Today's NY Times has a respectful op-ed piece today about evangelical leader John Stott, by columnist David Brooks. (Hat tip to TitusOneNine)
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Building a universe
(a very embryonic compilation project)
The Great Project: We're Helping to Build a Universe
Creation: A Titanic Set of Processes That Continues Today
Why I Still Call Myself a Christian and an Episcopalian
Some Reasons to Think There's a Creator
The Continuing Creation: Not Carpentry, But Bonsai
Admit It: Life Is Indeed Getting Better
Progress, Hope, and Trust in God: A Thought Experiment
The world isn't broken, it's just unfinished
Good News, Bad News: Sin as Evolutionary Side Effect?
What It's All AboutRediscovering the religion of Jesus (not the one about him)
Goyim for God: A reformed Judaism, open to gentiles, like Paul wanted in the first place
Faith = Openness to Truth = Trust in God
Putting God First Means Facing the Facts
Christianity = The Great Commandment
The real Christianity: Devotion to God and care for one another
The Difference Between Christians and Jews
"So Just What Do You Believe, Dad?"
Can You Still Be a Christian if You Don't Believe Jesus was the Son of God?
Worship: Acknowledging God,
Not Groveling Before Him
A Crude, and Moving, Wooden Cross
What the Cross Really Symbolizes
The Perfect, Changeless Religion: There Isn't One
Some inconvenient difficulties with traditionalist Christianity
Christianity's Elephant in the Room
Six Reasons for Skepticism About the New Testament Accounts
Reasons to Question the Reliability of Scripture
My Favorite Theological Question: "How Do You Know That?"
Is Jesus Coming Again? The Predictors' Track Record Doesn't Inspire Confidence
What Did "Messiah" Mean to the Apostles?
The Apostles' Teaching Didn't Seem to Include a Divine Jesus
The Trinity: A Football Analogy (see esp. the comments)
The Empty Tomb: Another Possibility
Resurrection Appearances: What Did the Disciples Really Experience?
"Jesus is Lord" Didn't Mean "Jesus is God"
Maybe we're giving the Gospel too much credit
Are We Smarter Than the Apostles?
A different approach to "doing church"
Communion without baptism: "The stranger must be welcomed and offered the best of what we have"
Communion at Burger King or IHOP
Let Small Groups Celebrate Their Own Eucharists
Four Short, Responsive Prayers Every Episcopalian Should Memorize
What is the Proper Role of Bishops?
The apostolic succession belongs to all the baptized, not just to bishops
Catholicity isn't all it's cracked up to be
What's Wrong with Being "Just a Religious Fraternity"?
The Rotary Club could be the ideal church
A Common Faith? Sure - If We're Willing to Look for It
Evangelism
Effort or Results - What Exactly is Our Job as Evangelists?
I have to say I've become utterly and completely sick of hearing about who "approves of the homosexual lifestyle" or doesn't.
It's not your place to approve or disapprove of my "lifestyle", Mr. John Stott. It has nothing whatsoever to do with you, and I suggest that the remedy for your "disapproval" is just exactly what our mothers told us it was: if you can't say anything nice, don't say anything at all.
Stop being busybodies about other peoples' personal lives, how about it, evangelicals? It's our families you're talking about here, and them's fightin' words, bud. As I'm sure you'd be the first to agree with.
We don't sniff at your "lifestyle"; we'd appreciate the same in return.
(There. Now I feel better. Thanks, QC.)
Posted by: bls | November 30, 2004 at 04:35 PM
We don't sniff at your "lifestyle"; we'd appreciate the same in return.
Ahhh...but confessing the "sins" of others, whether they asked you to or not, is one of the central memeplexes of the religious right. They could no more stop "sniff[ing] at your "lifestyle"" than they could become Unitarians ;)
Posted by: David Huff | December 01, 2004 at 11:28 AM
You might be right, David. And maybe that's the whole basis of this, too, now that I think of it. I've always thought that gay people are mainly a fundraising tool for certain religious right organizations. Nothing else explains the hysteria of the past 30 years.
In fact, when these people - Dobson and Falwell and Robertson - were kids, in the 40s and 50s, homosexuality was the worst possible sin a person could commit. It was "the love that dare not speak its name" - that's how bad a thing it was. And this must be completely ingrained in their thoughts.
Maybe they thought it was catching back then. Or maybe it was the McCarthy era. But no doubt, the gay rights movement came along just in time to give the religious right a big boost. Now they have lots of money to use to confess the sins of others....
Posted by: bls | December 01, 2004 at 07:34 PM
Actually, there is much more to this story, apparently, than meets the eye. John Stott seems to be at the very center of the evangelical storm we're seeing today; this movement has been around for over half a century, and has had very specific goals. Here's a post on my own blog that refers to a letter Andrew Sullivan posted on his. Here's a quote from that letter: "The Evangelical Pope is also the unseen general of a vast army whose soldiers have faithfully executed a long-ago (1947) defined strategy to assert a muscular evagelicalism that would not not only "bring millions to Christ", but also re-shape the very cultural fabric of nations."
Here's another: "The absolute uniqueness of Christ's salvific efficacy, the substitutionary nature of the atonement, the complete and untarnished inspiration of the entire Bible, a quasi-literalist hermeneutic, traditional sexual ethics...John Stott has put his imprimatur on all of these, and his followers have followed suit (among whom are many, if not all, of the key figures in global Anglicanism who have recently used homosexuality as *the* issue on which the hinges the future unity of the church - the Bishop of Sydney and his brother, Michael Nazir-Ali, etc.)"
Anglicanism has been at the heart of this issue for a lot longer than Spong and the General Convention of 2003. I'm amazed.
Posted by: bls | December 03, 2004 at 08:30 AM
Actually, there is much more to this story, apparently, than meets the eye. John Stott seems to be at the very center of the evangelical storm we're seeing today; this movement has been around for over half a century, and has had very specific goals. Here's a post on my own blog that refers to a letter Andrew Sullivan posted on his. Here's a quote from that letter: "The Evangelical Pope is also the unseen general of a vast army whose soldiers have faithfully executed a long-ago (1947) defined strategy to assert a muscular evagelicalism that would not not only "bring millions to Christ", but also re-shape the very cultural fabric of nations."
Here's another: "The absolute uniqueness of Christ's salvific efficacy, the substitutionary nature of the atonement, the complete and untarnished inspiration of the entire Bible, a quasi-literalist hermeneutic, traditional sexual ethics...John Stott has put his imprimatur on all of these, and his followers have followed suit (among whom are many, if not all, of the key figures in global Anglicanism who have recently used homosexuality as *the* issue on which the hinges the future unity of the church - the Bishop of Sydney and his brother, Michael Nazir-Ali, etc.)"
Anglicanism has been at the heart of this issue for a lot longer than Spong and the General Convention of 2003. I'm amazed.
Posted by: bls | December 03, 2004 at 08:30 AM
(Sorry 'bout that. Please feel free to delete one of those posts if you'd like!)
Posted by: bls | December 03, 2004 at 08:31 AM
(Sorry 'bout that. Please feel free to delete one of those posts if you'd like!)
Posted by: bls | December 03, 2004 at 08:33 AM
(And one (or both) of those, too! Sorry again. That last one was due to the quick re-post denial feature.)
Posted by: bls | December 03, 2004 at 08:40 AM