Unitarians' Unsplit Hairs<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"It's hard to tell from the report whether the new Bishop of Albany, Edward Snarfenberger, was giving the kind of after dinner talk he the\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davidmills\/2014\/10\/unitarians-splitting-hairs\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Unitarians' Unsplit Hairs\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"It's hard to tell from the report whether the new Bishop of Albany, Edward Snarfenberger, was giving the kind of after dinner talk he the\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davidmills\/2014\/10\/unitarians-splitting-hairs\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"David 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{"id":1098,"date":"2014-10-09T09:30:45","date_gmt":"2014-10-09T13:30:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/davidmills\/?p=1098"},"modified":"2014-10-08T22:57:26","modified_gmt":"2014-10-09T02:57:26","slug":"unitarians-splitting-hairs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davidmills\/2014\/10\/unitarians-splitting-hairs\/","title":{"rendered":"Unitarians’ Unsplit Hairs"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

But amusing as the poor befuddled but earnest man\u2019s response is, I want to look at one sentence:<\/p>\n

In the interfaith world, we often focus our energies on where we agree rather than splitting the theological hairs where we disagree. \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

The man is a Unitarian-Universalist<\/em>. He believes, as the old joke goes, in at most one God. The difference between whatever it is he believes \u2014 he describes himself as \u201ca Unitarian Universalist that focuses on shared values rather than shared beliefs\u201d<\/span>\u00a0\u2014 and the Christian belief in the Holy Trinity is tiny, so tiny as to be irrelevant. Just splitting hairs, trying to distinguish the two.<\/p>\n

We think that with the Trinity comes the Incarnation and all that lovely salvation and God became man so that man might become god stuff. Won\u2019t be missed, he suggests. Not important.\u00a0God became man, God (whoever or whatever that is) didn\u2019t become man, just a split hair\u2019s difference.<\/p>\n

And that surprising mention of Hell. Our pastor undoubtedly rejects the whole idea, except perhaps as an antiquated and dangerous metaphor. Eternal\u00a0alienation from God a possibility, not to possibility, no real difference there.<\/p>\n

Hell\u2019s not\u00a0often mentioned, I\u2019ll grant, but if the Church is right about it, it\u2019s something her bishops will feel a need to warn people about, like, oh, a doctor telling you about the ebola virus in that tent over there.<\/p>\n

And I want even start on the muddle of \u201cvalues\u201d rather than \u201cbeliefs.\u201d Splitting hairs, oh my paws and whiskers.*<\/p>\n

My thanks to Stephen Smith and William Tighe for the link.<\/em><\/p>\n

* An expression used by Professor Gervase Fen in the very entertaining mystery stories by Edmund Crispin.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"