{"id":270,"date":"2011-03-16T10:42:00","date_gmt":"2011-03-16T10:42:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/religionprof\/2011\/03\/beautiful-heresy\/"},"modified":"2011-03-16T10:42:00","modified_gmt":"2011-03-16T10:42:00","slug":"beautiful-heresy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/religionprof\/2011\/03\/beautiful-heresy.html","title":{"rendered":"Beautiful Heresy"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

There\u2019s been more about Rob Bell and Universalism around the blogosphere, and once again I felt that some of it deserved to be shared and brought together.<\/p>\n

The title of the post comes from Andrew\u2019s post<\/a> and is actually the name of a blog<\/a> he linked to. But it was sparked in conjunction with Hemant Mehta\u2019s paraphrase<\/a> of what he perceives to be going on around the Christian blogosphere: \u201cIs Rob Bell a heretic? Or worse, a universalist?\u201d Some remember a time when universalism was \u201cjust\u201d a \u201cheresy\u201d and not something worse. That isn\u2019t as long ago as Origen (who was the subject of a cartoon by NakedPastor<\/a>).<\/p>\n

<\/a><\/div>\n

But it isn\u2019t even<\/em> heresy universally (pun intended) in Christianity. Karl Barth is a famous recent exclusivist universalist, and that viewpoint has continued to find supporters in the Eastern Orthodox churches. Pithless Thoughts today\u00a0offered a cartoon depicting \u201cAn Orthodox View of Salvation\u201d<\/a> \u2013 perhaps closer to \u201cgenerous orthodoxy\u201d than strict universalism.<\/p>\n

<\/a><\/div>\n

\u00a0Otagosh suggests<\/a> that the real reason Rob Bell is the recipient of such ire is not that he is a universalist per se \u2013 plenty of Christian thinkers have been and continue to be \u2013\u00a0but the fact that he is spreading such views to a wider public, beyond the domain of an educated elite. But as Rachel Held Evans indicated recently<\/a>, there is a generation that is asking questions about such traditional doctrines. It isn\u2019t just any one person. And of course, when it comes to the things labeled \u201cheresy\u201d, it rarely is.<\/p>\n

Then there\u2019s\u00a0the latest in the series on \u201cBaptist Distinctives\u201d on the blog Stuff Fundies Like<\/a>. It focuses on the doctrine of \u201csoul freedom\u201d or freedom of conscience. And that leads to the irony one finds in fundamentalist baptist churches, that \u201cthere has never to my knowledge been a recorded case of a fundamentalist actually being caught practicing soul liberty and living to tell the tale.\u201d <\/p>\n

Just in time to get included here, Hacking Christianity posted a primer<\/a> on universalism and other key terms in these discussions, while Jason Boyett interviews himself<\/a> on this topic.<\/p>\n

Is there any orthodoxy that wasn\u2019t once heresy<\/a>\"\"<\/span>? Is there any heresy that isn\u2019t someone\u2019s orthodoxy?<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/div>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

There\u2019s been more about Rob Bell and Universalism around the blogosphere, and once again I felt that some of it deserved to be shared and brought together. The title of the post comes from Andrew\u2019s post and is actually the name of a blog he linked to. But it was sparked in conjunction with Hemant […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":136,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-270","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\nBeautiful Heresy<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"There's been more about Rob Bell and Universalism around the blogosphere, and once again I felt that some of it deserved to be shared and brought\" \/>\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\/religionprof\/2011\/03\/beautiful-heresy.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Beautiful Heresy\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"There's been more about Rob Bell and Universalism around the blogosphere, and once again I felt that some of it deserved to be shared and brought\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/religionprof\/2011\/03\/beautiful-heresy.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Religion Prof: The Blog of James F. 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