I used to wonder why I wasted all those years studying modern theology. One thoelogian leads to studying another, just like following college and pro football. If someone follows the Packers, every pro game has significance. College football is just the same. I get emails about Notre Dame, with multiple Big Stories each week. For Domers, the alcholoic wide receiver is big news, and so is latest recruitment success or failure. For that reason, I watch very little football all year, college or pro.
My seminary professors were very big on Tillich, but my advisor at Notre Dame (Hommes) and his colleague (Fiorenza) were Tillich fanatics. Thus I read and took notes on Tillich. Karl Barth was important for Hauerwas, my dissertation advisor, but Barth actually taught my dissertation director, John Howard Yoder. In addition, Fiorenza (now at Harvard) was president of the Barth Society, so he was considered an expert on the Communist pastor of Safenwill.
Barth is important for all Lutherans, because he remains the official theologian of Fuller Seminary. Barth's students at Fuller were responsible for turning Fuller from mild inerrancy to anti-inerrancy.
Bonhoeffer is a modern who seems safe for all synods. SP Harrison quotes him adoringly. Bonhoeffer taught at Union Seminary in NYC, aka The Devil's Playground. Tillich tuaght at Union as well. Both men were Nazi sympathizers, if you look below the talking points about both theologians. Is that better or worse than being an advocate for Communism, as Barth and his hawt mistress (Kirschbaum) were.
Don't get me started on Schleiermacher, another rationalist from Halle. He never settled his doubts about the Christian faith, so he became the pivotal theologian for the moderns. He learned to write elegantly about the Christian faith without believing in the Word of God. Some wits call this faith without belief. ELCA oozes faith without belief, and the Syn Conference is dominated by it via Fuller.
All these theologians and many more are indebted to Kant, the 19th century philosopher. Modern theology--with a few rare exceptions, like Sasse--is a combination of rationalism from philosophy and Biblical terms from the past.
Jesus was born during the beginnings of the Roman Empire, since the Republic was already dead. The Roman Empire's culture was Greek, and all educated people spoke and wrote Greek, quoting it liberally in their letters. Greek was the soi-disant French language of the time. Therefore, the Christian faith was often articulated in the language of the philosophers. Augustine was a genius in this culture, and his conversion meant that all future theologians would share the language and thought of the philosophers.
Luther was suspicious of philosophical thought, but not because he was untrained in it. As an Augustinian monk of the Middle Ages, he knew Medieval philosophy and theology better than the pope. He also realized where that mindset could lead, based on assumptions. The ultimate Medieval philosopher and theologian was Aquinas, part of a college course in Medieval Latin. The Angelic Doctor, as he is called, used syllogisms to form his massive works.
Although Luther could argue with the best of theologians, using his vast knowledge of history and philosophy, he chose to use the Word alone as the basis for all assumptions.
For instance, if we accept the assumption that God would not let His vicar (the pope) make an error, then anything from the Antichrist is true. With a few changes in place, this is the assumption of Syn Conference and ELCA pastors: God would not allow Whorely Mother Synod to make a mistake. Therefore, any deviation from Holy Mother is a breach of fellowship, worthy of excommunication and shunning.
Fuller Means Barth and Kant
Laity have trouble with the agenda of the Lutheran synods (ELCA on down) because most people think in Biblical terms, like Luther, rather than in secular terms, like the Fuller-trained businessmen who run the synods.
They are not very good businessmen, because they have run their organizations into the ground. Any other retailer would fire them, offering many of them up for prosecution on felony obstruction and fraud charges. But these yahoos know how to take care of one another while fooling the laity.
UOJ Means Schleiermacher and Kant
Those who spend their time with Luther's sermons and the Bible have an immediate allergic reaction to Universal Objective Justification.
UOJ depends on logic, beginning with rationalistic assumptions. The Stormtroopers are unfazed by their own side-stepping of Biblical revelation and Confessional clarity. They do not realize they are channeling Barth, Schleiermacher, and Knapp because the Syn Conference con artists have portrayed a very select group of writers as the ultimate in orthodoxy. They also try to fool people into thinking that Means of Grace theologians embraced UOJ before it was invented by the Pietists.
I can go through my database and find UOJ people mentioning Calov, Gerhard, and Luther as their allies in "God declaring the entire world forgiven." But actual quotations prove otherwise.
UOJ, like ELCA, Is All Condemnation
The most energetic UOJ guardians are also the most condemning. In the name of all-grace and all-forgiveness, they spend most of their time reviling and excommunicating. As Luther said, lacking faith means there is nothing but Law.
For example, ELCA condemns anyone who questions the necessity of ordaining homosexuals and performing homosexual marriages. Although ELCA questioned those policies only a few years ago, to do so now is an invitation for scorn, abuse, and shunning. I told 29a he was a bigot, then a racist, for doubting ELCA's wisdom. He laughed, knowing what I was doing.
Tim Glende's anonymous blog is nothing but condemnation, albeit carried out in a clownish and illiterate fashion. Everyone is forgiven without faith, so he condemns with the law (his law) because he is all law. St. Peter in Freedom will die without Groeschel being plagiarized. But if someone identifies plagiarism as such, Glende will fire him (the circuit pastor) or excommunicate him (Techlin) during Holy Week.
Likewise, Kudu Don Patterson is open minded about all religious teachers. He gathered WELS church workers together to hear the pan-demon confab at Orlando, Florida. Let us spoil the Egyptians and rob them of their precious gems, gold, and silver. Confidential to VP Patterson - it costs a lot of money to carry out this spoiling, no?
But such diversity of thought is not to be tolerated in the congregation. If someone questions UOJ or criticizes blowing $35,000 on Cornerstone, he is cut off, excommunicated. The VP of the district, Patterson hisself, will be glad to visit with Joe and Lisa Krohn, as long as the newly excommunicated simply sit and listen. Only a short time ago, Joe was appointed an elder in the congregation. That means he can be an elder as long as he follows orders with glazed eyes and an empty mind.
But -
In the midst of this, there is love. Yes, there is no love like that of one UOJ Stormtrooper for another. Nothing binds people together like the joy of kicking out sincere members who want to discuss doctrine.
Get your Shamwow hankies out. Kudu Don Patterson and Tim the Bully Glende became Facebook friends in May of 2011. Blest be the tie that binds.
Luther to Zwingli - You Have Another Spirit
Luther knew that Zwingli was a rationalist, an Enthusiast who did not attribute all things to the Holy Spirit working through the Word. He refused to shake Zwingli's hand, saying, "You have another spirit."
That is true of the UOJ/CG Enthusiasts of today. They have another spirit. They are making plans, marketing the Gospel, entertaining the seekers, popping popcorn and brewing coffee for the Old Adam and Old Eve.
The Syn Conference pastor says, "My future rests in the hands of Holy Mother Synod. I must obey or I will starve to death. I must submit or I will not have a congregation."
The Word of God says that the Triune God is more powerful than any synod official, that the treasures of the Gospel are worth far more than a bowl of lentil soup.
