If you go to the second floor of the National Museum of American History in Washington, D.C., you’ll find a small room containing an 18th-century Bible whose pages are full of holes. They are carefully razor-cut empty spaces, so this was not an act of vandalism. It was, rather, a project begun by Thomas Jefferson when he was a mere 27 years old. Painstakingly removing those passages he thought reflected the actual teachings of Jesus of Nazareth, Jefferson literally cut and pasted them into a slimmer, different New Testament, and left behind the remnants (all on display until July 15). What did he edit out? He told us: “We must reduce our volume to the simple evangelists, select, even from them, the very words only of Jesus.” He removed what he felt were the “misconceptions” of Jesus’ followers, “expressing unintelligibly for others what they had not understood themselves.” And it wasn’t hard for him....
Christianity has never been in crisis; that which not Christianity is in crisis and always shall be. "No weapon that is formed against thee shall prosper; and every tongue that shall rise against thee in judgment thou shalt condemn. This is the heritage of the servants of the Lord, and their righteousness is of me, saith the Lord. "(Isaiah 54:17 KJV)
Jim Lincoln wrote: Not too many people in Thomas Jefferson's day called him a Christian he was a deist. He didn't believe in any miracles, and from this article he could almost belong to that group--a very misguided group--called, Red-Letter Christians.
I read the article and would have to agree, Jim. Sullivan, whom I assumed is a Catholic, seems to advocate a socio-political gospel which is nothing more than the liberal RC gospel of a lifetime of good works (of the law) in the hope of meriting salvation which negates Jesus' ultimate work of laying down His life for the sheep that the righteousness of God without the law might be revealed.
I think what Sullivan was saying is that in England, 'Roman Catholicsm is in crisis' which is neither here nor there as far as Christians and God's kingdom is concerned.
“...Others defend a rigid biblical literalism, adamantly wishing away a century and a half of scholarship that has clearly shown that the canonized Gospels were written decades after Jesus’ ministry, and are copies of copies of stories told by those with fallible memory. Still others insist that the earth is merely 6,000 years old—something we now know by the light of reason and science is simply untrue.”
“...this sheer Christianity, seeking truth without the expectation of resolution...”
Sullivan (a homosexual Catholic NR contributor) says all this, yet wants some sort of Christianity just the same. But how so? If there is no truth to be found in it, why is it worth the trouble then? I think he's an atheist, but simply afraid to admit it.
Hudson Taylor wrote: The inconsistencies of Christian people who, while professing to believe their Bibles, were yet content to live just as they would if there were no such Book, [has always] been one of the strongest arguments of my skeptical companions.
(Its a pretty good quote, though I had no idea who this fellow is. )
Not too many people in Thomas Jefferson's day called him a Christian he was a deist. He didn't believe in any miracles, and from this article he could almost belong to that group--a very misguided group--called, Red-Letter Christians. Many should listen to, The Believer and Politics.
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Sean E. Harris | 1/16/2011
Dr. Alan Cairns | 11/25/2008
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