Theology for the Masses

Keith Ward, in chapter 6 of Is Religion Dangerous, deals with the issue of morality and the Bible.  He addresses the charge that religious morality is based on an unthinking acceptance of old religious laws.  As his example, he brings up one of the most notorious of religious injunctions – Deuteronomy 20:15-18.

“But these instructions apply only to distant towns, not to the towns of the nations in the land you will enter. 16 In those towns that the Lord your God is giving you as a special possession, destroy every living thing. You must completely destroy the Hittites, Amorites, Canaanites, Perizzites, Hivites, and Jebusites, just as the Lord your God has commanded you.  This will prevent the people of the land from teaching you to imitate their detestable customs in the worship of their gods, which would cause you to sin deeply against the Lord your God.

Geno-what did you say?  Isn’t that the very piece of evidence that we use to indict the Nazi’s, their attempted genocide of the Jews?  If we are to be morally consistent, shouldn’t we reject this piece of the Old Testament and anything/anyone that relies on this passage/the book/the collection of books that uses it.  Any religion that accepts this as part of their canon (read: Jews and Christians) are guilty of blindly basing their morality on old and outdated religious laws.  There are three ways that religious adherents have approached this problem. 

Approach One : The Morally Primitive Imagining History

This approach looks at the historical record first.  They notice that the Hittites, Amorites, Canaanites, Perizzites, Hivites, and Jebusites keep popping back up in the narrative and the archeological record.  As such, the ban was not actually implemented.  Secondarily, they note that the text itself was “written” [1] around 700BCE, but are describing events that are much, much older.  Taking these two points in tandem, they hypothesize that scribes and priests wrote into the narrative God commanding the slaughter of “present day” rival groups to delegitimize any territorial claims they might have.  This moral tradition (that it is ok to slaughter your opponents wholesale for the protection of your group) is morally primitive and is later corrected by the Prophets. [2]  

Pros:

• The Genocide did not happen historically
• God is not a mass murderer

Cons:

• The Text is a pack of lies
• The authors of our text are a bunch of evil liars

Approach Two: A Unique Situation

This next approach bites the bullet(s).  They say – our text says that God gave the command.  However, this is a unique situation and not universally applicable.  God only intended it for the Israelites in this particular situation, which was necessary for the perpetuation of the Israelites.  We see that it is unique because of all of the other moral injunctions in the Hebrew Bible contradict “the Ban.”  This allows us to maintain the integrity of the text while cutting off this law from the others that we can abstract moral principles from.  It was said and it happened [3] but it was only for one situation and one time.

Pros:

• Maintains the integrity of the text and its authors
• The Ban was a one-time affair and not repeatable nor abstractable.

Cons:

• God is evil and bipolar
• We have mass murderers in our religious tradition.

Option Two point Five: A developing God

Ward does not mention this, but it is possible that God is developing along with his creation.  In order for him to know how and what to be and act, he must have something to act and be contrasted against.  After all, how can I know what red is if I have never seen it?  Likewise, how can God know what wrong is unless he has done it?  This is a Hegelian view of God.  Under this view, God had not fully developed his morals yet.  The narrative reflects God’s moral at that point in time.  Later on his morals developed and he understood that all life had value and that it was wrong of him to order the genocides.

Pros:

• God was not evil – only immature and is now mature through his interaction with his creation
• Maintains the integrity of the text

Cons:

• God is a developing being and is not always right and moral

Approach Three: Morally Primitive People Acting on a Self-Correcting Partial Understanding of God

This third approach tries to address the weaknesses of the other two.  It suggests that we have a roughly accurate reporting of what these people think was happening.  That is to say, the ancient Israelites thought that God wanted them to purge all peoples who threatened their identity.  After all, surviving and maintaining your identity was an incredibly difficult thing to do in the ancient world – something we cannot fully grasp in this blessed age of comfort and inconvenience.  They had part of God figured out – that she wants total devotion, but they also had part of him wrong – that he has deemed all human lives of worth and the wholesale slaughter of peoples is wrong.  In time, they would discover more and more about God and come to understand this, but at this time in their development, they had not reached this understanding.   There is some perception of the divine will, but a limited one.  Under this interpretive model, the Bible contains humanity’s developing understanding of God.

Pros:

• God is not evil
• Maintains the integrity of the text and the developing moral understanding of its authors
• The Ban was based on a partial but flawed understanding of God

Cons:

• The Bible is something to be wrestled with, not a direct perfect view of God and its interaction with history (can’t take it at face value)

Out of these three [4] views that Ward presents, I am uncertain as to which I follow.  My background tells me that all live is Gods and he can do with it as he pleases.  Based off of that, option two seems the most viable.  However, I also maintain that God is morally consistent and always has been.  This forces me to at least consider option three.  If I am forced to choose, this is the option I am going with right now, even though I am uncomfortable with how this view forces me to hold the Bible.  As Ward notes on page 138, “Believers have no magical route to moral certainty, nothing that undercuts the hard process of moral analysis and reflection.”  But it is the same for nonbelievers.  They have to give an account of how life can have meaning in the face of nothingness – or at least fleetingness.  If my flame flickers and then is snuffed out – does it really matter what it burned while it was here?  I am not saying atheists cannot give such an account [5] – only noting that it too is a path forged through analysis and reflection and is not self-evident.

1. that is, the “final” version was edited together around this time – not that these traditions were invented at this time. the traditions behind the text are much, much older [↩]
2. see Ezekiel 18:20 [↩]
3. or at least was attempted [↩]
4. four, if you add 2.5, the one that I added [↩]
5. even though I freely admit that I ultimately reject their account [↩]

Religion Overthrowing Heresy and Hatred by Legros the Younger

I know I ask this ‘bout once a year, but what do you do with the category of “heresy?”  I keep wondering about the distinction between someone having a wrong doctrine and someone being cut off from fellowship and naming by other Christians.

On the one hand, I think my reformed sisters (and brothers) are wrong about a great many of things. This wrongness that I assign to them (and them to me) cuts deep, it pertains to matters as important as the nature of God and the process of salvation.  But I still name them Christians and fellowship with them as much as they allow (which can vary greatly, let me tell you). 

On the other hand, I think of some of my Latter-Day Saints brothers (and sisters) are wrong about a great many things.  This wrongness that I assign to them (and them to me) cuts deep; it pertains to matters as important as the nature of God and the process of salvation.  Because of this, I refuse to name them Christians (unless I am talking about how they self-identify) and fellowship with them in terms of our common humanity and not on the basis of a shared faith.

I’ll name the one set of wrongness “heresy” and the other I’ll brand “disagreements."  These may seem to be obvious examples, but where do you draw the line between them?  I’m not interested in dead men’s formulations being quoted ad nauseum,  I wanna hear about how you all deal with such things on the ground, in real life. 

Also, I get the sense that Christians, here and throughout time, have been quick to name, reject, and delegitimize views different than our own, as if they no longer had anything meaningful to say to us.  Do you get this sense?  Is it just me?  I am reminded of countless blog posts, conversations, readings of Church fathers, and Christian columnists summarily dismissing an idea, movement, or everything a figure had to say on the basis of a boxed, wrapped, and delivered heresy that we assign to them.  I will recognize the value of striving for truth and truth alone, but I wonder how useful this approach is – or when this approach is useful and when it is counter-productive to the growing of the kingdom of God.

When we stifle opposing voices, we turn them off and turn them away.  Our truth cannot be conquered by a lie and it need not worry itself (nor do we need to worry ourselves) concerning this.  Additionally, it may just be the case that people with certain wrong views can teach me a great deal – maybe it is God’s will for me do learn from them.  But it can’t happen if I reject them wholesale.  Additionally, if we set ourselves up as a community that ostracizes at the hint of dissenting, then we risk stifling doubt and risk cast people who might have such doubt along their journey towards the Father out, thereby alienating them from God’s community. 

Anyway, this is just some ramblings from a tired person who can afford to question such things at the moment.  What do you do with such things? 

I try to stay out of politics as much as I can.  However, I did leave some feedback on a column over at Worldview Network that I bloged about the other day.  Much to my surprise, it survived moderation and even received two responses.  Since all of this reflects how I see the Kingdom of God and the Kingdom of America interacting, I thought I’d copy the discussion here.

My first comment:

How much should Christians be involved in political affairs? I don’t see Jesus or Paul or anyone of the New Cov era getting involved with Rome’s invasions or defense. I wonder (and I am not sold either way) if we followers of the prince of peace should be concerned with advancing and defending America’s political, economic, and cultural power and instead be concerned with showing God’s love to the world though our deeds and actions and rhetoric. What do you think?

First Reply by Lou

JESUS CARED FOR ALL

Are we not to lead all men to Jesus Christ. Would that not include people in the government, people of the government, and people for the government. I try to show the Way of Jesus Christ by all that do or do not do. Jesus was concerned for every single person and died for all. Should I be unconcerned about one group trying to take the property of others or even one group trying to take the life of the poorest and weakest and most innocent of the humans here on this earth. We know that most of these illegal immigrants have a religion that is hostile to true Christianity. Our government is giving this nation away to those who have not shed any blood, sweat, or tears for it. Should we not protect the innocent in this matter. I do care about a van load of children being killed by Mexican trucks that can not even read our signs let alone obey our laws. Lou

Second Reply by John

answer

Well, Christianity is giving. If we say we have love and aren’t involved in the affairs of the world, do we have love? You say Jesus was not involved in the affairs of the world, however, he battled the world, the world systems, and their beliefs. This is why He is hated and why we are to be hated. Jesus also said to give unto Caesar the things that are Caesar’s. He said this because governments are instituted by God and we are to be salt and light, defend righteousness, and be bold. To put this all together, I would say faith and love requires action. As for the USA, we still should defend the good and proactively try to change the bad. The principles of freedom and democracy are biblical and worth defending, bondage (Egypt) is the alternative and the unsaved seek it. John

My Response to John and Lou:

Hey, Thanks for the gentle feedback Lou and John. I appreciate your thoughts.  So, Lou, you rightly say that Jesus cared and died for all.  I think we should very much be concerned about one group taking the lives and livelihood from another group of people.  What I am not sure about is if war with that first group of people is the best way forward.  Why are we upset with one group taking from another?  Because it denies the image of God present in the second group.  Our challenge is to respond to the situation that shows Christ’s love for both the attackers and the attacked.  How do we as citizens of the Kingdom of God help the situation without denying the images of God in the attackers?  Christ loves and died for them as well.  I am not advocating any sort of easy solution, but rushing to defend them through killing their enemies seems to fly in the face of what Jesus advocates.

Lou, you also talk about how most illegal immigrants are hostile to Christianity and suggest that on this basis we keep them out.  (I might be misrepresenting you on this point, so let me know if I am, for that is not my intention.)  Assuming for the moment that this is the case, I love the idea of having people move in around me that are hostile to Christianity, for there are more opportunities to grow the Kingdom of God and help restore interpersonal relationships and to help them get to know their creator and to trust in Him for their salvation.

John, I completely agree with you when you say that we need to be involved in the affairs of this world.  I agree wholeheartedly.  I think we disagree in terms of how we go about doing that.  I see us as citizens of the Kingdom of God first and American citizens second.  As such, I think that Christians as a group and individually should act from our primary membership, as citizens of God’s Kingdom, not America’s Republic.  Jesus did confront the world, but he did not battle it (in terms of physical aggression, that is).  He used teaching, aid, and relationships to transform the world.  We should, as citizens of His Kingdom, employ the same tactics.  We are called to be good citizens, to be sure and God has instituted the governments of America (and Iran and China by the same logic).  But we are to be citizens of God’s Kingdom first and to our local political systems second.  I think (and I could be wrong) that God’s Kingdom would be better served if we acted via God’s Kingdom rather than via America’s interests and methods. 

What do you think?

If Jesus is the “Word,” [1] and we don’t want to be sloppy with our language and steer ourselves away from confusing the Word with the Bible, then what ought we call the Bible to emphasize it’s nature as God-breathed scripture?

I don’t like using “the word of God” because it confuses the Bible and Jesus and I want to stay as far away from that as possible.  Using the word “scripture” is what I end up doing, but it just does not carry the weight that I want it to carry.  The closest thing that I can think of for the Bible internally referring to itself (and I recognize the problems with even typing that sentence) is in 2 Timothy 3:16 where the author refers to writings that are inspired of God. [2]

So, it Bible and Scripture the best terms to use for the collection of books that we Christians consider to have been inspired by God?  What other options are there?  What do you use?

1. ‘Εν ἀρχῇ ἦν ὁ λόγος, καὶ ὁ λόγος ἦν πρὸς τὸν θεὸν, καὶ θεὸς ἦν ὁ λόγος. –> In [the] beginning was the Word, and the word was beside the God, and God was the Word. – John 1:1 [↩]
2. The author of 2 Timothy uses γραφή (gra-phay), lit – “a writing” a term that can mean anything from sacred writing, to a painting, to a legal document.  The author equates these “writings” with Θεόπνευστος (theh-o-neus-tahs).  This is a curious word, which only shows up in the NT and LXX here in 2 Tim 3:16 and is a combination of θεο + πνευστος, or God + spirit.  Thus, Θεόπνευστος becomes “inspired by God” or “[having] ( since in this context there is an “is” before the word because we have two nominatives being equated.) the spirit of God.” [↩]

I like the way Peter Enns articulates the problem of myth and biblical studies, especially given our discussions on the term.

The Following is from Page 40 of Inspiration and Incarnation:

Christians recoil from any suggestion that Genesis is in any way embedded in the mythologies of the ancient world.  On one level this is understandable.  After all, if the Bible and the gospel are true, and if that truth is bound up with historical events, you can’t have the beginning of the Bible get it so wrong.  It is important to understand, however, that not all historians of the ancient Near East use the word myth simply as shorthand for untrue, made-up, [or] storybook.  It may include these ideas for some, but many who use the term are trying to get at something deeper.  A more generous way of defining myth is that it is an ancient, premodern, prescientific way of addressing questions of ultimate origins and meaning in the form of stories: Who are we?  Where do we come from?

I think that is a definition we can all agree upon, no?

A few days ago I linked to a an article that addressed the “evil” god found in the Old Testament.  Throughout history different Christians have dealt with the sanctioned genocides and murder of infants etcetera in a variety of different ways.  Some people say God can kill anyone he wants and have anyone kill anyone he wants because he is lord over all.  Others say that god as portrayed in the Old Testament is a different god than the God in the New Testament.  Quite a few Christian groups during the first few centuries after the resurrection were attracted to this idea.  Other people use this issue to deconstruct, discredit, and ridicule Christianity, constructing Christianity as a fragile house of cards as if criticizing one or several things throughout the 4000+ year history/literary development of our faith negates everything else.  With that said though, we Christians need to wade through these issues because we risk becoming that house of cards if we ignore or gloss over this problem. 

Over the last few months, Greg Boyd’s has started to look at these issues.  Tom alerted me to Boyd’s project yesterday; here is Greg’s description of the problem and his aims:

What intensifies this problem even more is that it’s not like Psalms 137 is an isolated case of celebrated violence in the Old Testament. It’s found all over the place! The worst episodes happened when the Israelites enter the promised land. As they approached certain cities, the Israelites were commanded — by God — to slaughter men, women, children and even the animals! Yahweh is aiming at complete genocide of the Canaanite people. Could anything be more antithetical to what we learn about God in Jesus Christ? Honestly (we’ve got to be honest here, even if it hurts) doesn’t this depiction of God look more like the God of Osama Bin Laden than the Father of Jesus Christ?

In my opinion, this is the most challenging objection to the Christian faith and most difficult theological question of the Christian faith. It’s a problem I want to wrestle with in my next few posts. But I want you to be forewarned: If you think I’m going to have nice and tidy answers to this question, you’re going to be disappointed. I don’t. I’m still in process, entertaining a number of possibilities.

So far Boyd has written thirteen posts exploring this topic.  I look forward to reading through them in the near future.

1. Divinely Inspired Infanticide and Genocide?
2. What’s at Stake in Trying to Explain the Violent God of the Old Testament?
3. The Violent Strand of the Old Testament and Our Picture of God
4. OT Violence and Christian Behavior
5. Could Old Testament Warriors Have Been Mistaken?
6. A Defense of Eller’s Thesis
7. A Critique of Eller’s Thesis
8. Craigie: The Problem of War in the Old Testament, Part I
9. Revealing the Horror of War: Review of Craigie, Part II.
10. A Negative Object Lesson: Review of Craigie III
11. “Shadow” and “Reality”
12. Review of Ehrman’s "God’s Problem"
13. The Teleological Exegetical Principle and O.T. Violence

John 18:38:

Jesus answered, “My Kingdom is not an earthly kingdom. If it were, my followers would fight to keep me from being handed over to the Jewish leaders. But my Kingdom is not of this world.”

Two things come to mind as questions to think about:

1. What does this mean for Christians and governments?
2. Is the kingdom of god that we hear so much about on earth now?  Or is it just something that comes later?

Scott, over at Grace is Unfair, looks at Amos and Isaiah and comes to some troubling conclusions about personal and societal sins.

In Amos, God condemns oppression of the poor and sexual sin in the same breath.  And in Isaiah, God shows that He detests both when people amass too much land at the expense of the poor and when people act as drunkards.  Neither passage suggests that God is placing a greater value judgment on personal sin or societal sin.  What does that mean for us as Christians, who desire to do God’s will?

At the end of his post, he quotes James 4:17, which says: “So whoever knows the right thing to do and fails to do it, for him it is sin.” We know the right thing to do – therefore societal sins that we participate in are our own.

Of course, I don’t mean your giving should make life easy for others and hard for yourselves. I only mean that there should be some equality. Right now you have plenty and can help those who are in need. Later, they will have plenty and can share with you when you need it. In this way, things will be equal. As the Scriptures say:

“Those who gathered a lot had nothing left over, and those who gathered only a little had enough.”

- Paul, writing to the assembly of Christians in Corinth, 2 Cor. 8:13-15

Jake Malloy was another person who prayed at the Parkade Baptist Church “Battle for America” Concert of Prayer.  He prayed a prayer of repentance, one that was modeled after the fruits of the spirit.  Here is a taste:

I apologize that the commandment of love You set above all others we have treated so lightly, Forgive us, please, for not loving You with all our hearts because our earthly treasures consume us. Forgive us for not loving with all our souls because we corrupt them and treat our and others’ souls as if they were not eternal. Forgive us our unloving minds that spend little time studying who You are. We repent of using our strength to serve ourselves rather than serving others with the strength You provide. Forgive us, Father, for creating a structure where Christians are expected to be consumers rather than productive servants.

I encourage you to read and pray the rest here.

We, as Christians, are among the world’s best at sweeping, dismissive judgments. All one needs to do is subscribe to the Worldview Weekend newsletter to see that. This is not a new trend, however, as evidenced by the following quote by Epiphanius:

Passing this judgment [on them is like passing judgment] on a toothless lizard full of madness, I will go on to the next things, beloved, calling upon God to help our inadequacy and to enable us to fulfill our promise [i.e. to write this book] (Medicine Box, 49)

As dismissive judgments go, likening your opponent to a “toothless lizard full of madness” is pretty sweet. In this case the lizards in need of dentures were the Quintillians and they were dismissed because of their allowance of women as clergy and prophetesses.

I keep wondering how Luke 6:37 fits into all of this, if not in the 4th century, then in the current postmodern context in which we find ourselves.

Do not judge others, and you will not be judged. Do not condemn others, or it will all come back against you. Forgive others, and you will be forgiven.

Here’s the rub: how can I actually not judge and still maintain myself?

I consider myself to be a collection of definitions.  I am 6′1” tall.  I like basketball; I hate baseball.  I follow Christ.  I determine that which I am. Well, the things that I can choose – I can’t choose to be a white male, for instance.  I determine this by means of judgment.  I judge for myself that baseball is three minutes of action crammed into three hours.  I determine that math is a good way to use numbers.  I determine that there is nothing sweeter than a drop step or a juke+spin+hook-shot in basketball.  How am I not to judge, which is a command from the One that I follow when judgments necessarily make up an individual?  In other places in the Bible, we are commanded to test the spirits, to determine what is right.  How do we reconcile this?

As best as I can understand it, there is a distinguishment between moral and factual judgments.  We are to make so-called factual judgments about matters and hold them over and above the judgments of others.  On the other hand, we are to refrain from making moral judgments about people and their positions.

While this seems almost self-explanatory, I know I often need reminding of this.  Just look through the archives of masstheology.com, hundiejo.com, or brendoman.com as evidence of this.

What do you do with Luke 6:37?

One of the themes in my Sunday school class is justice. We have looked at God’s desire for material justice [1] in the world. We have looked at such verses as Isaiah 61:8, Zech 7:8-10, and James 1:27; all of which make it crystal clear that one of our functions in this world is to work towards material justice as well as the spiritual redemption of humankind.

I get the small scale application of this issue. Well, I am lying, I kinda get it. I know how to act justly towards the individual people in my life. I might not be overly good at it, but it is something I am working towards.

I μέν see individual Christians working towards peace and material justice in individual lives as the answer to Ivan’s moral problem with God in “Rebellion,” what δέ I can’t see is how this works on a large scale. I am of the firm understanding that throwing money at the problem (and here I am most specifically thinking about aid to Africa here) only at best perpetuates the problem and quite possibly makes things worse.

Also, I am not a big fan of certain statistics used in showing the gap in material possessions between our world and the developing world. Statistics such as “X people only make $1 a day” assume that the base model for human life is a capitalistic, consumeristic model, as if to say the problem won’t be fixed until They make as much money as Us. Now, at the same time, I see the usefulness of these stats, they help shatter certain conceptions about the material conditions in which these peoples find themselves and help to highlight the need for justice in their lives. What I don’t want to do is bring the God of materialism along with the God of Christianity to the Other.

Whenever I go a thinking about a widespread, “big picture” plan of action, I keep coming the conclusion that a political solution is needed. Given the nature of certain countries’ leaders, a political solution must be predicated by a military solution. Yet, all of this seems to go against my “Kingdom of God” theology. As such, I am at a loss. I know how I would go about trying to fix the problem apart from Christian values, but when I factor those in, I am left with a myriad of contradictions.

And yet, God still demands that we help those in need, and I am to do what God demands. What I need here in an infusion of creativity and ideas. How can we help those in need in the concrete?

I get the need, I need a plan.

1. By material justice, I don’t mean equal possessions. I am talking about real and tangible justice in this world, as contrasted with waiting around for the just situation we will find in the next. [↩]

Dan, at brendoman.com refers us to two lists of God’s that are rejected by two groups, Christians and Atheists.

The question becomes: Why do you believe in only one of these – and what makes that one so special to the point of rejecting all the other ones? I encourage you all to answer that question as it is a worthy one.

Brendoman.com :: Gods we don’t believe in

This is my best answer so far. What’s yours?

In the passion account of Mark’s Gospel three disciples figure prominently: one the one hand, two of the twelve – Judas who betrays Jesus and Peter who denies him – and on the other, the unnamed woman who anoints Jesus. But while the stories of Judas and Peter are engraved in the memory of Christians, the story of the woman is virtually forgotten.

Although Jesus pronounces in Mark: “And truly I say to you, wherever the gospel is preached in the whole world, what she has done will be told in memory of her.” (Mark 14:9), the woman’s prophetic sign-action did not become a part of the gospel knowledge of Christians. Even her name is lost to us. Wherever the gospel is proclaimed and the Eucharist celebrated another story is told: the story of the apostle who betrayed Jesus. The name of the betrayer is remembered, but the name of the faithful disciple is forgotten because she was a woman.

A little while ago a friend of mine asked me why Christians are always attempting to rally against films and other media that threaten their worldview. He said that he just did not understand what the hub-bub was all about; i) Christians are by far the majority in the US, ii)these pieces of media often are not direct threats, and iii) the actual impact of these media are quite small. However, to listen to some of the claims in Christian social circles and media it seems as through Chicken Little is running around pointing at the sky.

My friend asked me this over lunch, so I tried to give the best improv answer as I could. Here are the main points:

• Cultural Hegemony Since Christians have the dominate cultural position, anything that critiques or offers alternatives is seen as a threat to their hegemony and must be reacted against.
• Shining City on a Hill Through out American history, Christians have been eager to see America as the New Israel, God’s replacement chosen land for the replacement of Israel.
• Israel as a Template of US History Given that the US is the new Israel, people in the US should be weary of making the same mistakes that Israel did in the First Testament. If We start to allow ungodly elements into our culture, God will send punishments upon the US, just as She did to Israel.
• Sinner, Keep Thy Thoughts Pure Certain Christians see any media that deviates from the “biblical” worldview as a sort of pollution. The more and more pollution one takes in, the more polluted the person becomes and the greater the chance that the person will die from it.
• Persecution Syndrome Despite the fact that the US is a nation of Christians and that Christianity is the implicit national religion, Christians often see themselves as a minority stakeholder in US culture, one that is always being picked on by Secularism.

I am not trying to evaluate these ideas (I can, I have strong views on the acceptance or rejections of each one) just want to get a feel for how the Christians that get worked up over the latest threat. Do you all think these apply, or am I off base? Are there any that I am missing?