David Felten, co-creator of Living the Questions, is also pastor of The Fountains in Fountain Hills, Arizona. He found himself under attack by fellow clergy who do not approve of his brand of Christianity. These clergy have used the op ed page of the local paper, newspaper advertisements, and expensive banners to campaign against David and progressive Christianity.John Shuck, himself a progressive Presbyterian pastor, interviews Felten on Religion for Life. You can also read about events in Fountain Hills on John Shore's blog.
Among the critics ("the gang of eight") who have put up banners and turned up the heat on the Methodists, are local Presbyterians, Baptists, Calvary Chapel and Lutherans. The Baptist pastor has referred to his Methodist neighbours so often as "the apostate church" that Felten, demonstrating a sense of humour the other churches must find hugely puzzling, bought the domain name apostate.church which now redirects to their website.
Seems religions, like stars, don't just fade away but endure an astable, volatile collapse.
ReplyDelete- Christianity's doom is a demonstrated by alarming Gen-Y indifference -
Doesn't mean the old folk [Felton] can't fiddle while Rome burns.
His conservative-baiting LBGTQ agenda is amusing.
But would Leftists really want Jesus as a philosopher - the Jesus that mentions slaughtering opponents of his dictatorship?
Expanding a little here....
ReplyDeleteI guess "Progressive Christianity" would be compatible with what one would learn at universities in Theology? That is, the supernatural elements of the Bible would be stripped away (I'm all for that) [Felten referencing the Virgin-Birth dogma in this connection] and the inauthentic Jesus-sayings [Jesus Seminar] would be deleted [good move]. But I can't help thinking that it doesn't leave much of a marketable product for the crucial cynical Gen-Y Millennials [silently fact-checking the sermons in real-time on their smartphones] . Not much of a Business-model here, just 'Jesus-sayings' like "Do unto others..." (itself not original to Jesus).