We run our website the way we wished the whole internet worked: we provide high quality original content with no ads. We are funded solely by your direct support. Please consider supporting this project.
Read This Before You Drop the H-Bomb (“Heretic”) on a Fellow Christian
Image by yhoitink via Flickr
Greg co-wrote the following article on heresy with Frank Viola for BeliefNet. Check it out!
“Heretic.” It’s a favorite word that many Christians have no problem dropping on the heads of their fellow sisters and brothers.
In common parlance, the term is used to describe any person who disagrees with “orthodox Christian teaching.” The problem, of course, is that there are different perspectives on what exactly constitutes “orthodox Christian teaching.”
Some claim this for Calvinism, while others claim this for Arminianism, or for Roman Catholicism, or for Eastern Orthodoxy.
And we must not forget the many Fundamentalist groups who reserve the term “orthodox” only for people who agree with every one of their distinctive beliefs and/or practices.
2,000 years down the church history pike and the body of Christ is sliced and diced into over 33,000 fragments, some of which pull the heresy lever at everyone else without blinking.
In this essay, we are definitely not going to suggest that false teaching doesn’t exist. It existed at the time of Jesus and Paul, and it exists today.
What we are going to suggest is that many people are using the word “heretic” in ways that are not biblical and/or that do not align with its use in church tradition. And this, we believe, brings disrepute on the body of Christ.
Click here to read the rest of the article on BeliefNet.
Category: General
Tags: Belief, Frank Viola, Heresy, Orthodoxy, Unity
Topics: Following Jesus
Related Reading
Podcast: What is Heresy?
Greg defines ‘Heresy’ and looks at why it is often viewed as a ‘mean-y’ word. http://traffic.libsyn.com/askgregboyd/Episode_0262.mp3
The Extremity of God’s Love
In response to questions he has received about whether Jesus was actually separated from the Father on the cross, Greg fleshes out his perspective on this. The love that unites the Trinity is the very same love that resulted in the separation of the Father from the Son. This separation actually expresses the great love…
Paul Teaches Free Will, Not Determinism: Romans 9, Part 3
In this series of posts, I am challenging the deterministic reading of Romans 9, which interprets Paul’s teaching as saying that God chooses some to be saved and others to be damned. There are six arguments that I offer to challenge this popular view. Today, I will look at the fourth. Argument #4: Paul’s Summary and…
Video Q&A: Do you think Jehovah’s Witnesses and Mormons are saved?
Does Greg believe that everyone goes to Heaven regardless of their beliefs? Find out here.
Podcast: What Should I Do If My Friends Call Me a Heretic?
Greg talks about the burden of novelty. http://traffic.libsyn.com/askgregboyd/Episode_0283.mp3 Photo by Lily Lvnatikk on Unsplash
A Rational Defense of Belief in God
The New York Times recently posted a review of Alvin Plantinga’s book, Where the Conflict Really Lies: Science, Religion, and Naturalism. In it, Plantinga argues on philosophical grounds that, among other things, theism is not in conflict with science, that a belief in naturalism along with evolution is contradictory, and that “Faith…is another basic way of forming beliefs, distinct…