Deconstruction, or Demolition?

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Mendalla said:
Questioning is quite important. I like questions. Perhaps even more than answers. I get giddy when I hear a scientist say things like, "This raises more questions than it answers" because it means the cool stuff will keep on coming. Not taking things at face value but wanting to get into the nuts and bolts, to ask "why" and "how", is why I am where I am in life (an IT geek).

And I see no reason to exempt my spiritual life from that. I have learned far more from that questioning than from sermons, even if some of the better sermons have helped with both answers and raising new questions.
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My first year theology prof told us that questions were far more important than answers both for the reasons you list but also because often the questions we ask (or how we ask them) will actually influence what answer we get.

I routinely tell people in sermons and Bible Study that I think it is my job to ask questions but not necessarily to provide answers to those same questions.
 
GordW said:
I routinely tell people in sermons and Bible Study that I think it is my job to ask questions but not necessarily to provide answers to those same questions.
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Which is a refreshing thing to hear given how many preachers seem to want to be seen as the ones with all the answers. I suppose that might correlate with theological spectrum, though. Conservative tend more to preaching "right" answers while liberal-progressive are more about putting ideas out there and asking questions. And I was going to lump RC and EO priests with the conservatives, but Richard Rohr and a few others seem to be bucking that (and some in the past have, too, often to the detriment of their priesthood).
 
In a world that hates to be questioned ... pose the question as something that they will not comprehend ... thus the air of myth! Double breas tere?

I left an engineering course after 4 1/2 years ... because the Profs often went by the book ... no matter what exceptions were apparent ... fixation? Pious what?

Perhaps Pri auraed ... Ouranos ... it is snaky ... they still haven't resolved micro plas*tique toxin a kind of itchy to break free as fey ... then it blows ... some say it swings lo' ... as Louis! Blues ... near black ... that cannot be said without some conflict! Inhumanity that's sad 's tique ... causes twitches ... other syndromes!

Tis a NU rael 'd item ... Like Mystery Disease ... mighty con 'd real ... only the pros can speak it as di ag'n osis ... will is pas bi?
 
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Interesting in that our bible study leader today was Esther, a LLWL. She has just come back from winter in Florida, where she attempted to lead a bible study using our process, except on the book of Nehemiah. It was quite difficult for these women (no men) to get questions, not answers.
 
You know, thinking about the whole questions vs. answers thing, I realized that the idea of religion being about questions, not definitive answers, is very much a modern, if not post-modern, thing. Up to at least the Enlightenment, at least in the West, religion was about answers. Traditional religions, classical European paganism, and such dealt with how and whys of the world. Early and medieval Christianity were about Jesus as the "answer" to the problems of the world. Asking questions happened, but such people were kind of outliers and even got branded as "heretics" or similar. Asking questions was really more the province of philosophy and even there, you had a lot of philosophers posing questions that they then gave their own answers to. Is that why there is still resistance to questioning in religion, at least in organized religion, today? Because that simply was not how religion his historically/traditionally worked?
 
Questions are dangerous to institutions. Members might ask questions that could lead to serious questioning of the institution itself.
 
jimkenney12 said:
Questions are dangerous to institutions. Members might ask questions that could lead to serious questioning of the institution itself.
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Which, really, is what we are seeing in some religious institutions in the West, isn't it? With a significant percentage of the laity now educated and literate, questions are asked and answers given are examined. Spiritual life is no longer governed by institutional fiat, and the laity have the power to ask questions rather than meekly accept what the clergy tell them and to change tradition if another gives a (to them) better answer.
 
Mendalla said:
That may actually be no worse than turning unquestioned, unexamined doctrines into idols.
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The difference is the standard progressive practice of in effect turnng questions into idolatry is driving educated young adults away from progressive churches like UCCan,l whereas the hard questions stimulate the discipline of systematic theology.
How interesting that, as expected, neither Rev. Jim nor other progressives here have so far not risen to my challenge to actually provide a list of the most threatening pressing questions actually often asked by their members.
 
Mystic said:
The difference is the standard progressive practice of in effect turnng questions into idolatry is driving educated young adults away from progressive churches like UCCan,l whereas the hard questions stimulate the discipline of systematic theology.
How interesting that, as expected, neither Rev. Jim nor other progressives here have so far not risen to my challenge to actually provide a list of the most threatening pressing questions actually often asked by their members.
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Question the'ole thing as largely significant when integral (that's when one put it all together from a scattered idolization)! The onus is on us ... honestly many are too buried to observe what's all out there ... the stuff we've been told without logic is insane!

Presently Seinfeld is presenting an argument against passion alone ... it needs a twin! Is onus often honest in a secular place where the main passion is to win and put the neighbor down? Thus doubts (dew bees, or dou est, when whetted for the Kohl'n ho'meo). Busted words? Drippy ...

Can one break their onus easily while some say their word is true as God (with nothing supporting that stance)? There we are at "nothing" again ... sort of like a wandering permutation ...
 
I am on holidays in Cyprus with about an hour a day for checking emails.
1. What does ... mean?
2. Why go to church?
3. Why does this church say/do/support ....?
4. Is the .... supposed to .....? (any church leader; action or decision or. )

Questions that touch on arbitrary practices of a congregation that are not grounded on faith or faith objectives; questions that expose how power works in the church.
 
Does God have an arbitrary backup ... resembling and opposed advocate? Imagine a dark essence like that under where you're laid out for observation ...

Then there's the obit and the eulogy that pumps up the dead ... ever hear anything like it? Stilled authority ... downers????
 
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