyone from glean from Cur Deus Homo, where the notion of the "wrath of God" figures hardly at all. <br /><br />More interesting is his attempt to save Christianity from corrupt Western juridical ideas of atonement by appealing to the Orthodox. "The basic [bad] idea," he says, "is that human beings owe God an unpayable debt on account of their sin."<br /><br />But this notion isn't purely Western. Look at section 20 of Athanasius' de incarnatione": "But since the debt owed ("opheilomenon") by all men had still to be paid,...he now on behalf of all men ofered the sacrifice and surrendered his own temple to death on behalf of all."<br /><br />I know that you, personally, would consider both views nonsensical. I only write to suggest that the theological gap between East and West on the atonement is not so great as some would suggest.rick allenhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07612435616018593956noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5449677811690616608.post-8101288238307047382009-04-27T09:41:00.000+02:002009-04-27T09:41:00.000+02:00I don't think I contradicted myself, but I stumble...I don't think I contradicted myself, but I stumbled because of the too many meanings the word liberal has.<br /><br />Your approach is liberal in that it questions everything until it can be proven. It leaves all options open... well, sort of..., in actual fact you have closed quite a few options for yourself... and it does not argue from a set of certainties.<br /><br />But in religious dialogue, liberal ususally means something else. We are liberal or conservative from within the parameters of our faith.<br />So a liberal Christian is not the same as a liberal Muslim, is not the same as a liberal Hindu.<br /><br />Your approach can lead to accepting any one or none of the world's faith, or to knitting yourself your own set of beliefs.<br />That is not wrong. But it comes from the other end of the spectrum.<br /><br />You ask all questions and analyse all possible answers, and journey towards a conclusion that may be called Faith or not.<br /><br />In conventional dialogue, when we we apply the word liberal to our faith, we have traveled in the other direction, having started out feeling reasonably comfortable within the parameters of what our creeds tell us, and then journeying towards a more and more liberal interpretation. <br /><br />When we lose the kernel, most of us end up calling ourselves agnostic and outside our faith community, not liberals within it.Erika Bakerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01812376497361267014noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5449677811690616608.post-55841019722273443382009-04-27T03:49:00.000+02:002009-04-27T03:49:00.000+02:00You've possibly contradicted yourself.
Liberal is...You've possibly contradicted yourself.<br /><br />Liberal is not only liberal about something, which you seem to regard as legitimate and standard, and then say you struggle that it is of a certain set of beliefs.<br /><br />Liberality is an approach to faith, any faith understood as a religion, religion or just trust. It is open, critical, goes where it will, and does not accept pre-set descriptions.<br /><br />Some faiths don't translate into liberal to conservative easily, as they weren't constructed that way, but as a Westerner I can approach other faiths that way as I approach the near Eastern ones.<br /><br />So it is not a rejection of Christianity as a starting point for me, but a liberal approach to faith including Christianity. I don't accept a kernel is there before I get to it. That's to be possibly discovered or not.<br /><br />So I agree with the second part of your past paragraph.Pluralist (Adrian Worsfold)https://www.blogger.com/profile/01922153724523820866noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5449677811690616608.post-85034989412673479112009-04-26T21:05:00.000+02:002009-04-26T21:05:00.000+02:00"Liberal" has to be something within certain param..."Liberal" has to be something within certain parameters.<br />So within the conventional spectrum of Christian faith, Giles is truly liberal.<br />You are probably either extremely liberal or almost falling off the edge.<br />You really cannot take your own rejection of everything Christianity stands for and believes in as the standard for where liberalism starts.<br /><br />For most of us, it is about God as he is revealed in Jesus. You can fill those words with your own meaning, but once you move away from the kernel that there is a "God" and that what he is about can be seen somehow in "Jesus", you can hardly call yourself a conventional liberal any longer.<br /><br />Also, I do struggle with the idea that liberalism should denote a certain set of beliefs.<br />Isn't it much more about having your own beliefs - wherever they are on the spectrum - but being quite happy for others to have theirs too?Erika Bakerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01812376497361267014noreply@blogger.com