I have decided to start blogging again. I will be blogging about theology, movies, and school. That is the goal. Please feel free to interact.
Let me begin by saying that I find conservative evangelical psuedo-theological discourse to be completely bankrupt and quite absent of any constructive and therefore liberative meaning. When I speak of conservative evangelicalism, I have in mind my alma mater Biola University in mind. Proponents of this tradition represent nothing more than a history of muddled anti-intellectualism, chauvinist imperialism, and ideological intolerance. This tradition claims to seek after God, but has found only its backward self.
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4 comments:
Ironic, isn't it, that such a poorly written paragraph condemns conservative anti-intellectualism, and that such a blatant bash-piece without any support for any of its assertions writes off a massive theological heritage in a few words while condemning intolerance.
You and I disagree about many things these days, but you can do much better than this, Ben. I suspect you'll have to if you ever want anyone to take your writing seriously.
Evangelicalism as "a massive theological heritage?" I would like to hear a case for this, assertion without support, considering evangelicalism would be hard pressed to trace its historical roots much further than the Old Princeton School. It is intellectually honest and understandable to appeal to the broad stokes of Protestantism, or the even the thicker Catholic history, but to speak of the theological heritage of evangelicalism as massive is nothing more than a clear example of the hubris and misguided nature of this "tradition." Maybe if evangelicals could actually look beyond their own tradition they might actually be able to find the mysterious and elusive God of tradition, world, and text.
Furthermore, I am not sure of the efficacy of your ad hominen attack to seal the deal at the end of your comment. I suppose if your comment is nothing more that a rant against a rant then this would make sense. Perhaps you should have used all that training in biblical exegesis to guide your interpretation of this brief blog. The post was a rant, not an academic argument. The language and brevity, as well as the medium, should have been enough to clue you into the genre of this post. I was ranting, not arguing. The blogsphere seems an acceptable space for such discourse.
You should read Robert Jenson and post your thoughts.
And as regards the previous banter, I must say that there is probably a a sense in which conservative theological discourse actually exists, and is not 'pseudo.'
I mean, the whole reason that the Christian intellectual tradition, including the tradition of adhering to the biblical text, is to clarify the gospel. In this respect I would say that where conservatives are adhering to the message that God's rule has come in Jesus Christ, they are doing Christian theology. More so when this discourse leads to individuals and communities that actively begin to do everything Jesus said commanded his people to do.
Anyhow, presuming that the resurrection of Jesus is true, then any discourse that functions to facilitate belief in that message as well as put feet to it in the context of the participants of that discourse, seems to meet your criteria for real theology.
All of that to say, some conservative theology is real theology.
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