FireDragon76

My understanding of the Christian tradition calls me to engage with those politically constructed logical frameworks for the purpose of sharing God's love with others. The best way to help others is to have them teach us how to help them. That means taking the actual lived-experience of gay people seriously, including their politics. That doesn't mean uncritical affirmation, but the "burden of proof" is not on historically marginalized people, that's for sure.

That's unfortunate about your friend but from a Lutheran POV that has more to do with not appreciating the sacramental nature of vocation and how God provides for us through creation. It has less to do with belief in miracles as God's acts within history. You should really read that article by Pr. Ed Knudson about George Tiller. Individual moral agency is crucial to our sense of ethics. As Dietrirch Bonhoeffer pointed out, there is really no such thing as a Christian or Lutheran ethics that is divorced from secular ethics. Our church's social statements are persuasive but they are not coercive, it's ultimately up to the individual in their relationship with God and their neighbor to judge matters of ethical importance. The Lutheran doctrine of divinization is similar to Orthodoxy's (though from an Augustinian theological framework) but it's not the one thing that we talk about, unlike the Orthodox Church that makes it the only paradigm for talking about salvation. The primary way we talk about salvation is in terms of justification and this is also the doctrine that shapes our particular approach to ethics as well.

In my congregation there are several people that I know that are gay that serve in our ministries. I don't think that's uncommon in many mainline churches. We, as a Lutheran congregation in the ELCA, seem to be slightly more conservative than average and have no particular ties to LGBT-advocacy ministries. Lutherans have never been a tradition defined by particular ethical stances. We really have no juridically binding documents on sexual ethics. We don't exactly approve of premarital sex but we don't define ourselves as taking a particular stand against it. Many of us are concerned about how traditional approaches to sexuality among Christians harms the sense of moral agency of younger people and distorts sexuality in ways that are unhelpful.

The difference is that belief in miracles does not harm my neighbor (and in the case of the resurrection, it's arguable it's essential to the faith, at least as my church understands it), but anti-LGBT attitudes have a proven track record in doing so. As a Lutheran, I don't believe anti-homosexual teachings are essential to my faith, since we separate theology from ethics. And our church agrees on this point, since we recognize that individuals' consciences can be bound on this issue in different ways according to their understanding of God's Word, and that must be respected. But in Orthodoxy, there is no respect for a pro-LGBT conscience. I don't view it as a bathwater scenario, and I think that sort of rhetoric trivializes the harm that the Church as an alleged divine institution has caused to marginalized groups throughout the ages. Lutherans do have a doctrine of divinization of sorts but it is understood in terms of mystical union through participation in the ordinary sacramental life of the Church gathered around the Word, and it is very much secondary to justification.

I don't know what else to call it when people are confronted by scientific evidence about sexual orientation but they still choose to treat gay people as problematic, instead of accepting them. That seems the very definition of anti-humanistic. Being holy and divinized also means you never have to say you are sorry to groups you have hurt, because you never have to question your own assumptions since they are "holy". That's one reason the doctrine of theosis is not unproblematic.

I appreciate your perspective. I'd like to hear you elaborate on this more. This seems similar to our own perspective as Lutherans, and it is why we do not place discipleship or praxis above religious or theological concerns of being a Christian. Jesus is not another Moses or Socrates. It's common for Americans to be pragmatic and/or utilitarian and want to know "What good does this do for me/us?", but the Gospel gives us something far more valuable than merely personal or societal self-help or transformation. Psychology, sociology, and political science does a better job of that, anyways.

Darbyism/Dispensationalism is also salient, and explains America's bizarre foreign policy in the middle east, as well as the relative disregard for social justice in American Evangelicalism. I actually think its more pernicious than the fights against evolution.

I'm speaking in generalities of course. But on the whole, what I said is true, especially considering the Church's attitude towards sexual minorities. It's anti-humanistic, worse than Roman Catholicism in that regard. Putting principles above people is exactly what that entails.

That's a good observation. Even in religious denominations that don't have the church owned by the pastor, American Evangelicals typically will have an authoritarian, personality-driven leadership style rather than consensual or communal decision-making. This goes back to the late 19th and early 20th centuries when this type of religion became dominated by personalities.

That's one reason American Evangelical missionaries are so distressed by the rise of their religion being linked to nationalism and racism/xenophobia, as it was in the past decade. On the one hand, their religious base at home is pleased but it hurts the reputation of missionaries overseas.

I've never heard an Orthodox Christian say anything good about humanism, that's for sure. Sure, hints of it can be found in Dostoyevsky, or the atypical St. Maria of Paris, but in practice the Orthodox Church looks upon ordinary human concerns as problematic, favoring a spiritual life of detachment and contemplation. I don't think moralism is such a difficult concept to understand. It's not unique to Lutheranism, even if it is something we generally frown upon.

As I pointed out, according to the Barna research group, the reason kids leave the church is bigotry, hypocrisy, and moralism. Problems with perceived conflict between science and religion aren't the leading cause of kids disaffiliating with the Church. Lutherans set low expectations so I don't see how we are going to be fairly accused of being hypocritical. We have a realistic view of human life that values authenticity, and we aren't known for moralism. If you want a philosophical approach to the Christian faith, there are much better choices but in my experience they all have tendencies that put principles and theory ahead of actual people. One thing I value in my Lutheran tradition is how our ethics is humanistic and people-centered. I think that's what Jesus was about, ultimately.

I am not a doctor of divinity or a preacher, and Lutheranism is difficult to explain to someone who is used to a more philosophical approach to the Christian faith. All I know is that my own congregation's religion steeped in "traditional theism" doesn't seem incomprehensible for the people that are sitting in the pews from different walks of life and education levels, from the very young to the very old. That's one reason I prefer to refer you to videos to explain more difficult bits of our theology. If you want a more detailed explanation of the distinction between Law and Gospel, Rev. Jordan Cooper might be helpful. He comes from a more conservative perspective than my own approach based on Gerhard Forde's theology, but it's still a good overview: I actually came to be Lutheran because I felt that is where God called me to be and it involved a great deal of prayer and searching, including wandering through the Episcopal Church for about a year and a half. Once I found a Lutheran church, it involved the better part of a year to actually understand Lutheran theology because I came from an approach based on theosis, similar to what you seem to believe is the authentic expression of the Christian faith. I understood intuitively as an Orthodox Christian something of Luther's own plight as I struggled with spiritual abuse in that church, particularly their lack of respect for the bound conscience of Christians. I still saw problems at the particular Episcopal Church I ended up at, where there was still a great deal of moralism present, particularly towards homosexuals, whom I witnessed being treated in an ungracious manner (they appeared to have problems baptizing a baby of a gay couple until it became a national story, and the church congregation reacted very defensively.) Being a pro-LGBT Christian, I felt it was not a safe space for me. Furthermore, arguments about the theology of baptism in the church that came out surrounding the issue, made me feel it was time to find a church that believed baptism conferred actual grace and was not merely a symbol of a covenant.

That video I showed you involving the Rev. Elizabeth Eaton, our presiding bishop, explained what it means to be Lutheran. I don't see how the language was particularly obscure or arcane, or incomprehensible to modern people. Lutherans believe there are tensions within the Christian life, and we find those even within the Bible, principally in Law and Gospel. These are not resolved through discursive reasoning but through living the Christian life in a community based on prayer and the sacraments. Perhaps that is what is missing from this discussion.

American religion in the past two or three decades has been exported globally. Fundamentalists in the US have taken their culture war overseas, particularly into Africa and Russia. Parts of Australia also have ties to US fundamentalism. American religion owes alot to sects such as the Puritans or Pietists that were either outlawed in their home countries or found social controversy and backlash. Utopian idealism was very common as well.

I simply don't understand where your iconclasm is coming from. I don't find the received tradition concerning Jesus all that problematic, nor do I find things like the Jesus Seminar all that persuasive. If I did, I doubt I would be a Christian.

Even Jesus says the time hasn't been revealed to him. Too much is made of his "failure" as a prophet, in light of this. He does prophesy the destruction of the temple and a calamity falling on Israel but that's far different from accurately predicting the end of our present cosmic order, something that the text does not necessarily suggest (but some more radical scholars, operating within a certain Christian paradigm in the background, do seem to presuppose as a necessary criterion for authenticity).

I find that a sad view for any Christian to hold on to. If the Kingdom did not exist in even a seminal form with the disciples, then I think this whole business is a waste of time. Jesus was not merely reiterating Jewish expectations of his time. At least we should be able to recognize him as an original thinker. Even scholars like Don Cupitt (of the Jesus Seminar, whose scholarship I don't agree with) recognize that Jesus was capable of being a creative synthesizer of his own religious tradition.

Those scholars ignore certain elements of the Gospel narrative and they over-literalize Jewish apocalyptic imagery. N.T. Wright is careful to point this out in many of his works. Jesus did see the Kingdom as a present reality. He does after all say, "The Kingdom of God is among you" (Luke 17:21), and earlier in Luke 11:20 he states that the power of exorcism he has is part of the inbreaking of God's Kingdom. He did not merely see it as a future reality.

I don't follow certain liberal scholarship in believing Jesus was a failed prophet (I'm in more agreement with N.T. Wright's scholarship). The Kingdom is God's reign by grace in the human heart. That is why Lutherans (and some other Protestants) distinguish between the Kingdom of God and the kingdoms of this world, it is really just a distinction between Law and Gospel. Since the kingdom of God has always been based on God's reign in the human heart, Jesus did not fail. In fact, he was wildly successful. Of course, the Kingdom suffers violence, of course it is oppressed. But it would be foolish to say it's a failure.

" The law says, ‘do this,’ and it is never done. Grace says, ‘believe in this,’ and everything is already done.” - Martin Luther, Heidelberg Disputation, Theological Thesis #26 The Law is whatever in the Bible that threatens or accuses the conscience, typically by way of commandment. The Gospel is whatever promises the forgiveness of sins and eternal life. Jesus "turn the other cheek" is actually Law. Law can be oppressive if it is misused. A bullied child should not be told they need to just turn the other cheek as their religious/spirituality duty, at least not right away until it can be placed within a wider context and is safe to do so. I know people who were bullied because they were gay or transsexual. Their bullying wasn't simply due to a lack of empathy but the powerful hold that ideology and religious teachings have on the human imagination. Asking them to take their pummelings cheerfully wouldn't serve justice. Here is more on Law and Gospel and the usage of these distinctions: https://www.livinglutheran.org/2017/04/luthers-preaching-still-preach/

What P says sounds good but bullying is often more than simply a slap on the cheek that is resolved through non-retaliation and a bit of compassion. Turning the other cheek is an ideal but its not necessarily always realistic. Obligating a bullied child to be the therapist for their bully isn't necessarily an ethical thing to do. As my pastor pointed out to me once, nobody can force you to be a martyr. That's why I appreciate the Lutheran distinction between Law and Gospel. Sometimes the most sensible, beautiful sounding stuff can turn out to be quite problematic in actual practice. Life is always more complicated. Which is one reason I am not fond of the whole "Red Letter Christian" Neo-Anabaptist movement, which is really quite fundamentalist in tone at times. I'm more of a Christian realist.

I was in a church that told me that God was loving but their behavior bordered on spiritual abuse. They preached a great deal of what we Lutherans would call "cheap law". I spent years of my life in a religion based on theosis and platitudes about love. So I think I am speaking from some experience. It is something that made me give up on being a Christian for some time. The problem of authoritarianism is a problem in North America among Christians, far more than peoples hangups with traditional theism. According to a Barna survey, the leading reason young people say for not being involved in the Church is because Christians are bigoted or hypocritical. That directly ties into what I have been talking about, because that kind of attitude came out of that imperial, constantinian religious synthesis.

I think this is an area where Lutherans and liberal Episcopalians must disagree. We don't view the Church as a club of the enlightened, bound by a romantic appreciation of the past, that must ingratiate itself to social elites and their tastes. We've more interested in how we communicate the Gospel to the marginalized than the privileged. Msot of what you have written falls under Luther's condemnation of fides formata or "formed faith", the Catholic dictum of faith formed in love. We believe in faith formed by Christ, rather, since love without embodiment is just a slogan that those with power will use towards their own ends.

We believe there are honestly some things as human beings we cannot fully understand about God and salvation, and how God's election relates to human reprobation is one of them. On this point we are neither Arminian nor Calvinist. Your analogy of the sweater is a bit off. Nobody would say that somebody who takes a sweater and puts it in a closet doesn't in fact have the sweater as a gift. Furthermore, the obligation to wear a sweater as a gift is a matter of custom or dignity, not law. A gracious giver no more demands that a gift be used in the way that they see fit than God requires we live up to the Law. The freedom of a Christian to respond to grace is something we have as a distinctive. Generally Lutherans are not known for being "fruit pickers". Jesus' grace is a safe space just to be a human being, free of spiritual baggage imposed by more Law-centered religion. God's love, unlike human love, is free from any self-interest or manipulation. That's why the danger of humans manipulating God's Word is so real, and why the distinction between Law and Gospel is so critical in our tradition. Generally we view Law, including Jesus ethical teachings, as aspirational ideals rather than strict obligations. We don't deny their importance but we bracket them within an understanding of God's grace and forgiveness as unconditional. Christian freedom is freedom from the condemnation of the Law, but it is also freedom to love our neighbor. This freedom does not require any specific response on our part but it is open to response as we are called by God. Therefore, we have a very weak understanding of the role of the Law as a guide for Christian living, it is not something we emphasize a great deal, because we believe it ultimately threatens the integrity of the Gospel if it is over-emphasized.