Christian faith, but not secular faith, now effectively banned from schools, colleges, and universities, has been relegated to the private and subjective arena. The result is the growing popularity of any who eliminate from Christian faith all that secular trust finds incompatible: miracles, the radical nature of sin and the consequent radical nature of grace, transcendence, holiness, and our human desperate need for God’s initiative action in Jesus.
The consequence of this secular replacement of Christianity over the years is that otherwise educated people can be bereft of any substantial grasp of scripture. One glaring example is Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori who tells us that Marcus Borg “opened the Bible to me.” (Acknowledgements A Wing and a Prayer). The Christian creed’s affirmation, to which she has repeatedly sworn, (but Borg negates) is that Jesus Christ is:
“the only-begotten Son of God, begotten of his Father before all worlds, God of God, Light of Light, very God of very God begotten, not made, being of one substance with the Father; by whom all things were made . . .”
Borg has not opened the scripture for Bishop Jefferts Schori but closed its revelation of Jesus’ divinity.
Part of the lie is that these folks represent the truth as known by scholars. Johnson, in The Real Jesus. listed them in a chapter entitled Amateur Night.
Thank you Bishop Allison.
The works of Borg have closed many minds to the wisdom of Bishop Allison as well.
In her book Schori–and remember Bishops are entrusted with the teaching office of the church–holds out for consideration the idea that Jesus became the Son of God at his baptism. Honestly
Dear Bishop Fitz,
Thanks for this – and for pointing out the real issue that is faced by SC and any diocese wishing to remain faithful.
One of the many cool things about Bishop Allison is that he and his scholarship and intellect stand as such a stark contrast across the chasm from the favored “scholars” and intellects of the revisionists in The Episcopal Church.
On the one hand, we have Bishop Spong, whom the revisionists love and whose ideas the traditional Episcopalians loathe. On the other hand, we have Bishop Allison, whom the traditional Episcopalians love and whose ideas the revisionists loathe.
The chasm is broad and deep and . . . revealing.
Thank you Bishop Allison for being one of the markers that demonstrates the two mutually opposing and antithetical gospels now believed in TEC. It’s no wonder that we have no unity.
Of course, point being that we can’t have “unity” because one is the Gospel and one is NOT.
#4 This is consistent with her gnostic beliefs. The heresy was that the Christ came on Jesus at his baptism and left before the crucifixation. Mary Baker Eddy also believed the same thing.
re 4 & 8: That’s called the heresy of adoptionism, which Bp Allison covers well and identifies in its modern recurrences in his The Cruelty of Heresy. In fact, he demonstrates how pretty well all the errors being embraced today are rooted in the heresies that the early councils of the Church definitively ruled against. A worthwhile read for any who’d like to know exactly where Borg, Spong et al are coming from.
Is there a thing of which it is said, “See, this is new”? It has been already in the ages before us. Eccl 1:10 ESV.