Something that I hear often in fundamentalist circles is a claim that what they are preaching and teaching is what the Church has always taught. Anything that strikes them as different, or that goes against the grain of what they grew up believing, they speak of as some strange, new teachings making the rounds. I often read facebook posts by well meaning people seeking to critique certain beliefs, that say things like, Theres a lot of crazy ideas going around these days about hell, or Im hearing some dangerous things being taught, like that the Bible is inspired but maybe not inerrant, or Theres a lot of wild and crazy things being taught today by those in the Trinitarian camp. What these posters dont realize, though, is that as far as Church history is concerned, the beliefs they accuse of being new and dangerous actually predate their own evangelical view by centuries, and that it was *THEIR* view, which they call orthodox, that was once the dangerous new kid on the block! The fundamentalist likes to pretend that they have time and history on their side, but unfortunately for them, they simply do not. When you actually study church history, you quickly learn that much of what we think is orthodox today would have landed one in the heresy chair not too long ago. Our problem is that we see our 20,30, 40 - 90 year experience as spanning the entire spectrum of Church history, but at the very most, a single human life is capable of experiencing a little more than one twentieth of Church history. There will always be at least 1,900 years that weve missed out on. Why is that relevant? Its relevant because it means that our life experience is a mere drop in the bucket of church history, and what is seen as orthodox in our day has not always been seen as orthodox and, in fact, has sometimes even been considered heresy. So, my dear fundamentalist friends, remember, history is actually not on your side. The teachers and preachers you seem to despise the most are actually those whose ideas would have gelled with those of the early church and the patristics. Be careful to not judge truth and orthodoxy by your very small and very short experience. The Church and her history is much larger than you or I.
Posted on: Sat, 30 Aug 2014 01:33:08 +0000