Liberal Christianity
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Liberal Christianity, also known as liberal theology and historically as Christian Modernism (see
Liberal theology grew out of
In the context of theology, liberal does not refer to
Liberal Protestantism
Liberal Protestantism developed in the 19th century out of a perceived need to adapt Christianity to a modern intellectual context. With the acceptance of
The sources of religious authority recognized by liberal Protestants differed from conservative Protestants. Traditional Protestants understood the
German theologian William Wrede wrote that "Like every other real science, New Testament Theology has its goal simply in itself, and is totally indifferent to all dogma and Systematic Theology". Theologian Hermann Gunkel affirmed that "the spirit of historical investigation has now taken the place of a traditional doctrine of inspiration".[16] Episcopal bishop John Shelby Spong declared that the literal interpretation of the Bible is heresy.[17][18]
The two groups also disagreed on the role of experience in confirming truth claims. Traditional Protestants believed scripture and revelation always confirmed human experience and reason. For liberal Protestants, there were two ultimate sources of religious authority: the Christian experience of God as revealed in Jesus Christ and universal human experience. In other words, only an appeal to common human reason and experience could confirm the truth claims of Christianity.[19]
In general, liberal Christians are not concerned with the presence of biblical errors or contradictions.[12] Liberals abandoned or reinterpreted traditional doctrines in light of recent knowledge. For example, the traditional doctrine of original sin was rejected for being derived from Augustine of Hippo, whose views on the New Testament were believed to have been distorted by his involvement with Manichaeism. Christology was also reinterpreted. Liberals stressed Christ's humanity, and his divinity became "an affirmation of Jesus exemplifying qualities which humanity as a whole could hope to emulate".[8]
Liberal Christians sought to elevate Jesus'
Nineteenth-century liberalism had an optimism about the future in which humanity would continue to achieve greater progress.[8] This optimistic view of history was sometimes interpreted as building the kingdom of God in the world.[9]
Development
The roots of liberal Christianity go back to the 16th century when Christians such as
Albrecht Ritschl (1822–1889) disagreed with Schleiermacher's emphasis on feeling. He thought that religious belief should be based on history, specifically the historical events of the New Testament.[26] When studied as history without regard to miraculous events, Ritschl believed the New Testament affirmed Jesus' divine mission. He rejected doctrines such as the virgin birth of Jesus and the Trinity.[27] The Christian life for Ritschl was devoted to ethical activity and development, so he understood doctrines to be value judgments rather than assertions of facts.[26] Influenced by the philosophy of Immanuel Kant, Ritschl viewed "religion as the triumph of the spirit (or moral agent) over humanity's natural origins and environment."[27] Ritschl's ideas would be taken up by others, and Ritschlianism would remain an important theological school within German Protestantism until World War I. Prominent followers of Ritschl include Wilhelm Herrmann, Julius Kaftan and Adolf von Harnack.[26]
Liberal Catholicism
Catholic forms of theological liberalism have existed since the 19th century in England, France and Italy.
Papal condemnation of modernism and
Influence in the United States
Liberal Christianity was most influential with Mainline Protestant churches in the early 20th century, when proponents believed the changes it would bring would be the future of the Christian church. Its greatest and most influential manifestation was the Christian Social Gospel, whose most influential spokesman was the American Baptist Walter Rauschenbusch. Rauschenbusch identified four institutionalized spiritual evils in American culture (which he identified as traits of "supra-personal entities", organizations capable of having moral agency): these were individualism, capitalism, nationalism and militarism.[31]
Other subsequent theological movements within the U.S. Protestant mainline included political
The 1990s and 2000s saw a resurgence of non-doctrinal, theological work on biblical exegesis and theology, exemplified by figures such as Marcus Borg, John Dominic Crossan, John Shelby Spong,[36] Karen Armstrong and Scotty McLennan.
Theologians and authors
Anglican and Protestant
- liberal theology", he claimed that religious experience was introspective, and that the most true understanding of God consisted of "a sense of absolute dependence".[37]
- higher criticism of the Bible.
- Calvinist orthodoxy of his famous father, the Reverend Lyman Beecher, to instead preach the Social Gospelof liberal Christianity.
- church historian, promoted the Social Gospel; wrote a seminal work of historical theology called Lehrbuch der Dogmengeschichte (History of Dogma).
- Charles Fillmore (1854–1948), Christian mystic influenced by Emerson; co-founder, with his wife, Myrtle Fillmore, of the Unity Church.
- Hastings Rashdall (1858–1924), English philosopher, theologian, and Anglican priest. Dean of Carlisle from 1917 until 1924. Author of Doctrine and Development (1898).
- Walter Rauschenbusch (1861–1918) American Baptist, author of "A Theology for the Social Gospel", which gave the movement its definitive theological definition.
- Northern Baptist, founding pastor of New York's Riverside Churchin 1922.
- Rudolf Bultmann (1884–1976), German biblical scholar, liberal Christian theologian until 1924.[clarification needed][38] Bultmann was more of an existentialist than a "liberal", as his defense of Jesus' healings in his "History of Synoptic Tradition" makes clear.
- Paul Tillich (1886–1965), seminal figure in liberal Christianity; synthesized liberal Protestant theology with existentialist philosophy, but later came to be counted among the "neo-orthodox".
- Leslie Weatherhead (1893–1976), English preacher and author of The Will of God and The Christian Agnostic
- James Pike (1913–1969), Episcopal Bishop, Diocese of California 1958–1966. Early television preacher as Dean of the Cathedral of St. John the Divine in New York City; social gospel advocate and civil rights supporter; author of If This Be Heresy and The Other Side; in later life studied Christian origins and spiritualism.
- Lloyd Geering (b. 1918), New Zealand liberal theologian.
- Anglican Bishop of Woolwich, author of Honest to God; later dedicated himself to demonstrating very early authorship of the New Testament writings, publishing his findings in Redating the New Testament.
- latitudinarianism and religious pluralism or non-exclusivism, as explained in his influential work, The Myth of God Incarnate.
- William Sloane Coffin (1924–2006), Senior Minister at the Riverside Church in New York City, and President of SANE/Freeze (now Peace Action).[39]
- Christopher Morse (b. 1935), Professor Emeritus of Systematic Theology, Union Theological Seminary, noted for his theology of faithful disbelief.
- miracles, and the Resurrection.
- Richard Holloway (b. 1933), Bishop of Edinburgh, 1986 to 2000.[clarification needed]
- UNICAMP, seminal figure in the liberation theologymovement.
- Creation Spirituality.
- Marcus Borg (1942–2015) American Biblical scholar, prolific author, fellow of the Jesus Seminar.
- Robin Meyers (b. 1952) United Church of Christ pastor and professor of Social Justice. Author of Saving Jesus from the Church.
- Epic of Evolution.
Roman Catholic
- Passionistpriest, cultural historian, geologian, and cosmologist.
- Hans Küng (1928–2021), Swiss theologian. Had his license to teach Catholic theology revoked in 1979 because of his vocal rejection of the doctrine of the infallibility of the Pope, but remained a priest in good standing.
- ex-Catholic and former priest, New Testament scholar, co-founder of the critical liberal Jesus Seminar.
- theologian and Professor at Harvard Divinity School
Other
- rejected the Trinity and the strength of scriptural authority, in favor of purely rationalistic "natural religion".
- Unitarian Universalist minister, Stanford Universityprofessor and author.
See also
- Biblical hermeneutics
- Christian atheism
- Conflict thesis (or warfare thesis)
- Death of God theology
- European Liberal Protestant Network
- Evangelical left
- Existentialist theology
- Free Christians (Britain)
- Fountain Street Church
- Fundamentalist-Modernist controversy
- Historicity of the Bible
- Jesus Seminar
- Liberal Anglo-Catholicism
- Liberation theology
- Moderate Christianity
- Moralistic therapeutic deism
- Postliberal theology
- Postmodern Christianity
- Religious liberalism
- Religious pluralism
- Riverside Church
- Secular theology
- Unitarian Universalism
References
Citations
- ^ a b Gurrentz, Benjamin T. "Christian Modernism". The Arda. Association of Religion Data Archives. Archived from the original on July 31, 2019.
- ^ Dorrien (2001, pp. xiii, xxiii): "Liberal Christian theology is a tradition that derives from the late-eighteenth- and early-nineteenth-century Protestant attempt to reconceptualize the meaning of traditional Christian teaching in the light of modern knowledge and modern ethical values. It is not revolutionary but reformist in spirit and substance. Fundamentally it is the idea of a genuine Christianity not based on external authority. Liberal theology seeks to reinterpret the symbols of traditional Christianity in a way that creates a progressive religious alternative to atheistic rationalism and to theologies based on external authority."
- ^ "Theological Liberalism": "Theological liberalism, a form of religious thought that establishes religious inquiry on the basis of a norm other than the authority of tradition. It was an important influence in Protestantism from about the mid-17th century through the 1920s."
- ^ McGrath (2013, p. 196): "Liberalism's program required a significant degree of flexibility in relation to traditional Christian theology. Its leading writers argued that reconstruction of belief was essential if Christianity were to remain a serious intellectual option in the modern world. For this reason, they demanded a degree of freedom in relation to the doctrinal inheritance of Christianity on the one hand, and traditional methods of biblical interpretation on the other. Where traditional ways of interpreting Scripture, or traditional beliefs, seemed to be compromised by developments in human knowledge, it was imperative that they should be discarded or reinterpreted to bring them into line with what was now known about the world."
- ^ Dorrien 2001, p. xviii.
- ^ Dorrien 2001, p. xv.
- ^ Dorrien 2001, p. xx.
- ^ a b c McGrath 2013, p. 196.
- ^ a b c d Campbell 1996, p. 128.
- ^ Ogden 1976, pp. 405–406.
- ^ Ogden 1976, p. 408.
- ^ ISBN 978-1-84706-542-1. Retrieved 30 August 2020.
- ISBN 978-0-664-22151-5. Retrieved 30 August 2020.
- ^ Ogden 1976, pp. 408–409.
- ^ Ogden 1976, p. 409.
- ISBN 978-0-567-40343-8.
On the relationship between the results of his work and the task of Christian theology, Wrede writes that how the 'systematic theologian gets on with its results and deals with them—that is his own affair. Like every other real science, New Testament Theology's has its goal simply in itself, and is totally indifferent to all dogma and Systematic Theology' (1973: 69).16 In the 1920s H. Gunkel would summarize the arguments against Biblical Theology in Old Testament study thus: 'The recently experienced phenomenon of biblical theology being replaced by the history of Israelite religion is to be explained from the fact that the spirit of historical investigation has now taken the place of a traditional doctrine of inspiration' (1927–31: 1090–91; as quoted by Childs 1992a: 6).
- ^ Chellew-Hodge, Candace (24 February 2016). "Why It Is Heresy to Read the Bible Literally: An Interview with John Shelby Spong". Religion Dispatches. Retrieved 19 June 2021.
- ISBN 978-0-06-236233-9.
To read the gospels properly, I now believe, requires a knowledge of Jewish culture, Jewish symbols, Jewish icons and the tradition of Jewish storytelling. It requires an understanding of what the Jews call 'midrash.' Only those people who were completely unaware of these things could ever have come to think that the gospels were meant to be read literally.
- ^ Ogden 1976, pp. 409–411.
- ^ Mack 1993, p. 29.
- ^ a b Woodhead 2002, pp. 186, 193.
- ^ The Making of American Liberal Theology: Imagining Progressive Religion 1805–1900, edited by Gary J. Dorrien (Westminster John Knox Press, 2001), passim, search miracles.
- ^ Brandom 2000, p. 76.
- ^ Dorrien 2003, pp. 233, 413, 436.
- ^ Tamilio 2002.
- ^ a b c "Modernism: Christian Modernism".
- ^ a b Frei 2018.
- ^ a b Dorrien 2002, p. 203.
- ^ a b Campbell 1996, p. 74.
- ^ McGrath 2013, p. 198.
- ^ Rauschenbusch, A Theology for the Social Gospel, 1917.
- ^ "Concluding Unscientific Postscript", authored pseudonymously as Johannes Climacus, 1846.
- ^ History of Synoptic Tradition
- ^ The Courage to Be.
- ^ Kelley, Dean M. (1972) Why Conservative Churches are Growing
- ^ Rescuing the Bible from Fundamentalism
- ^ Alister McGrath. Christian Theology: An Introduction. 5th rev. ed. Wiley, 2011. Look in the index for "Schleiermacher" or "absolute dependence" and see them nearly always juxtaposed.
- ISBN 978-1-4514-8792-3.
[Per Rudolf Bultmann] his February 1924 lecture on the 'latest theological movement'—represented, he says, by Barth, Gogarten, and Thurneysen—when he explicitly contrasts this new movement with Herrmann and Troeltsch as the representatives of liberal theology. Bultmann then states the thesis of his lecture: 'The object [Gegenstand] of theology is God, and the charge against liberal theology is that it has dealt not with God but with human beings.' We see in this piece the maturation of the claim stated in his Eisenach lecture of 1920, namely, that liberal theology fails to reflect on the specific content of Christian faith. In that earlier writing he contrasts the spiritual content of genuine religion with the liberal emphasis on a particular moralistic form.
- ^ Peace Action web page accessed at http://www.peace-action.org/history
Sources
- Brandom, Ann-Marie (2000), "The Role of Language in Religious Education", in Barnes, L. Philip; Wright, Andrew; Brandom, Ann-Marie (eds.), Learning to Teach Religious Education in the Secondary School: A Companion to School Experience, Routledge, ISBN 978-0-415-19436-5.
- Campbell, Ted A. (1996). Christian Confessions: A Historical Introduction. Westminster John Knox Press. ISBN 978-0-664-25650-0.
- ISBN 978-0-664-22354-0.
- ——— (2003). The Making of American Liberal Theology: Idealism, Realism, and Modernity, 1900-1950. Vol. 2. Westminster John Knox Press. ISBN 978-0-664-22355-7.
- ——— (September 2002). "Modernisms in Theology: Interpreting American Liberal Theology, 1805–1950". American Journal of Theology and Philosophy. 23 (3). University of Illinois Press: 200–220. JSTOR 27944262.
- Frei, Hans Wilhelm (March 18, 2018). "Albrecht Ritschl". Encyclopædia Britannica. Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.
- ISBN 978-0-06-227568-4.
- ISBN 978-0-470-67286-0.
- "Modernism: Christian Modernism". Encyclopedia of Religion. Thomas Gale. 2005.
- JSTOR 1462813.
- Tamilio, John III (2002). "Friedrich Daniel Ernst Schleiermacher (1768-1834): Progenitor of Practical Theology". The Boston Collaborative Encyclopedia of Modern Western Theology.
- "Theological Liberalism". Encyclopædia Britannica. Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc. November 5, 2018.
- Woodhead, Linda (2002), "Christianity", in Woodhead, Linda; Fletcher, Paul (eds.), Religions in the Modern World: Traditions and Transformations, Routledge, pp. 177–209, ISBN 978-0-415-21783-5.
External links
- "Liberal Theology Today" – International Conference, Munich 2018
- The Progressive Christian Alliance
- Progressive Christian Network Britain
- Fellowship of Non-Subscribing Christians
- Liberalism By M. James Sawyer, Th.M., Ph.D.
- Christianity and Liberalism by J. Gresham Machen (1881–1937)
- The Christian Left – An Open Fellowship of Progressive Christians
- Liberal churches are dying. But conservative churches are thriving, Washington Post