final response (theology; no otr content)

["Katherine E. Willis Pershey" <katherinepershey@yahoo.com>]

hi all,
  i want to thank mark & the others who have responded
for your passionate and intelligent response to my
comments.  i want to thank mark also for being so kind
toward me personally, as i realize that these issues
can be wrought with conflict.  
  in one of my classes last year, we studied three
different theological orientations back to back:
neo-orthodox, evangelical, and liberal.  i learned so
much in that class about why such contentious
differences of faith and doctrine occur between
strands of christian thought.  from what mark wrote,
it sounds like he comes from a more evangelical
understanding of the christian faith.  w/
evangelicals, the emphasis is very much on the bible
as the source of theology; christian tradition, human
experience, and reason are certainly considered, but
the bible is certainly primary.  liberals, on the
other hand, put experience and reason on equal-- if
not greater- footing w/ the bible.  this isn't a value
judgment.  i'm in no way trying to call evangelicals
"unreasonable."  yet reason and experience tell me
that the bible is very much a product of multiple
contexts, all of which have vastly different
worldviews than i do.  i believe it is a beautiful and
harrowing (b/c of its sexual and physical violence) 
book written by people about their understanding of
God and their own history.  this view of the bible is
admitedly very different than the traditional
"inerrant" version.  i learn about God by reading what
the authors of the different books have to say, and
then i interpret it through my own reason and
experience.  so for me, scripture is storyline.  
    because of these differences between liberals and
evangelicals, however, it makes it extremely hard to
cross the interpretive gap between us.  i respect
evangelical faith very much; i also respectfully
disagree with its doctrines.  
 before i discontinue on-list discussion about this (i
would be happy to discuss this w/ anyone off-list), i
do want to make one more point.  i may be totally
wrong about the unethical nature of atonement
theology.  maybe jesus' suffering really was
redemptive for humanity.  BUT.  evangelical or liberal
alike need to be very careful about distinguishing
between types of suffering.  i have heard too many
stories and seen too many statistics regarding the
link between religion and violence.  women continue to
be told by their pastors that they should return to
their abusive husbands and accept the suffering like
jesus did.  
  thanks again to all of you for putting up with me. 
i know that religious arguments are unwelcome on the
list, and i want to join mark in saying that i, too,
am amenable to having this post erased if the
community wishes.
peace & otr,
katherine

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