[Seekers] Punishment

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JASON FILLEY


>>>WARD FENLEY

>>><< Ok, without the Bible, prove to me that anyone's definition of "right"

>>> and "wrong" is absolute.


JASON FILLEY

I just read this in "Who Wrote the New Testament - The Making of the
Christian Myth," by Burton L. Mack and think it is appropriate:

(page 307)  "Should we turn to the Bible for answers?  Those saying yes,
from Waco to Washington, including all the recent pronouncements to that
effect by Protestant churches, cannot be right.  The surreptitious function
of the Bible as America's epic mythology is causing as many problems as it
is solving....  So the time has come for some critical reassessment of our
mythic foundations.

It will not be easy.  Americans in general are not accustomed to cultural
introspection.  And Christians in particular have never thought to be
critical of Christianity.  Christians know about being critical, of course.
They render critique on society all the time, but always from the vantage
point of the Christian vision, a protected sphere of ideals held to be
inviolate, never to be questioned.  To look for the Christian influence at
the core of Western culture and its social manifestations, and to wonder
what the Christian religion has contributed to its troubles as well as its
blessings, does not come naturally.  And as for the contemporary challenge
to sort through the mass of Christian values, beliefs, and symbols in a
critical quest for renewed self-definition, that is not a skill that
Christians have ever learned.  Criticism from the traditional Christian
point of view is either 'prophetic' or judgmental and always directed
outward.  It is seldom pursued in the interest of calm analysis, humanistic
understanding, and the making of constructive proposals at the level of
cultural critique.  Cultural critique is not good news.  And cultural
critique that comes to focus on the influence of the Christian myth at the
heart of our national epic has usually been thought subversive.

Perhaps our study of the Bible can help........"

Jason

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