Blaming "Fundamentalism"

[Jagella]

I've noticed that "fundamentalism" has turned into apologists' and many others' favorite bug-a-boo. While Christian fundamentalism is no doubt harmful like many other varieties of religion, I think it's safe to say that it is no worse. Or to put it another way, liberal Christianity and religion is no better than fundamentalism. In some ways liberal Christianity may be worse than fundamentalism because it hides behind a cloak of presumed intellectual respectability while at its core it is the same irrational sideshow. At least Christian fundamentalists are open about what they believe and actually seem to know what they believe while liberals are wishy-washy often "reinterpreting" or outright denying the doctrines of Christianity to save face.

The reason I'm raising this issue is because many apologists are quick to blame fundamentalism for Christianity's ill effects. The message is that if something goes wrong with Christian faith or practice, then it's fundamentalism's fault! The "true" Christianity is nothing like that, of course. One apologist here goes as far as to say anything based in fundamentalism is by necessity "invalid and unconvincing"--no exceptions. For anybody who knows anything about logic, that's a blatant "against the man" argument and a mistake in logic. It's faulty reason to conclude that an argument must be wrong based on the religious beliefs of the person making that argument.

Question for Debate: Can anybody here successfully argue that liberal Christianity and religion is any better or truer than fundamentalism?

[Tcg]

[Replying to Jagella]

We are living in a post Christian world.

We are living in a world where Christianity is the dominating religion.






Tcg

[AgnosticBoy]

So are you trying to argue that stubbornly and apparently dishonestly sticking to a given dogma such as young earth creationism is just as intellectually respectable as changing one's views in light of new scientific evidence?

Well I wouldn't say it's just as "respectable" but rather it's on the same level of reasonability as what I typically get from liberal Christians.

The reason I believe this is because it's one thing to change your view and acknowledge that the Bible was wrong in this area, but it's another matter when you change your view and try to interpret Scripture in light of MODERN day knowledge. The latter case is a cop-out, a way of not acknowledging that the Biblical writers were wrong in some cases. Of course, if the Bible was so prone to errors and misunderstandings (liberal Christians tend to bring this up by the way except that they think they resolve the issue by reinterpreting) then I question the very notion that they got it right when it comes to a G
od existing or to his nature.

[Mithrae]

Well I wouldn't say it's just as "respectable" but rather it's on the same level of reasonability as what I typically get from liberal Christians.

The reason I believe this is because it's one thing to change your view and acknowledge that the Bible was wrong in this area, but it's another matter when you change your view and try to interpret Scripture in light of MODERN day knowledge. The latter case is a cop-out, a way of not acknowledging that the Biblical writers were wrong in some cases. Of course, if the Bible was so prone to errors and misunderstandings (liberal Christians tend to bring this up by the way except that they think they resolve the issue by reinterpreting) then I question the very notion that they got it right when it comes to a God existing or to his nature.

I think you must mean something different than I do when you talk about liberal Christians. Refusing to acknowledge that the biblical writers were wrong on some points is a characteristic of evangelicals, and antithetical to liberal thought by definition. Again, it is a mistake to assume that if someone is not a fundamentalist they are therefore liberal. Protestant fundamentalism in many ways is just evangelicalism on steroids; what you are describing, evangelicals willing take on board any old ad hoc 'reinterpretation' to preserve the notion of infallibility, is about as far from liberal Christianity as it is possible to get without being fundamentalist

[AgnosticBoy]

[Replying to post 13 by Mithrae]
Conservatives want to preserve infallibilty while liberals want to preserve relevance. The main point is that both are false or unproven. Trying to square Scripture with Modern Day knowledge doesn't take away from the fact that the biblical writers we're wrong in some cases.

Take the Creation story for example. If the only reason to consider it fiction (as opposed to false) is that it conflicts with science then that's an interpretation based on convenience and not logic and evidence. If the Jews took to story to be literal then it was a FALSE belief on their part no matter how the liberals want us to look at it "today".

[Mithrae]

[Replying to post 13 by Mithrae]
Conservatives want to preserve infallibilty while liberals want to preserve relevance. The main point is that both are false or unproven. Trying to square Scripture with Modern Day knowledge doesn't take away from the fact that the biblical writers we're wrong in some cases.

Take the Creation story for example. If the only reason to consider it fiction (as opposed to false) is that it conflicts with science then that's an interpretation based on convenience and not logic and evidence. If the Jews took to story to be literal then it was a FALSE belief on their part no matter how the liberals want us to look at it "today".

I imagine many Jews have read Genesis 1 as a literal account of physical events while many others have not; in the 1st century Philo wrote that "It would be a sign of great simplicity to think that the world was created in six days," and I've already shown that Augustine of Hippo in the 4th century pondered several different interpretations and settled on one different from a simple literalist reading. Odds are that many liberal Christians would view it as derivative from the Babylonian creation myths, adapted to the social and theological needs of the Israelite community; and therefore considerably more useful to them than unverifiable claims, accurate or not, about the origin of the universe.

Saying that the relevance of the bible is "false or unproven" makes no sense; obviously it is relevant to Christians of all varieties, and for that matter to the whole history of western civilization, art and literature. Liberal Christians would tend to think - quite reasonably in my view - that it is best to first and foremost try to understand the facts, as much as we can, of when and by whom the various parts of the anthology were written and what purpose or meaning they had for their authors and original recipients. By contrast evangelicals, fundamentalists and many critics of Christianity are interested first and foremost in what they can do with or get out of 'The Bible'; their theologies and rules for daily life on the one hand, or the contradictions and fodder for mockery on the other.

[AgnosticBoy]

I imagine many Jews have read Genesis 1 as a literal account of physical events while many others have not; in the 1st century Philo wrote that "It would be a sign of great simplicity to think that the world was created in six days," and I've already shown that Augustine of Hippo in the 4th century pondered several different interpretations and settled on one different from a simple literalist reading. Odds are that many liberal Christians would view it as derivative from the Babylonian creation myths, adapted to the social and theological needs of the Israelite community; and therefore considerably more useful to them than unverifiable claims, accurate or not, about the origin of the universe.

I agree with most of your points here but I used the Creation story as an example. The reason behind the interpretation is what I'm getting at. Modern day knowledge conflicting with the Bible should not be a determining factor for taking something in the Bible as literal or non-literal. Christians tend to use this as a factor to avoid the conclusion that the Biblical writers were wrong, not surprising all they do is take the problematic areas as non-literal and keep the non-problematic areas (the ones that don't conflict with science) as being literal. That's clearly a faulty and unreasonable way to interpret things. How the Jews understood their own writings should be the determining factor.

Saying that the relevance of the bible is "false or unproven" makes no sense; obviously it is relevant to Christians of all varieties, and for that matter to the whole history of western civilization, art and literature.

It makes perfect sense to me if the morals are being claimed to be objective, from God, etc. God would have to be proven, his morals would have to be proven, etc. If you say that God and morals don't apply to everyone then that makes your system no better than any other system, in which case I ask what is the point in following Christianity over any other religion or system? That certainly takes away relevance of Christianity. A lack of relevance and/or prominence are among some of the reasons that religions die out.

Liberal Christians would tend to think - quite reasonably in my view - that it is best to first and foremost try to understand the facts, as much as we can, of when and by whom the various parts of the anthology were written and what purpose or meaning they had for their authors and original recipients. By contrast evangelicals, fundamentalists and many critics of Christianity are interested first and foremost in what they can do with or get out of 'The Bible'; their theologies and rules for daily life on the one hand, or the contradictions and fodder for mockery on the other.

Even if Liberal Christians are more reasonable than your typical evangelical, but that doesn't prove that God exists, nor that people should use principles from the Bible. Missing justification for these two points alone would make the Bible no different than any other opinionated worldview.

[Mithrae]

I agree with most of your points here but I used the Creation story as an example. The reason behind the interpretation is what I'm getting at. Modern day knowledge conflicting with the Bible should not be a determining factor for taking something in the Bible as literal or non-literal. Christians tend to use this as a factor to avoid the conclusion that the Biblical writers were wrong, not surprising all they do is take the problematic areas as non-literal and keep the non-problematic areas (the ones that don't conflict with science) as being literal. That's clearly a faulty and unreasonable way to interpret things. How the Jews understood their own writings should be the determining factor.

Early Jewish and Christian perspectives are one important thing to look at, but hardly the be-all and end-all of hermeneutics; Jews living half a millennium after something was written could well be just as prone to misunderstanding it as anyone else. For example, is it possible that 'the fall' story in Genesis 3 was originally written and intended as an allegory for the transition from primitive hunter-gatherer to sedentary agricultural lifestyles (and more broadly, for human intelligence generally and disconnectedness from a perceived state of natural innocence)? There's certainly allusions to fruit, agriculture, knowledge, innocence and (in ch4) an explicit contrast between agricultural and nomadic(?) herder ways of life with the latter being treated as better and holier. It's quite possible that without any living examples or clear knowledge of hunter-gatherer societies, such an interpretation wouldn't readily occur to folk living later in the fairly thoroughly civilized Middle East, but that doesn't mean that folk from an earlier period couldn't have intended it as such.

It makes perfect sense to me if the morals are being claimed to be objective, from God, etc. God would have to be proven, his morals would have to be proven, etc. If you say that God nor morals don't apply to everyone then that makes your system no better than any other system, in which case I ask what is the point in following Christianity over any other religion or system? That certainly takes away relevance of Christianity. A lack of relevance and/or prominence are among some of the reasons that religions die out.

Perhaps that's the case, but if liberal Christianity were no better than - or just as good as - systems like Buddhism or secular humanism, that's hardly an argument against it, and the answer to the OP question is that it would certainly be better than the irrationalities of fundamentalism.

Liberal Christians would tend to think - quite reasonably in my view - that it is best to first and foremost try to understand the facts, as much as we can, of when and by whom the various parts of the anthology were written and what purpose or meaning they had for their authors and original recipients. By contrast evangelicals, fundamentalists and many critics of Christianity are interested first and foremost in what they can do with or get out of 'The Bible'; their theologies and rules for daily life on the one hand, or the contradictions and fodder for mockery on the other.

Even if Liberal Christians are more reasonable than your typical evangelical, but that doesn't prove that God exists, nor that people should use principles from the Bible. Missing justification for these two points alone would make the Bible no different than any other opinionated worldview.

As I suggested in post #6, I imagine that for most liberal Christians such metaphysical claims are of secondary importance to the community, culture and existential value they find in their faith. Those are identifiable needs that we do have, which certainly might be met through other channels, though I suspect that religion is the only medium in which such a wide array of them are addressed in a coherent, united format. Additionally, perhaps some of the reported experiences of these ancient Jews were based in actual fact - maybe they really did experience God somehow. That'd be a nice bonus, in many liberals' views, but it's not the main point of it all (and some reject that possibility outright).

I'm no expert, but for the sake of argument suppose that chakras and chi and whatnot may or may not be based in fact; would that mean that practitioners of yoga or tai chi should abandon them as "no better than any other system" of exercise? Or stop encouraging others to try it out and see if they like it? Seems to me if something is working for you and your friends and family, you're probably going to keep doing it and even encourage others to give it a try. I wouldn't begrudge them that, nor deny the reasonableness of liberal Christianity, even if it's not for me.

[AgnosticBoy]

Early Jewish and Christian perspectives are one important thing to look at, but hardly the be-all and end-all of hermeneutics; Jews living half a millennium after something was written could well be just as prone to misunderstanding it as anyone else.

I was referring to how the writers and those living in his time period would've understood these writings. Also, Jesus claiming to have Divine knowledge takes away from your point about regular knowledge (i.e. people being far removed from the time period of the writer straying from the intended meaning). The NT writers having been "revealed" by Jesus believed in Adam and Eve, the Original fall, etc. Without the original fall, Jesus's sacrifice would make little sense (although skeptics claim it makes no sense).

Perhaps that's the case, but if liberal Christianity were no better than - or just as good as - systems like Buddhism or secular humanism, that's hardly an argument against it, and the answer to the OP question is that it would certainly be better than the irrationalities of fundamentalism.

It depends on how you frame the argument. Is it better than the typical evangelical approach? Perhaps. Does it prove that Christianity should be accepted by all, salvation, God, miracles? No it does not.

I'm no expert, but for the sake of argument suppose that chakras and chi and whatnot may or may not be based in fact; would that mean that practitioners of yoga or tai chi should abandon them as "no better than any other system" of exercise? Or stop encouraging others to try it out and see if they like it? Seems to me if something is working for you and your friends and family, you're probably going to keep doing it and even encourage others to give it a try. I wouldn't begrudge them that, nor deny the reasonableness of liberal Christianity, even if it's not for me.

Again, "reasonableness" of Christianity as a system, liberal or otherwise, does not mean that the system is true or corresponds with reality. I can make up a fictional story that contains rules, morals, and make it coherent but that doesn't mean it applies to reality.


Also, you speak of liberal Christianity as if there's one set view but I'm not aware of any unified view. I'm only aware of one common principle which is to paint the Bible as being nothing more than metaphor, one to be understood and applied through a modern lens. Perhaps we can also say that some liberal Christians take this as their philosophy and placed it over first justifying that Jesus and other biblical writers wanted their belief to be looked at and applied in this way. Either way, the conclusions drawn from such parameters tend to vary (contradict) from person-to-person. Perhaps you should focus more on liberal Christians actual conclusions.

[Jagella]

We are living in a post Christian world. But We can't throw away the history of western civilization which is based on the Church. Both liberal and fundamental Christians need to open their mind to the worlds religions. For what its worth no one religion has the whole truth. With Christ as our spiritual anchor holding on not rejecting our Christian foundation we can add to our knowledge of the ultimate reality expresses in the worlds religions. I personally have benefited in my study of Buddhism Taoism Zen and Hindu 's Upanishads and Bhagavad Gita .Thanks to these world religions I have a fuller appreciation of my Judeo-Christian origins.So liberal or fundamental Christian distinctions are irrelevant in my mind. Its all good.and bad.

I see no reason why a fundamentalist Christian could not study other religions like you do. Besides, if fundamentalist Christians believe they have the "whole truth," then that's fine with me. What do liberal Christians say they have? Half-truths? If so, then maybe you can tell us what falsehoods liberal Christians have.

So I still see nothing better about liberal Christianity than fundamentalism. What I do see is a fundamentalist New Testament that liberals turn their backs on leaving me wonder what they mean when they call themselves Christians.

[Mithrae]

Also, you speak of liberal Christianity as if there's one set view but I'm not aware of any unified view. I'm only aware of one common principle which is to paint the Bible as being nothing more than metaphor, one to be understood and applied through a modern lens. Perhaps we can also say that some liberal Christians take this as their philosophy and placed it over first justifying that Jesus and other biblical writers wanted their belief to be looked at and applied in this way. Either way, the conclusions drawn from such parameters tend to vary (contradict) from person-to-person. Perhaps you should focus more on liberal Christians actual conclusions.

Perhaps the OP should have waited until we have an actual specimen to cross-examine before trying to debate 'liberal Christianity' Your idea of what the term means still looks very different to mine; you seem to have swung from talking about evangelicals concerned with the authors' infallibility and taking any old ad hoc approach to preserve it, all the way across to the opposite extreme (despite some superficial similarities) of postmodernists concerned with their own meaning read into the text regardless of the authors' intent. By contrast, according to Wikipedia:

• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberal_Christianity
  Liberal Christianity, broadly speaking, is a method of biblical hermeneutics, an undogmatic method of understanding God through the use of scripture by applying the same modern hermeneutics used to understand any ancient writings, symbols and scriptures. Liberal Christianity did not originate as a belief structure, and as such was not dependent upon any Church dogma or creedal doctrine. Liberal Christianity from the start embraced the methodologies of Enlightenment science, including empirical evidence and the use of reason, as the basis for interpreting the Bible, life, faith and theology. . . .
  
  The sources of religious authority recognized by liberal Protestants differed from traditional Protestants. Traditional Protestants understood the Bible to be uniquely authoritative (sola scriptura); all doctrine, teaching and the church itself derive authority from it.[4] A traditional Protestant could therefore affirm that "what Scripture says, God says."[5] Liberals, however, seek to understand the Bible through modern biblical criticism, such as historical criticism, that began to be used in the late 1700s to ask if biblical accounts were based on older texts or whether the Gospels recorded the actual words of Jesus.[3]

What you now seem to be talking about may be more along the lines of 'progressive Christianity':

• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Progressive_Christianity
  Progressive Christianity is a "post-liberal movement" within Christianity "that seeks to reform the faith via the insights of post-modernism and a reclaiming of the truth beyond the verifiable historicity and factuality of the passages in the Bible by affirming the truths within the stories that may not have actually happened."[1] . . . .
  
  Though the terms Progressive Christianity and Liberal Christianity are often used synonymously, the two movements are distinct, despite much overlap.[6]