Comments Demanding Response

There’s been some good stuff in the comment section of the last post. If you will allow me to temporarily leave the subject of the Trinity and venture into the land of theological method, I have questions for a couple of you:

Scott: What, exactly, is orthodoxy? In other words, how do you define or determine that in an age where truly ecumenical church councils are no longer realistic? I have previously proposed the “authority of interpretive communities,” a la Stanley Fish. What do you propose (of course avoiding the hegemony of academic elites being the ones to determine orthodoxy)?

Jason: Do you really mean to say that there are non-negotiables in Christian theology? Do you really mean to defend dogma? Couldn’t Lyotard’s famous dictum be amended to state that the postmodern condition is one of “incredulity toward dogmas”? How does one enter into a truly open theological dialogue if your opening salvo is, “I will never not believe in X doctrine”?

What I’m trying to challenge here is the foundationalism inherent in both of these positions. I think there is an “open methodology” out there for emerging theology. In my mind, it’s something like an open, hermeneutical process, not a totalzing scheme or a one-size-fits-all method.

Of course, anyone can chime in on these…