They claim to be a church that “doesn’t require you to leave your brain at the door,” yet promote irrationality of the highest order. Their comments on philosophical issues are out of touch with current scholarship, their comments on the historical Jesus are out of touch with current scholarship.

They have no core beliefs (except for the unified denial of orthodoxy), and seem to rally primarily around LGBT issues. From a quick scan, this seems to come up in just about every sermon I found, and features prominently across their site.

Honestly, their “progressive” Christianity seems more of a regression to 1950s mainline liberalism when Paul Tillich reigned supreme in the mainline seminaries. As mainline (and progressive) Christianity has declined rapidly over the last fifty years internationally (whereas evangelicalism, Pentecostalism and even Catholicism have grown worldwide) it seems like their remaining holdouts must shout louder in order to be heard…this billboard is an example.

I think you’re thinking of St Andrew’s on the Terrace, a liberal congregation in Wellington.
.-= My last blog-post ..Doctor Living Stone, I Presume! =-.

First, I never said that it was insulting for people to deny the virginal conception. I said it was insulting to caricature others beliefs in a manner that insinuates that God and Mary were adulterers. If I addressed a secular liberal belief by setting up an insulting caricature different from the real thing and ridiculing it (maybe I suggested for example that people who support homosexual conduct really support pedophilia or that people who support abortion really like killing six year olds) there would really be no argument from liberal churches about the appropriateness of what was said. Remember that next time a liberal harps on about the so called hypocrisy of conservative churches.

Second, there are numerous dubious assertions of fact in this comment. (a)example that prior to the council of Nicea there were going to be four members of the trinity. Actually the debate was between Arians and the followers of Athanasius, it was over wether the son was of the same substance as the father or of like substance of the father, no one held to a quadrinity. (b) that the virgin birth is derived from Greek mythology, a long discredited claim, in fact the so called parallels evaporate when examined (c) that the dead sea scrolls some how tell us about Jesus (they don’t they are the writings of a certain Jewish community with little or no connection to Jesus a hundred years or so before his birth) (d) that there are a series of documents such as the gospel of Thomas that were written prior to the synoptic gospels, this is extremely dubious most would date these works considerably latter than the gospels.

Third, you repeatedly talk of what people want to believe or what they relate to or what fits a certain political understanding of human rights etc. That is I think the fundamental problem with much theological liberalism. In other words what matters is not truth it’s what we want to be true and what’s politically expedient, this is all then sold not on the basis of an argument but on stereotyping and insulting conservatives (suggesting they are all hypocrites).

For these and other reasons some find the kind of progressive Christianity you mention, shallow, substance-less and reflecting little more than a pathetic attempt to look make Christian theological motifs look trendy.

Oh yes, you are conservative

Here’s the truth: a great number of people in the world value Jesus Christ as a human who was spiritually evolved, one who had lots to offer to the world and who had a completely different viewpoint to the one set forth by the likes of Paul in Corinthians.

There are a great many people in NZ and around the world who really, really want to go to a place (church) for sanctuary, for peace, for spiritual guidance without asserting the belief that Mary was impregnated by a spirit.

While you may call it insulting to you, there are a great many others who embrace the idea that such assumptions of Christs virginal birth (based on Greek mythology) is up for discussion while NOT discrediting the amazing gift he has given to the world.

Maybe, just maybe, it’s not all about fundamental Christianity.

Maybe, just maybe, a great number of people will benefit from the words of the bible and Christ if they did not have their basic rights taken away from them (eg. If you have faith you have eternal life, if you do not , you won’t – oh but if you do not you burn in eternal hell – but oh yeah, you have free will – I mean what?? this is free will supposedly afforded human? What kind of CHOICE is that??)

But I digress!

From Glenn: The reality is, they are aware of the fact that liberal Christianity has nothing to offer that cannot be had elsewhere, so they are desperate for attention, even if it means resorting to orgasm jokes.

Oh yes, it does! The Christian church has pushed away far too many people because it cannot deal with historical fact – the dead sea scrolls, the gospel of Mary, the gospel of Thomas etc. A church that manages to allow you to follow the teachings of Christ, while also acknowledging FACT is offering far more than any New Age or fundamental church can. It offers intelligence.

This whole argument is flawed – based on the idea that something isn’t allowed to be shown if it is offensive to another group. What? Then let’s stop celebrating Christmas ( a rip off of the pagan celebration anyway), let’s NOT celebrate Good Friday or Easter Monday – because they are a rub in the face to the non-Christians (again, pagan festivals).

It’s about allowing other members of NZ society to realize that a church is not synonymous with hypocritical assertions. It’s about a Jesus that people can relate to, and whom reflects the Jesus reflected in some of the oldest texts available – PRIOR to churches getting hold of them!

As for the holy Trinity? Historically, it was going to be a four…and a group of men sat around a table and decided upon it. A holy ideal? I think not.

Suppose for example I falsely made the claim that your deceased father was a pedophile. This claim would not be made about any person in the world, nor is it aimed at any such person. Yet this would still be insulting to your fathers family and loved ones, and it would be the kind of comment it is prima facie immoral to make.

“What it did was make satirical comment on the religious claim that a god impregnated a virgin.

Your complaint fails to distinguish the criticism of certain (false) beliefs held by some people from the criticism of those people themselves. While the latter is an “insult” directed ad hominem, the former is not. It is taking issue with ideas, not with the people who hold them.”

I agree there is a distinction between criticizing false ideas and ad hominem attacks on the character of the believer. I don’t think the Billboard did either. It did not attack the character of those who believe in the virginal conception, and it did not offer any arguments against this doctrine. Iit by implication ridiculed the claim that God had sex with Mary, however ridicule is not argument and the claim that God had sex with Mary is not what the doctrine of the virginal conception affirms. All the Bill board did was make comments which were insulting to others.

Your point of view would open the floodgates to all manner of moral restrictions of speech. What else would you censure as immoral? Discussion of family violence? Surely it is insulting to a violent man to discuss domestic abuse?

I addressed this point in my post, what I said was ” prima facie, it is wrong to insult other people.” I went on to add “ Of course, there can be situations, such as where a person does something wrong, that the appropriate response is to insult them but absent such situations, charity dictates that we refrain from doing so.”

Domestic violence is a situation where a person is engaging in a seriously immoral activity, believing in the virginal conception is not.

I also think one can make a distinctions between, a person who gets offended because someone expresses an idea they disagree with and a person who makes insulting comments in the vein of “your fathers a pedophile”. Suggesting that people should prima facie refrain from comments like the latter hardly entails that one should condemn the former.
.-= My last blog-post ..Merry Christmas: Mary’s Magnificat =-.

Oh heck, the mainstream media’s wrath will be upon that church. I bet there won’t even be any debate what so ever. Not even if the sign show any fact publicly available from trusted source (e.g.: statistical data).

I have been mulling this over some more, and it seems to me that the thing you are missing here is a realistic understanding of authentic Christianity.

You see authentic Christianity isn’t just about a commitment to, or adoption of a certain set of propositions about life, morality and the cosmos, etc, instead it is very much grounded in a relationship with a person – the person of Christ – in a total act of self giving to that person, and in another sense, also to the wider body of people known as the Church.

In this regard, Christians view themselves as part of a family, not just an ideological movement or group, and the person of Christ is central to that familial bond.

Now for Catholic Christians Mary has a special maternal role as the Mother of God (mother of the second person of the Trinity), and also as mother of the Church (Mary is given to John, who is symbolic of the Church, at the foot of the Cross with the words “behold your mother”).

So when sacred beliefs about Christ and His mother are insulted in this sort of vulgar and uncharitable fashion, Christians view this in a similar way as they would an attack, of this kind, against a member of their immediate human family.

Imagine the scenario of someone living down the road from you who believed that his mother was a saint, and someone else in the neighborhood thought this was stupid so he erected a public billboard which profanely ridiculed your other neighbor’s statements about his mother’s sanctity.

Are you really going to try and tell me that you would consider such an act merely an act of freedom of speech, that the first neighbor has no right to be extremely hurt and offended by?

Glynn Cardy clearly stated in his initial press release that his motivation for erecting this billboard was to ridicule the belief in a virgin birth.

Yes, some acts of self expression may offend some people, but there is a huge difference between an act that is intended to offend, and an act which unintentionally offends.

The key difference between the two relates to truth – if you haven’t grasped the reality that there is such a thing as objective truth then you will have no yardstick with which to measure the validity of various acts claiming to be acts of freedom of expression – and thus you are forced to live in a world where all acts of self expression. no matter how pointless, vulgar, hurtful, or uncharitable they may be, have to be accepted without any qualification or restriction.
.-= My last blog-post ..Yes, Virginia, it’s a Christmas tree =-.