I hate theology.
written by Julie R. Neidlinger 0 comments link this postInternetMonk brought his "I Hate Theology" essay up for air on his blog.
Go read it.
I particularly identify with the section about theology becoming the enemy of personal devotion. The story he relates is of a young person talking about a book she had read:
The gist of the post was, "I want to love God and hate sin, and this book is helpful to me in that goal." Given what I know about the Bible and Jesus' message of repentance and holiness, there was nothing to complain about in the post. It wasn't a post about the true nature of justification. It was a heartfelt, human aspiration to be more Christ-saturated and Spirit-transformed. With that sort of simple desire to love God on the table, you know there's going to be trouble.
[...]
The problem was that, theologically speaking, some could fault the theology that was cited from the book.
[...]
That 0.0003% of the population that knows theology might be "concerned." And one theologian spoke up. It was a simple glancing blow, but it burned my toast.
Oh, I've been there. I'll find that some book written by an author who someone somewhere has deemed bad or wrong -- heretic, even! -- somehow gets me to re-examine my spiritual life in a positive way. My mistake, of course, is making note of it and opening the door for "learned" religious people to point out all the errors.
It reminds me of the lesson I learned about bringing unfinished work to art critique. Don't do it. They'll savage you and your idea and make it seem worthless and stupid and you won't ever finish the painting.
Yeah. Just go read his essay. He covers so much more.
Labels: christianity, religion
Copyright (c) Julie R. Neidlinger 9/21/2008 12:15:00 PM
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