Noted Heretic Popular With ELCA

Exposing the ELCA ^ | 3/1/13 | Dan Skogen

[rhema]

Why would a Christian denomination pay a lecturer to speak at their events who does not believe Jesus physically rose from the dead? Why would the same denomination recommend and use that lecturer's teaching resources when he doesn't even believe God exists? Those are good questions every lay person should be asking the leadership of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America.

The lecturer I am referring to is John Dominic Crossan, co-founder of the Jesus Seminar (read about it here) and popular New Testament scholar. Let me first show you the multitude of ways the ELCA has sought Crossan and provided access to his teachings, then we will document some specifics of what this man teaches and believes

[rhema]

Birds of a feather apostatize together.

[mosesdapoet]

Dan Skogen’s exposing the ECLA raises questions I would like to ask Catholic bishops on why Georgetown is a hotbed of radicalism, and why Obama gets invited to Notre Dame.

[right way right]

The ELCA is NOT a Christian organization.

[rhema]

The invitation was bad enough. The awarding of a Juris Doctor Honoris Causa degree was scandalous.

Many bishops opposed the invitation. South Bend Bishop John D'Arcy refused to attend Notre Dame's commencement because of the honorary degree award to Obama. D'Arcy rebuked the university and told it to "recommit itself to the primacy of truth over prestige."

[muawiyah]

Folks who apostasize from the ELCA become Christians.

[SgtHooper]

WOW!

[rhema]

The ELCA has become the Jesus Seminar writ large.

Jesus Seminarians like Crossan and Borg are lionized in ELCA leadership circles, albeit often with weaselly evasions along the lines of: "While we don't endorse everything Crossan and Borg say, there is still much we can learn from them." Yeah, sure. If the ELCA had been around in the fourth century, it would have been saying, "While we don't endorse everything Arius says, there is still much we can learn from him."

Where the ELCA and the Jesus Seminar most resemble each other is in both groups' avidity to sit in judgment on the Bible and alter God's Word to suit their sin-spurred whimsies. The Jesus Seminarians capriciously voted that Jesus really said only 18 percent of the words attributed to Him in the New Testament. The ELCA capriciously voted -- after years of "study" commission "findings" that chipped away at the foundation -- that the Bible really doesn't mean what it plainly says about the sinfulness of homosexual sex.

The Jesus Seminar and the ELCA have another similarity: both enfeebled groups are fading rapidly into well-deserved marginalization. An official report by the ELCA revealed that the denomination suffered a net loss of 370 congregations in 2011, along with a loss of 213,000 members.

ELCA losses 2009-2011:

more than 500,000 members

more than 750 congregations

[rhema]

"And what union can there be between God's temple and idols? For we are the temple of the living God. As God said: "I will live in them and walk among them. I will be their God, and they will be my people. Therefore, come out from among unbelievers, and separate yourselves from them, says the LORD. Don't touch their filthy things, and I will welcome you. And I will be your Father, and you will be my sons and daughters, says the LORD Almighty."

[rhema]

Indeed.

[stevem]

Why would a Christian denomination pay a lecturer to speak at their events who does not believe Jesus physically rose from the dead? Why would the same denomination recommend and use that lecturer's teaching resources when he doesn't even believe God exist?

For the same reason that a putative Catholic University (aka Notre Dame) would invite the Balloon-head in Chief to give a commencement address. They did so even after the Balloon-head in Chief made it clear that any and every live birth represents a failure of cosmic proportions.

They did it because the putative Catholic University (aka Notre Dame) is no longer Catholic.

The ELCA cadre in question no longer even pretends to be Christian. Real Christians embarrass them.

[boatbums]

When I was in Bible college, we had guest speakers a few times who were not what I would call orthodox in their beliefs. One in particular I remember said he didn't believe Moses parted the Red Sea and then went on and on about it really being the "Reed" Sea and it was shallow, and a special low tide when they crossed, blah, blah, blah. The main reason why he was allowed to speak was so that we could pepper him with questions such as how a tide could part a body of water across from east to west, the people walked on dry land (all million+), a "wall" of water was on each side of them as they walked over AND the Egyptian army was drowned with all their horses. It was a good experience to test our thinking skills and apologetics as well as being aware what thinking was out there.

Now why a church leadership would allow a person who denied some of the central tenets of Christianity to preach to the people in the church and make his materials available to study, I do not know. I think probably that they are confused about what and why they believe or they stopped being a Christian body altogether. There's no GOOD reason.

[Mrs. Don-o]

This is really excellent, boatbums.

When my (now 23-year old Marine) firstborn son was a little boy, I told him about the Exodus, repeatedly emphasizing that the water was "like a wall to their right and to their left." He was skipping along with me one day when he was about age 5, going across a muddy area, and he was grabbing invisible "somethings" out of the air and putting them in a little basket he was carrying.

"What are you doing, Ben?"

"Picking fishes out of the wall."

[boatbums]

Love it! Thanks for sharing that.