"And, in the wider field of religious thought," says a writer in a great international religious paper, "what truer service can we render than to strip theology of all that is unreal or needlessly perplexing, and make it speak plainly and humanly to people who have their duty to do and their battle to fight?"
Sometimes a sermon or a book or one comment or the other literally make me cringe. It may ignore history, or modern discoveries, or common sense or... I wonder how such a statement can come out of the mind and mouth of an "educated" person.
I do believe that if Christianity is to survive in the long run, the theology needs to be rethought. It needs us to consider what were the premises of Jesus and Paul, when was this or that bit of theology inserted and by whom for what purpose??? We need our teaching to be congruent, that is lifted out of its contradictions. It needs to make sense. It needs to guide our lives to be more and more Christ-like. It needs to be both mystical and practical. It needs to move us, inspire us, touch us at the deepest levels.
As society becomes more and more material, more Marxist, more away from religion and farther away from churches, synagogues, temples, mosques etc, it does not look hopeful at this moment. It seems this may be the crucial moment in history to turn it all around. I wonder if we are up to the task??? I seems up to those younger than I, and yet they seem the least likely. My heart calls out, "oh if I had only known what I now know back in my youth," but of course that cry is useless. I pray some vital younger people will be called and will answer.
Lord, open our eyes, open our hearts to You. Show us The Way to The Way. Give us the inspiration and the courage to find true spiritual lives and to release the false and the shallow. Our hearts cry out to to return to You.
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