Religion is founded on a notion that it has teachings or scriptures from a divine (supernatural) source, and this source is provides insights into ultimate truths which can not be discerned by mere mortals investigating nature.From here.
Any religious institution which believes it needs to modernise its beliefs is admitting that its beliefs have never had such a divine source - they are man-made and, like all man-made things, need to be modernised periodically. Consequently, that institution no longer represents a spiritual belief system, but is simply a political organisation [sic] which pretends to be founded on spiritual beliefs.
That pretty much sums up the C of E.
Via MCJ
This calls to mind for me the famous opening speech of John XXIII at the first session of the Second Vatican Council. John argued that there is a distinction between the deposit of faith, which is supernatural in origin, and it's various modes of articulation and presentation, which are subject to cultural and historical influences. The former obviously cannot be modernized whereas the latter can, and indeed must be, if the Faith is to remain credible. In the years following the Council, every time a venerable practice was jettisoned, we were solemnly informed that the deposit of faith was still in tact. The only aim in the mind of the reformers was to render that deposit more attractive to "modern man" (whoever SHE is). And so as I read this I can't help imagining various priests I've known over the years bridling at the suggestion that their aim was to "modernize belief. "We are only tinkering with a few non-essentials," would have been the automatic response. Personally, I believe the argument was always disingenuous. The real aims of the reformers were far more sweeping that they ever had the courage to admit publicly, and if poor pope John had ever realized what he was unleashing, I think he might have been a lot more cautious, but be that as it may, we have reached the point at which the long (and lengthening) list of "non-essentials" now includes belief in the Trinity and the Resurrection. What exactly is left to define as "essential?"
ReplyDeleteOne of the reasons why I left the Anglican Church for Orthodoxy. As soon as leftism in all it's forms were allowed into the top echelons of the behemoth, that's the end - the heart was killed, and all it has left is a shadowy effigy of itself in plain sight to be stabbed and killed and plundered and trampled on to the great glee of the NAZBOL enemy.
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