Trouble With Liberal Christians

[UnFundEd]

I'm late to the thread as well, but hope I can offer a useful perspective.

 

I spent a few years among liberal xians on my way out of a more fundy heritage. Liberal xianity was an interesting animal. I think it is more born out of pragmatism than any sort of attempt to accurately represent the bible.

 

It kind of comes down to money, I think. A person who feels called into the ministry goes to seminary and discovers that the bible isn't true, and xianity isn't what it was cracked up to be. Now he's stuck. He's preparing for a career that appears to be illogical. And a couple of years later he finds himself serving in a church of a couple hundred people, who expect something useful to come out of his mouth every week. Giving up would mean a painful career change, so he keeps plodding forward.

 

So, these folks have set about to "reimagine xianity" in a way that cherry-picks only the loving portions of the bible, tries to understand how the mythology evolved throughout history, and tries to find some useful thing for xianity to do (like helping others) while still hanging onto enough of the ritual and liturgy to be able to call itself xian - and ultimately to save xianity from the fundies. Meanwhile, they can make a career (and draw a salary) doing something that doesn't seem too much like manual labor.

 

So, I'll give them credit for trying to make the best of a bad situation. They imagine that they can set themselves up as a reasonable alternative to the fundy nonsense. Ultimately it didn't make sense for me - the liturgy and ritual was still way to xian for me, and started to give me the willies just being around it. It's not my path, but I understand that there are folks for whom it makes a lot of sense - "We've always been xian, so lets figure out how to do it in a way that makes some sense". They aren't too likely to debate the fundies, because it just isn't worth the effort. Fundies are too entrenched in the literal interpretation and can't be reasoned with.

[R. S. Martin]

 

 

"Liberal" Christians (the Jesus character would say lukewarm) don't have the balls to actually do anything their book or supposed Savior tells them to do. It's half-assed lip service to some vague idea of a religion and it's more revolting than the snake handlers who have faith and take the message seriously and put their life on the line because they actually believe that shit. "Liberal" Christians actually believe in nothing, and they act accordingly. If they paid any attention and had any morality of their own they would be leading the charge against their more fundamental, hateful, shit flinging brethren.

 

Florduh, I think you misunderstood the post of directionless. The church legitimates the Bible, not the other way around, which means that they don't have a book to follow or they don't see the Bible as the Holy Rule Book the newer post-Reformation denominations like evangelicals do. This includes the Mennonites and a host of other post-Reformation denominations.

 

My Lutheran prof said the Bible is only one part of it, experience is another. It's almost as though they see the NT as a family history, rather than the infallible Word dictated by God and unchanged through the millennia. The idea that the Bible is the foundation of belief is apparently a relatively new tradition--the two-thousand-year-old church does not see it that way. That the Bible is the foundation of faith is an idea that came along about the time of the Reformation, I think. The Bible was made available in the common vernacular and the printing press made for relatively cheap books that common people could afford. This happened around 1500 and following decades and centuries. 

 

Before the printing press, books were copied by hand and chained to desks in churches, seminaries, libraries, etc. so as not to be stolen. They were so valuable. Now the average person suddenly had access to the Bible and new religions sprung up all over Europe based on the Bible. We are the descendents of this movement. But the old churches still exist with their ancient beliefs that do not depend on the Bible. I know it's really difficult for us who were taught to revere a book so highly to comprehend this.

 

I know about early church history, but even in the beginning there was no reason for Christianity to exist apart from the Bible. Yes, people make up their own rules and religious dogma and create their traditions, but at the heart of it all is the biblical story of a miraculous risen god-man named Jesus. Today more than ever, Christianity exists in all its current forms solely because of the information taken from the writings in what's known as the Bible. There is no Christianity at all without the Bible because the Bible is the only place the Jesus character ever existed. Believers in that story may choose to accept only the virgin birth, only the resurrection or any other essential tenet and then summarily dismiss the rest. Such is the nature of humans. Still, if one accepts part of Scripture, it seems cowardly and disingenuous to not give weight to the whole of Scripture.

 

 

Okay, florduh, I'm nitpicking here. You say you know *about* early church history. I guess you realize that is not the same as actually knowing the history. Part of that early history is that the NT is younger than Christianity itself, which means the first Christians did not have the Bible as we know it today.

 

It is my understanding, based on graduate courses in NT at a world class university (not a fundy institution by any stretch of the imagination though fundies could study there if they wished) and other readings, that the NT was written bit by bit over the course of decades or even centuries. Not until the early fourth century, when the Emperor Constantine ordered it, was a serious attempt made to consolidate the bits and pieces of writing into one whole. I say "attempt." No one ever fully succeeded. Even today, the Catholic Bible is different from the Protestant Bible. 

 

Here's another very important bit of early history: Christianity was not "born" when Jesus was born in Bethlehem, or when John the Baptist was born. I am also very skeptical of the story that says Christianity was born when Jesus ascended into heaven or on the Day of Pentecost when the Spirit descended on the disciples. I think all of this was made up afterward to explain what had already happened but nobody remembered or knew how or when.

 

I take it you're with the Jesus-mythers and don't fully accept that such a person ever existed. I'm solidly in that school of thought. So: Where did the Jesus story come from to begin with? From a literary perspective, Christianity is so obviously built on a mistranslation of Isaiah--that verse saying a young woman shall give birth that the Septuagint translated to say a virgin shall give birth. For those who don't know, the Septuagint is the Greek translation of the Hebrew OT that was made between 300 and 200 BC, or about 200 years before Jesus supposedly was born. It's the "Bible" Jesus supposedly quoted and that the early Christians used. http://www.septuagint.net/

 

Non-religious scholars who seek for the origins of Christianity cannot find it. One placed the story in a text of Mystery Religions, and listed it under Mystery Religions of Judaism instead of others such as the Greeks or Romans. If I remember correctly, in the course I took on mystery religions, Mithras was another one, as was Elysius. You get the picture. As I studied in depth the ceremony and narrative of one particular religion for an assignment, and as I continue to think on the implications, I cannot help but feel convinced that the story of Jesus existed for the best part of a century (at least) outside any written literature. And that when they did get around to writing it down, they twisted the OT to support it. It feels very much contrived, as though someone was seeking a legitimate basis for something that already existed. See for example the verse from Isaiah, as well as the non-existent OT verses Jesus "quotes" in the NT.

 

Some scholars are convinced that the writing of the Bible was politically motivated and they provide political reasons for the writing of each book. As we know, political use of holy books, especially the Bible, continues so why could that not have been the original purpose as leaders competed for followers? It helps the cause when the masses are persuaded that obeying the leader is in their best interests to escape punishment from an omniscient god who can kill with thunder and hail and earthquakes, or even cast into an eternal pit of fire aka hell.

 

Back to the concept of Christianity originating as a mystery religion. As we know, virgin births and resurrections were a common occurrence in the mystery religions. And you're right; some versions of today's Christianity stress one theme and some another, and they have some version of the Bible. But I find it disturbing--or maybe I simply don't understand it--when atheists dictate what Christians *must* believe. Having significant training in the social sciences, I believe the only fair way of learning about people is to ask them what they believe, how they live, and the reasons for it, read what they write--then accept that the truth differs from my preconceived notions.

 

On this thread we've had more than one former liberal Christian testify what role the Bible played in their lives as Christians. I personally sat under the instruction of liberal theology professors and also had private conversations with them in their offices to get a better understanding of the theology they were teaching. So far as I can see, what these liberal Christians, and former liberal Christians, are saying meshes logically with what I'm saying in these two posts. Possibly I'm missing something. If so, please show me, and provide the support for your argument. Thank you.

[florduh]

Okay, florduh, I'm nitpicking here. You say you know *about* early church history. I guess you realize that is not the same as actually knowing the history. Part of that early history is that the NT is younger than Christianity itself, which means the first Christians did not have the Bible as we know it today.

 

I'm not claiming authoritative knowledge of church history or making academic arguments. I'm just saying that in today's real world, the Bible is the only basis for any type of Christian belief because there is no living oral tradition from early believers and whatever was written down later is all there is.

[directionless]

One problem is that the meaning of Liberal Christianity has changed. Original Liberal Christianity was Protestants who followed Liberal Theology beginning in the 1700s before Fundamentalism and Evangelicalism existed.

The word liberal in liberal Christianity originally denoted a characteristic willingness to interpret scripture according to modern philosophic perspectives (hence the parallel term modernism) and modern scientific assumptions, while attempting to achieve the Enlightenment ideal of objective point of view, without preconceived notions of the authority of scripture or the correctness of Church dogma.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberal_Christianity

Later it seems that non-Protestants like Catholics began to adopt the same ideas about the Bible. The difference is that a Catholic can eviscerate the Bible by applying science without eviscerating Christianity, because the Catholic's standard of Christianity is Holy Tradition - not the Holy Bible. The same is true for Orthodox and Anglicans who believe they have preserved Early Christianity within their liturgies, rituals, rules, writings, etc. A Protestant who bought into Luther's Sola Scriptura must fall back on other standards for Christianity when the Bible fizzles. A Charismatic or Pentecostal Protestant can hope for guidance from the Holy Spirit. Mainline Protestants must use human judgment - not unlike atheists.

I guess I didn't really have a point - or I can't remember what it was.

 

EDIT: Also the Catholics in particular have the Vatican, and that allows them to adapt Holy Tradition to changing times. The legitimacy of Catholicism comes from their claim to being "the Church". The Eastern Orthodox claim to be "the Church", but they don't have the central authority of the Vatican to actually agree on changes, so they must rely more on the idea that they have not changed fundamentally from the Early Church. Catholics can change all they want as long as the Vatican approves - at least that is my impression.

[R. S. Martin]

One problem is that the meaning of Liberal Christianity has changed. Original Liberal Christianity was Protestants who followed Liberal Theology beginning in the 1700s before Fundamentalism and Evangelicalism existed.

The word liberal in liberal Christianity originally denoted a characteristic willingness to interpret scripture according to modern philosophic perspectives (hence the parallel term modernism) and modern scientific assumptions, while attempting to achieve the Enlightenment ideal of objective point of view, without preconceived notions of the authority of scripture or the correctness of Church dogma.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberal_Christianity

 

Later it seems that non-Protestants like Catholics began to adopt the same ideas about the Bible. The difference is that a Catholic can eviscerate the Bible by applying science without eviscerating Christianity, because the Catholic's standard of Christianity is Holy Tradition - not the Holy Bible. The same is true for Orthodox and Anglicans who believe they have preserved Early Christianity within their liturgies, rituals, rules, writings, etc. A Protestant who bought into Luther's Sola Scriptura must fall back on other standards for Christianity when the Bible fizzles. A Charismatic or Pentecostal Protestant can hope for guidance from the Holy Spirit. Mainline Protestants must use human judgment - not unlike atheists.

 

I guess I didn't really have a point - or I can't remember what it was.

 

 

You're helping me better understand what my prof was talking about and that some Christians do indeed have something besides the Bible, I just couldn't remember all the things my prof said because it was so completely foreign. But that was nearly ten years ago and I've learned so much from online discussions and other readings since then. I can make a lot more sense of it now when you talk about preserving early Christianity in things like liturgies and rituals and writings. There have always been writings outside what was eventually accepted as the Bible. All one has to do is look at the Gnostic writings and the writings of the Early Christian Fathers. I have in mind some of the earliest were contemporary with what was accepted into the NT. I'm thinking my prof may have felt these writings were like a living oral tradition along with the NT. I really can't speak for him; just trying to understand because I disagree that liberal Christians are "Christian in name only." I know they are very sincere about their beliefs, that they do not consider it Christlike to be so rigidly literal about the biblical text as many of us here were taught.  

 

Another item comes up for me when evangelicals or former evangelicals make as though their form of Christianity is the one and only true belief. As a former horse and buggy Mennonite, we looked on these evangelicals as lost to sin and the world in their contemporary dress with their cars, TVs, and women in pants and cut hair. Catholics, evangelicals, Anglicans, modern Mennonites--all of them dressed and lived the same and we considered them all equally worldly. 

 

What I struggled with was the other horse and buggy Mennonite groups, the plain Mennonites who drove cars but dressed and lived pretty much like us though a bit more fancy--yet we were taught that our own group was the only one that was truly right, though the others might get to heaven since that was how they were raised. People would leave our group and join one of the other groups and those remaining behind would get very seriously upset because those who left have chosen to follow Satan, or something like that.

 

Evangelicals were on the far side of the Great Divide and like I said we couldn't even identify with them or see them as Christians. Yet on these forums and in the modern Mennonite church I see people arguing that some people were too worldly. In my opinion, if people want to argue that others are not real Christians, they should first make sure that they themselves are real Christians. Evangelicals, according to my upbringing, are very definitely no better Christians than liberal Christians. 

 

Yet like I said, I found that they have very sincere beliefs as in values, convictions, or principles. I find this applies across the board from fundamentalist Christians to militant atheists to progressively liberal Christians and their peacefully laidback atheist counterparts.

[PuffOfLogic]

Basically, whatever people say, apart from the total crazies no-one takes every word in the bible directly. Otherwise no churches would allow women preachers, or wearing hats, or other wacky things Paul didn't like. So once you develop a mechanism for either rationalising or ignoring that (I guess everyone has their own way), then you can apply that "technique" onto other "moderate" issues of your choice

[directionless]

What I struggled with was the other horse and buggy Mennonite groups, the plain Mennonites who drove cars but dressed and lived pretty much like us though a bit more fancy--yet we were taught that our own group was the only one that was truly right, though the others might get to heaven since that was how they were raised. People would leave our group and join one of the other groups and those remaining behind would get very seriously upset because those who left have chosen to follow Satan, or something like that.

 

Evangelicals were on the far side of the Great Divide and like I said we couldn't even identify with them or see them as Christians. Yet on these forums and in the modern Mennonite church I see people arguing that some people were too worldly. In my opinion, if people want to argue that others are not real Christians, they should first make sure that they themselves are real Christians. Evangelicals, according to my upbringing, are very definitely no better Christians than liberal Christians. 

 

Yet like I said, I found that they have very sincere beliefs as in values, convictions, or principles. I find this applies across the board from fundamentalist Christians to militant atheists to progressively liberal Christians and their peacefully laidback atheist counterparts.

Sometimes I've thought about becoming a horse and buggy Christian. Some people like learning to use all the newest technology, but it seems like a rat race to me. One of these days I'm going to need to learn to use a smart phone - ick. I know I'm probably too wimpy and unskilled to do the horse and buggy thing, but it has an appeal.

[kolaida]

Yeah, I've wondered about liberal Christians, too. I think I was maybe a liberal Christian for a few months (the beginning of my deconversion), but honestly I just figured it was people who haven't really read the Bible, like they are the people that only show up on holidays and just acknowledge God but don't really pratice Christianity.  My mom used to say liberal Christians were just Catholics (she really had it out for Catholics and Pentecosts).  I was so far in, I still have my Bible Drill trophy, lol, the only thing I'm real proud of from my time as a Christian.  Love when people ask if I really ever read the Bible- why, yes, several times cover to cover and all around, I also had to find verses in less than a minute in front of four judges, recite all the books, and recite a bunch of verses from memory for them, would you like to see my trophy!? 

 

So, once I became a liberal Christian, I had doubts that nagged and I very quickly became agnostic.  But I have met even some gay people state they are Christian, but hey they are liberal Christians-  I'm just as much at a loss as you are.  I never really met these liberal Christians before either (unless a couple gay Christians count?). 

[tylereverett]

My totally non empirical and potentially offensive opinion is that "liberal" christians, muslims, jews, whatever religion, aren't in the religion for logical reasons but rather for emotional / cultural reasons.

 

After all, if the bible is true, shouldn't you take it seriously and follow it literally?  I never understood the propensity to cherry pick bits and pieces out whenever something sounds good.  In a way, liberal christians seem to be determining their own truth as opposed to taking the bible at its word, and its with very little logic.  

 

That's why sometimes I find them more frustrating.  At least a fundamentalist is intellectually honest enough to believe what they say the believe.  You can meet them where they are and debate.  Liberal believers can't be reasoned with because they pick and choose what sounds right and wrong.

[Becks]

Read all the posts and my experience is slightly different. Although I hate labels, I would have called myself a liberal Christian then. I attended a "non-denominational" church which focused on relationship with Jesus/God, spiritual warfare, etc. i, along with many of my church friends, some who "came out of" fundamentalist churches, had a pretty elitist view about fundies and how we were the ones who had it right. The bible was our source, and I'm pretty sure we treated it as a mystery. It was a totally subjective spiritual experiential existence. i had a slow but steady progress of coming out of that lifestyle when I started studying science. Finally something concrete or at least provable by testing. Faith, being a complete mystery, (you had it or you didn't, and if you didn't have enough your prayers weren't answered) was too arbitrary and I began to see how ridiculous the mess was. No way I would go all fundamental to fix it. I supported gay rights as a Christian, easy since I believed God is love. I didn't feel the need to defend my faith, since it was personal and I was elite. It's with repugnance I share this information. Now I'm athiest or maybe an athiest-pagan since I still love some of the nature aspects and fun mythology of pagans but don't really believe in the god/goddess aspect. I'm still liberal!! Just not Christian. My social views have changed since Christianity and my politics as well. It's hard to deal with liberal Christians. They really think they have the best of both worlds. They may not see they are fence riders. For them to pick a side is very uncomfortable, they would actually have to THINK (gasp) and choose to face reality. Poor peeps. Glad I made my choice!