Hello all, "Greg Crawford" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> The Uniting Church has its own stance in relation to the Bible in > paragraph 5 of the Basis of Union. However, after many decades in the > Uniting Church I am starting to wonder whether this is an actual > position, or just a statistical average of the many different views held > within the Church. I tend to agree. I think the statements the UCA holds regarding the bible are carefully worded to allow almost everyone to agree with them despite the differences people have in their beliefs about the bible. On the surface, this may appear to be a good thing but I don't think it is. It is ignoring a very basic and core difference of opinion in how we understand the will of God. As a result, other debates becoming protracted because the real issue (our approach to the bible) is not being addressed. Furthermore, it never does get addressed because we all "agree" on the UCA statements about the bible! > These questions fall alongside another realisation. The first Christians > had neither an Old Testament nor New Testament canon. "Believing in the > Bible" did not seem to be a vital part of their faith. Instead, they > appear to have had a vital experience of the Holy Spirit. Yes. As I understand it, "believing in the bible" is a relatively recent invention stemming from the formation of Fundamentalism in the earlier 1900s. I agree we should be looking for a vital experience of God (or the Holy Spirit) to be the basis for understanding the will of God. One way to do this to try and understand the experience others have had of God. One way to do that is to read the record of those experiences in the bible. Finally, we need to remember that any experience of God and any subsequent understanding of the will of God (including those recorded in the bible) can be misinterpreted. Hence the importance of the community of faith and hearing the experiences of many different people. Cheers, Jonathan __________________________________________________________________ Switch to the New Netscape Internet Service. As low as $9.95 a month -- Sign up today at http://isp.netscape.com/register Netscape. Just the Net You Need. New! Netscape Toolbar for Internet Explorer Search from anywhere on the Web and block those annoying pop-ups. Download now at http://channels.netscape.com/ns/search/install.jsp ------------------------------------------------------ - You are subscribed to the mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] - To unsubscribe, email [EMAIL PROTECTED] and put in the message body 'unsubscribe insights-l' (ell, not one (1)) See: http://nsw.uca.org.au/insights-l-information.htm ------------------------------------------------------
