Religion

I agree about the civil and serious discussion. It is very important to me also, obviously.

Your dual attendance is actually not that strange. It is becoming more and more common in our society. In fact, many religious groups are trying to learn to incorporate the different streams of Christianity (to borrow from Richard Foster's terminology). So you see Evangelical, Liturgical, Social Justice and the other "types" of churches being intermixed. In many ways I find this refreshing and encouraging. In others, I find myself scared to death.

However, I trust God to work it all out in the end.

God Bless,
Clint

 

Hello Craig,

I enjoy dialoguing about the theological issues, as well. I should say from the outset that I do not doubt Christianity as a choice - my doubts fall within nuances in our faith. I guess I've done a fair amount of wrangling in the past - to try and "...work[sic] out one's salvation..."

I agree that scripture alludes to election and then gives leverage to free will. The nation of Israel seems to provide an example of this - although covenant theology was given to God's true "elect" (the nation of Israel) the fact they were permitted to act within election (much to their folly too often) shows the interplay between these two columns. After all, wasn't God's desire to see Israel as a "nation of priests..." impacting the entire world? (Exodus 19:3-6) Truly the rest of the world would not have been viewed as "elected" in the predestined sense - but God's original plan gave credence to them "accepting" Him.

I have always felt that predestination should be viewed as "preknowledge". Omniscience, or moreoever, the ability to behold time as a static observation, blows my mind. But, if I give allowance for God to be omniscient then I realize he has absolute knowledge of all things at all times. It's not too much a stretch to feel that God would know in advance who would choose to/ or not to follow him.

I hold fast to a premillenial/mostly pretribulational understanding of the fulfillment of the end of age. I too await the literal fulfillment of Revelation...but amillenial theory and even realized eschatology intrigues me.

Nice to meet you and hope to dialogue more in the future...

Steven King

 

Re: Re: Re: Re: Religious Stuff

Clint,

Admittedly, I have not read Deere's book...might not be a bad one to wrangle with for awhile.

Having come up through the ranks of ministry, I understand all to well the "occasional" opportunity to preach. While I know it's late advice...I hope 2 Corinthians 8 & 9 are helping you develop some ideas about giving...

Kind regards,
Steven King

 

I know virtually nothing of formal theology and have no objection to the inclusion of "secular humanism" in the listing of choices, but if you're going to use the above definition of religion you'd also have to include categories such as Socialism, Communism, Capitalism, Vegetarianism, Philately, etc. etc as these are all activities that are pursued with zeal or conscientious devotion, at least by some people. No?
Jack

 

Admittedly, I am a man without a religion.

I was baptized and raised as an Episcopalian, had attended services at a Methodist church for a period of time, converted to Catholicism with the birth of my eldest daughter, and have been to Temple. I have read extensively on the issue of faith and it’s relationship to Buddhism, Hinduism, Shinto, Islam, Scientology, and Taoism. One common thread with all religions is the belief in a central deity and “the golden rule” of doing unto others what you would have them do unto you.

I suppose my dilemma with modern religion is that our society accepts and embraces the notion of a “formed” religion, with a centralized leadership and the hierarchy of a unified “church”. My faith is ever so slightly diminished by the constant demands for money to serve the higher good, the polarization of “my religion is better than yours” or worse yet, “my religion is the one true religion". As if God selected one group and the rest of us are fools.

Where is the belief? In early times, men and women met together to exchange ideas pertaining to their beliefs and in turn, strengthened their faith. Today, we are judged not by our faith, but rather in our attendance at church, temple or synagogue.

So, here I am a man without a religion, in search of the light. A light, which is not overshadowed by the religion itself, but rather it's faith.

 

Obviously it was a mistake to list "Secular Humanism" as if it were a religion, as not a single person has selected it; but it looked like the most reasonable classification for scientific non-theists. Obviously I'm going to have to rethink my terminology, though I'm still drawing something of a blank when it comes to what word or phrase I should have used in its place.


Cheers,

 

I think Rich knows quite a bit about the mechanics of scientific polling, but I disagree that polls have to be "fair" in the sense that all possible respondents have to be adequately identified.

If your polling company was asked to find out how many registered or unregistered Democrats and Republicans were in each county of Virginia, it is irrelevant how many Greens, Independents, Libertarians, and Communists, etc. are there; this simply is not the question asked.

Therefore an adequate poll for the question asked is:

Are you a registered or unregistered:
1) Democrat
2) Republican
3) Anything else

That does not mean that Independents and Libertarians are the same; it just means that the poller doesn't care to differentiate between them, for their purpose.

 

Re: Religious Awakenings

Steven, by Bapticostal brother:

I was also reared COG (Cleveland, TN). However, as I evolved in my search for deeper truth, I became even more convinced of the validity of Pentecostal theology. I, too, have read Charismatic Chaos , as well as numerous other volumes which address the excessive manifestations of Pentecostalism. From my own research I found that every great revival movement in church history has been characterized by religious fervor/excess, with the majority being non-Pentecostal. Even today many rural/country Baptist, Independent, etc., churches, as well as numerous non-Pentecostal African-American churches are characterized by fervent worship, hyper-emotionalism, demonstrative preaching, etc. So these are not traits singular to Pentecostalism.

I earned my doctorate at a Presbyterian seminary (RA ), with each member of my doctoral committee being PCUSA--all strongly Calvinistic. Yet, my theological position has remained Wesleyan/Pentecostal. Like you, I have also wrestled internally with such issues as election, predestination, perseverance, etc., and find my position strongly Wesleyan/Arminian. There are indeed questions for which one may never have a concrete answer, yet the journey continues.

 

Re: Re: Religious Awakenings

Russell,

Thanks for the intro...perhaps I'll come around eventually.

God bless,
Steven King

 

I agree, Jack.

I think that the dictionary definition that Russell used was a colloquial definition of the word 'religion'. Most people using 'religion' to simply mean zeal and devotion would be fully aware that they were using the word in a metaphorical way. Somebody was treating their cause *as if* it were a religion. They were showing *religion-like* zeal. We might say "His Corvette is his religion", knowing full well that he's a Methodist.

It's still a very open question what the definition of 'religion' is, or even if there is one.

My suspicion is that it is one of those "family resemblance" concepts that Wittgenstein discussed. Perhaps all ordinary language words are like that. The word 'religion' is surrounded by (or is able to elicit) a cloud of associations in each of our minds that collectively form its meaning: divinities, worship, temples, priests, altars, prayer, sacrifice, salvation... including memories of personal experiences of many kinds. Each of us has a slightly different cloud of associations, and those variations grow larger as our cultural background and personal histories diverge. But so long as we share enough of our associations in common, we can still (usually) intuit another person's intentions when they use the word.

It's interesting that no single religion needs to exemplify all the associations. But a religion needs to share a critical mass of them, I guess, in order to be recognizable as a religion by "family resemblance".

Perhaps as fewer and fewer of the things we associate with 'religion' are exemplified in a person's belief and behavior, we become more and more aware that if we ascribe the word 'religion' to him, we are using the word metaphorically.

 

Reminds me of a dying client some years ago '...Frenchy, thank God I am an atheist...' and then he left the building spiritually.

I don't know where he ended up ....

Peter French

 

Re: Religious Awakenings

...or an Exclusive Brethren for 33 years [by birth - NOT by choice] who became a Roman Catholic and Freemason on the way through.

Now to interject with an observation ...

I did notice the Roman Catholic/Eastern figures compared to Protestant. By the way, what happened to the Jews?

The left footers - right footers are interesting as they do follow sociological studies I did on US data in the mid 90's looking at school populations. Anglicans don't rule the establishment here.

Our split is quite different due to the source of the RC's being Ireland and richer areas of Europe compared to where they came from to the US. Consequently, they have a strong and dominant school system here at all staus levels, and strong representation in politics and business.

This indicator seems to be in line with the norm, so Tom, despite the critics, this result is NOT as inaccurate as some would [ignorantly ?] suggest.

Peter French

 

Re: Re: Religious Awakenings

Roman Catholic & Freemason??? You would not be the first one I have met. I got no further than the EA degree and quit. Freemasonry has a rather good sized catechism of its own to memorize and it must be word for word. The time commitment for the memorization and the fact that my soon to be ex-wife considered the whole thing to be strange lead to my dropping it.

I now have some personal religious issues with it but also feel that the Freemasons get a lot of undeserved if not outright paranoid bad press.

North

 

My background is in the Lutheran Church (ALC). My wife was raised Catholic and went to Catholic schools. We are both now baptists. We were baptised together at Calvary Road Baptist Church in Alexadria, VA in 1996, and are now members of a Baptist church in San Angelo, TX.

I don't know much about what it means to be a charismatic or a cessasionist, but I do believe that salvation by faith in Christ is the key to eternity, and, while issues such as charismatic-versus- cessasionist *may* effect your happiness, level of fulfillment, personal fellowship with other believers, and the depth of your relationship with Christ, I don't think it effects your salvation as long as you believe in Christ's attonement for your sins.

The charismatic movement has gotten a lot of bad press and I honestly don't know how much of it is warranted. I know that some Baptist churches are accused of being "too charismatic." Notice that they are not accused of being charismatic, but of being too charismatic, which seems to indicate some fear of the charismatic movement.

I know that the charismatic movement involves much more than the clapping of hands, but it does seem to be one of the issues that a lot of non-charismatic churches get hung up on. Many churches (including the Lutheran church of my youth, and the Catholic church of my wife's youth) shun the clapping of hands in praise to God, as such a thing is seen as "too charismatic." The pastor at the SBC church I now attend encourages it. He says that if you can clap your hands for the Cowboys when they make a touchdown, you can clap your hands for God because He saved you. Seems like a reasonable position to me. The pastor of another church (Independant Baptist) I attended once addressed the issue of the clapping of hands in a sermon. He said that it was his opinion that applause means the same thing to the younger generation of church-goers that "Amen" means to the older generations, and that no one should be judged because they do or do not clap thier hands during a sermon. Once again, a very reasonable, gracious position, in my opinion.

As for the emotionalism which seems to be a mark of charismatic worship, it just isn't *my* style. But, on the other hand, why shouldn't it be? I have, on occasion, in the privacy of my own home, thought about my salvation and laughed. I have never let myself go, like I have seen some do on TV, but I am not sure that it would an abomination, were I to do so. I would be surprised if I saw someone do it at my church, and I doubt if I would join in, but I don't think I would be offended, and I certainly wouldn't question their salvation...which us brings us to to the question of security.

Many times I have heard of a believer "falling from grace." Generally this is followed by claims that the individual must not have really been saved in the first place. I am not so sure. I am not one to question another's salvation based upon his or her actions. I think that for some people, it challenges their own faith to believe that a fellow believer can fall so perilously into their own humanity. It is safer for them to believe that the fallen one was never saved to begin with. So be it.

I do believe that salvation requires that one has made a decision to believe in Christ as savior. How one comes to make this decision is, I think, somehow worked out between God and the believer, and it may involve hearing the testimony of other believers, having a life-threatening experience, or any combination of the infinate ways in which God has to reach us. However it happens, the believer can rest assured that it was the way God chose for him, personally. Again, how the believer acts upon the decision is a very personal matter. Some may do it before an audience of millions at a televised Billy Graham crusade, others may do it in their broom closet.

Many of these issues (such as worship style, wether to drink or not to drink, to fast or not to fast, etc) come down to Christian liberty. Christ died and rose again to free us from our sins, and he made it clear to us (or perhaps to Paul, who then made it clear to us) that we should not allow ourselves to be bound by legalism. This places a clearer focus upon grace. Since grace is greater than our sins, it must also be superior to the law--and to anyone's opinion about how another worships God for setting him free.

Tracy<><

 

Profound statement!

 

Some comments on how this thing is shaping up:

1. There are 1,664 registered Degreeinfo members. The number of poll respondents is 35 (2.10%). Nevertheless, this seems to be an active thread.

2. 20/35 (57.14%) are Protestant Christians. 6/35 (17.14%) are RC/Orthodox Christians. But worldwide, there are more Catholics than Protestants. Is the large number of Protestants a function of Degreeinfo's American origins?

3. One wonders what kind of Protestants these are. Are there many liberal Protestants, or do our Protestants tilt towards the theologically conservative end? (I'd guess the latter.)

4. Assuming that our Baha'i/UU/Quaker (2 people) contingent aren't Baha'i and that UU counts as Christian (historically it does), we have 28/35 (80%) Christians.

5. One respondent favored Judaism, there is one Buddhist, one neo-pagan and four "something else" (including me). So far there are no Muslims, even though several people with Muslim sounding names post on Degreeinfo. There are no Hindus, despite there being almost a billion of them out there in the world.

6. And it has belatedly struck me that we are missing a category for Chinese traditional religion(s), a group that could involve another billion people. (Many are Buddhist perhaps, but in a rather syncretistic way.)

It's kind of amazing how little is known in the West of contemporary Chinese religion, considering its numbers and importance. Here in California traditional Chinese beliefs are all around us, from traditional magic and a touch of alchemy through feng shui and tai chi, yin-yang theory, taoist theory, martial arts, acupuncture, ancestor shrines, herbal medicine and who knows what else. But in a weird way it's all kind of invisible despite being in plain sight, since few Western students of religion pay any attention to it.

I guess that it's a lot easier for Western university professors to study Asian sutras and commentaries, rather than snooping into real people's actual religious practices which are often something rather different.

7. These numbers, which seem pretty representative of relative religious membership in the United States but wildly atypical of world religious figures, make me wonder what a poll question asking where respondents live would show us.

 

*S*

I am the one "neo-pagan," interesting term *S*

 

Yes--and also a reflection of the fact that more than half of Internet users in general are American.

I'd say they're probably a little to the right of American norms on average--depending on how one classifies conservatism, of course.

Speaking as one of the two B/U/Q respondents, I'd be comfortable describing myself as a Christian for statistical purposes--but the majority of UU's (I think I saw a figure of something like 70%) don't classify themselves as such.

This struck me as very weird, too.

Agreed. There's kind of a Shinto dynamic there, though, from what little I've seen; if you ask a Japanese Zen Buddhist who also practices Shinto whether she's a Buddhist or a practitioner of Shinto, she would probably describe herself as Buddhist. One of the wonderful things about folk religions is that they're very easy to accommodate.

Well, we do study Taoism and Confucianism, which have incorporated most of the ideas described above--for example, post-axial Taoism is pretty much responsible for what we regard as feng shui, tai chi, acupuncture, and herbal medicine. But yeah, when it comes to Chinese folk religion, I don't know squat and don't know how to learn.

There's that and the fact that folk religions in general tend to be anything but systematic, and it's hard to study anything that's not systematic. The phrase "nailing jell-o to a wall" comes to mind. That's why there isn't a whole lot out there about Shinto, either; it's so wonderfully organic that you can't really do much with it in a comparative religion book. The other problem is that folk religions tend to be more insular than the missionary faiths.

My wild guess: About 85-90% of participants would be North American, with most of the other 10-15% being in the UK or Australia.


Cheers,

 

Re: Re: Religious Awakenings

Russell, I couldn't agree more. Starting out as a COG'er and then finding a home in a more baptistic orientation has been an evolution for me. I will say that I recently attended our local Church of God to see David Roever and was pleasantly surprised by the move of God's Spirit which I sensed there. I guess you can take the boy out of the COG...

Last night I purchased Soul Survivor by Philip Yancey - so far it's a decent read. This little volume profiles 13 people who, either directly or indirectly, influenced Philip Yancey's personal appropriation of faith.

Chapter one profiles Martin Luther King, Jr., whose admonition toward nonviolence influenced Yancey that perhaps his segregationist/racist upbringing had been in vain.

I love a book that is hard to put down.

Kindly,
Steven King

 

Tracy,
I agree that Christians too often have an extreme legalistic bent. That is why I can not simply dismiss the reality of God's Spirit which has been evident in various religious engagments I've attended. What I mitigate against is fanaticism, or more specifically, emotional fantacism. Numerous Pentecostal ministers with whom I have interacted felt my desire to pursue higher education was antagonistic to simple, childlike faith. My own family has blacklisted my religious orientation since I have abdicated "the faith" of my youth. Religious discussions around the fireplace usually deteriorate into closed emotional discourse. I recall informing my dad years ago that I was attending a nondenominational Christian church - and he asked me if I were part of a cult. Geesh.

In my own pursuit of higher religious education, I found that every doorway I opened into the truth of God, or his Word, revealed another 1000 doorways I didn't even know existed. Unfortunately, attending seminary can make one hyper-critical of other pastors' interpretation skills, homiletic skills, etc. My "fit" for worship is one that allows a congregation honest expression, even if that borders on a charismatic.

Although I don't know Rick Walston, and certainly do not endorse unaccredited (read questionable) seminaries, I do like the statement he makes about being a Pentellectual on the President's page of Columbia Seminary's webpage. Perhaps I am a bapticostal with a touch of Pentellectualism...

Still on the journey,
Steven King
[note: a Master of Divinity degree, the standard ministerial vocational degree, is 93-98 graduate units - I completed approximately 1/4 of an MDiv with Western Conservative Baptist Seminary. I plan to pick this study back up post-MBA.]