I got a message yesterday from someone I don’t really know that well. I know this persons family pretty well, and I like this person, but this isn’t someone “near” to me by any stretch. Anyway, the person brings up a couple of things, misconceptions, really, that surround me and my movement away from belief.

1. I haven’t been burned by religion.

While there are many forms of Christianity that I take exception to, and I vocally rail against, there are incredibly refreshing forms out there. In some ways I still consider myself part of the Christian community, in the end, the ideals of Jesus are something I can completely get behind, and love. This, of course, begs the question, who’s view on the ideals of Jesus am I working from? I think I’ve done a decent enough job at categorizing my views on that point (click “Social Justice” under categories), so I won’t go into that here.

Suffice it to say, I’m not against religion in general, but will openly point out those spots which I do stand against. I think it would be a tragic loss if religion were to be removed from the world, I see that people need religion, or at least think they need religion, and that’s fine. Personally? I don’t see a need for it, and I’m not going to try to get you to run away from religion.

as a side note here, I do enjoy asking provocative questions that make you think more about what you believe, that could easily be seen as me trying to “deconvert”, but it’s not, I try to get people to think

2. Having an open mind

While many people undoubtedly believe they have an open mind about things, they don’t, and I’m not sure if I fall into the category of close-minded or not. Honestly, I don’t think I am [close minded], but I’d be hard pressed to argue either way. In this respect, I think one needs to defer to the opinion and judgement of others, if I’m being consistently told I’m close minded, then it’s probably valid.

As it stands, I’m not being told that, and I think as much honest self assessment as I can muster on the topic leads me to believe that there are only a few areas that could be construed toward me being close minded, and religion is not one of them.

side note 2: I’ll probably sit for a bit over the next few days and question myself in this regard. I doubt a lot, even the things I say, and I find it hard to believe that a doubter could be consistently close minded. Maybe. We’ll see.

3. The final comment I got was “we don’t know what we don’t know”

I’m not certain if this was more of a “understand what you don’t know,” or a “there are things we don’t know what we don’t know.”

In the first sense, I completely agree. I Don’t Know about God. I’m not an atheist, I’m not willing to stand and say “There is no god” or “There is a God,” because I understand that I don’t know.

I understand that I know very little in the great schema of the universe. I’m ok with that. And I think the converse of this statement needs to be thrown out there, “Know what you know.” In that vein, I’m always learning, always seeking to gain new insights, and only willing to fully stand on that which I know I know.

As far as the second form, “there are things that we don’t know we don’t know,” and again, I agree with this. The goal should be to continue to strive toward the enlightenment of that which we know and that which we do not know (and thereby the increase in knowledge by learning what we do not know).

I bring this up for a couple reasons, one because I like Nick, I drank his booze and swam in his pool once, but mostly because I’ve been talking recently about my own agnosticism quite a bit lately, and Nick also approaches the topic in his book (albeit from a more… hopeful [that pun was too easy] standpoint). Nick and I share some of the same views on the topic, so if you’re interested in hearing where this neo-Agnosticism is headed, come check things out tomorrow (Jan 12th) at 7 at Johnnie MacCrackens.

Here’s the facebook event link, if you prefer that.

Also, buy the book.

Also also, I’ll review the book sometime.

It’s been fun folks, feel free to email (matt@themattscott dot com) me if you want, or you can still find me on twitter and facebook.

In “Jesus, Interrupted” Ehrman lends himself to show a bit more compassion towards Christianity than it appeared in “Misquoting,” while I liked the message in both books, I’m well please with this (perhaps only perceived) change between the two. Ehrman talks of how open many Christians are to hearing the message of the book, and their willingness to accept/wrestle with what is often viewed as “dangerous” to the faith. Instead of spending time attacking Christianity and Christians, Ehrman encourages Christian leaders and ministers (who have had seminary training in the topic of Textual Criticism) to no longer hide behind the guise of “Biblical Inerrancy” but instead be open with their laity about the subject.

I believe that this topic is one that the Church must be willing to enter, and books like “Jesus, Interrupted” must continue to be pushed to the forefront. Each book of the Bible is important to our spiritual formation, and understanding the background, authorship, and issues with book should become more of a priority than it currently is. If we hope to attain a “Generous Orthodoxy” then our understanding of the reason, authorship, and audience of cannon must be explored. “Jesus, Interrupted” is a step in that (the right) direction.

The topic of discussion this week deals with the second of Emergent Village’s “Values and Practices.” (After the break)

2. Commitment to the Church in all its Forms:

We are committed to honor and serve the church in all its forms – Orthodox, Roman Catholic, Protestant, Pentecostal, Anabaptist. We practice “deep ecclesiology” – rather than favoring some forms of the church and critiquing or rejecting others, we see that every form of the church has both weaknesses and strengths, both liabilities and potential.

We believe the rampant injustice and sin in our world requires the sincere, collaborative, and whole-hearted response of all Christians in all denominations, from the most historic and hierarchical, through the mid-range of local and congregational churches, to the most spontaneous and informal expressions. We affirm both the value of strengthening, renewing, and transitioning existing churches and organizations, and the need for planting, resourcing, and coaching new ones of many kinds.

We seek to be irenic and inclusive of all our Christian sisters and brothers, rather than elitist and critical. We own the many failures of the church as our failures, which humbles us and calls us to repentance, and we also celebrate the many heroes and virtues of the church, which inspires us and gives us hope.

PRACTICES:

• To be actively and positively involved in a local congregation, while maintaining open definitions of “church” and “congregation.” We work in and with churches, seeking to live out authentic Christian faith in authentic Christian community.
• To seek peace among followers of Christ, and to offer critique only prayerfully and when necessary, with grace, and without judgment, avoiding rash statements, and repenting when harsh statements are made. To speak positively of fellow Christians whenever possible, especially those with whom we may disagree.
• To build sincere friendship with Christians from other traditions.

Should be an interesting discussion, in light of some recent blog posts I have made, some of the practices are really staring out at me. All in all I’m looking forward to (again) This Tuesday at 7:00 pm. I hope to see everyone there from last time, as well as a few others I talked to over the past month. Contact me if you have any questions at matt@themattscott.com .

Technorati Tags: Emergent, Cohort, Emergence Christianity, Christianity, conversation, friends, Pub, Irish, Johnnie MacCrackens, celtic, food, brew, faith, friendship

Sorry if you happen to be from Oxford and fail to understand the greatness of Baseball, one day you may.

For your enjoyment, here is a recent ASBO cartoon, that plays heavily into things I am thinking about.

But seriously, my coffee is burned and it’s really bumming me out. Tastes like tobacco. Gross.

Oh! I got rid of the image/video adds, they weren’t formatting very pretty into the blog, and switched to text based adds.