Catholic Apologetics Guidebook

Dialogue on the Reliability, Inspiration, and Inerrancy of Scripture – Page 5

Paul, good post! (the long one from the previous page)

OK, first off it is my contention that it is believers in inerrancy who hold the Bible to a higher standard and not me, but I understand your logic behind saying the opposite.

However, I am not the one holding the Bible to the impossible standard of inerrancy.

The thing is...I don't really need for the Bible to be inerrant, to get the message, as I regard many of the stories within as allegory and not historical fact.

So...one may learn a story's lesson without believing the story to be anything more than a parable.

I would also like to take this moment to forward an opinion that is probably not going to be well-liked or well-recieved, and certainly not shared by many, but if the church and word of God is a "living thing", then I tend to believe that it must move forward and evolve, and therefore I see strict adherence to ancient scripture to be potentially regressive.

So...while knowledge of scripture is important, so is the idea of re-interpretation for the modern world and other forms of enlightenment.

This is why I find Christian sects that are largely anti-science to be out of step. It would appear to me that their "living word" stopped evolving roughly 2,000 years ago.

So...it is my belief that inerrancy promotes stagnation.

Anyhoo....

Yes Paul, you are correct...I don't have a problem with Christianity at all, in fact...I consider myself a Christian. What I object to are certain modes of Christian thinking that I believe to be regressive, extremist and therefore dangerous.

And seeing as though much of this kind of thinking has invaded every aspect of American political, academic and social life, yes....it concerns and troubles me.

Anyway....I also agree that the gift of salvation comes from Christ, but does not necessarily have to go through him.

This is why I object to those who suggest that only those born again in Christ will be awarded salvation.

Under such conditions and pretexts, any person who lived unaware of Jesus Christ would be punished through no fault of their own and that conflicts greatly with the idea of a truly loving and forgiving God.

Again...this is the inherent danger of strict interpretation, or the belief that there is only one interpretation that is valid.

I also wonder why people want to saddle God with the human failings and trappings of vanity.

Would a truly loving, forgiving, vastly superior and infinitely powerful God really care if everyone personally worshipped Him?

I mean, if salvation through grace has already been accompolished then why is everyone's personal acknowledgement of it so vital?

Does God really need the individual endorsement of billions upon billions of people, down through the ages?

It seems to me that this puts a condition on unconditional love.

Again...I see this as man's inability to understand the true nature of God, or his inability to not think of God in human terms.

Thus, we have the inherent flaw in scripture...the idea that, divinely inspired or not, it is still reduced to human terms and human terminology.

So yes...even the Biblical authors were flawed human beings, whose environments and past experiences shaped their perceptions, created biases and carried their emotions.

Nothing inerrant can come from that.

If God wanted His word to appear to us in an inerrant form, it is my contention that He would have chosen an inerrant vessel for His word and not relied upon His deeply flawed creations.

What if, and I am just asking "what if"...such a realization is an introductory step toward further enlightenment?