I’m feeling like shooting fish in a barrel today, so that can only mean one thing: the latest unsuccessful attempt at rational thought by the Rt. Rev. John Spong, found in the Washington Post‘s “On Faith” column. He’s trying to answer the question “Is America losing faith?” His answer: no, though why it matters is another question:
The problem with religion is that each system claims it has captured ultimate truth in its own propositional creeds and organizational structures, so that when those things fade or die great anxiety is loosed. In Christianity today we are caught up in the same mentality with Catholics making excessive claims for the Pope’s infallibility and Protestants making excessive claims for the Bible’s inerrancy. Both seem unaware of the constantly changing religious history of human beings.
Spong certainly has the virtue of being completely predictable. Ask him any question, sit him down in front of a word processor, and he spits out the same stuff. If he hits F8 on his word processor, it gives this paragraph. Spong may not have a clue what he believes, but he is absolutely, positively certain of what he doesn’t believe: anything even remotely connected with historic, biblical Christianity.
Whatever God is, God is beyond the human mind to embrace. This means that God is beyond the scriptures, the creeds, doctrines, dogmas and even beyond the boundaries of any faith system. Does this mean that our current faith systems should be abandoned? I do not think so,
So our “current faith systems” bear no resemblance whatsoever to a reality that is hopelessly beyond any of us anyway, but they shouldn’t be abandoned. They should apparently be propped up for the sake of the children of all ages who can’t stand to be without their fairy tales. I can’t think any other reason not to abandon the frauds that Spong claims all of the world’s religions are. In fact, it’s obvious that if Spong is right about the nature of God, there’s no reason to pay Him any more mind, since He hasn’t revealed Himself to us, is incapable of relationship with us, and is no more relevant to our existence than King Arthur or Elmer Fudd.
but it does mean that our current faith systems, like all human creations, will ultimately die. Their value is that they are the means through which we journey as we walk into the mystery of a God who is beyond all limits. The religious claim that any human religion possesses the ultimate truth of God is not only false but will inevitably die.
This is meaningless gibberish. Surely if the world’s religions, including Christianity, have nothing to tell us about “God,” whatever that is, then there is no meaningful sense in which they can be the “means through which we journey.” If they haven’t got a clue where we’re going, why should we want to walk the paths they lay out? For that matter, how can we “walk into the mystery of a God” whom we cannot know in any sense? And what does that mean, anyway?
Oops, I forgot. It’s John Spong we’re talking about here. It doesn’t mean anything.
