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| How did this get into print without the clergy laughing out loud? According to Luther, Scaer should be deprived of food, driven out of town, baited by dogs, and pelted with manure. If you do not know that, you should study The Large Catechism. |
I remember Frank Fiorenza pouncing on someone in his seminar on ecclesiology at Notre Dame. The doctoral students, MA students, and seminarians were in the same class. We met at the seminary across the lake from the main campus.
Frank is now at Harvard, holding an endowed professorship, and anyone can discern why. Frank asked about the sources for the student's paper on Luther. "So, what is wrong with quoting from What Luther Says?" - Fiorenza asked rhetorically. I was not the target, and I did not know where this was going. Frank answered his own question. "This is a Missouri Synod book, and it is conservative."
That little polemic from Frank left me wondering, "Why is it so bad to quote actual sources in a graduate seminar?" Later I got the full treatment when my paper got the third degree on every possible detail. One of the priests said to me, "Greg, he really grilled you."
I learned from Frank and his professor wife Elizabeth - (Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza - Krister Stendahl Professor of Divinity) also at Harvard - that conservative was a label that meant "not to be trusted under any circumstances and tainted with faith." When I exposed Paul Tillich during a presentation on the great phony, Frank said, "Lutherans don't understand Tillich." All I did was quote from a biography of Tillich, written by a fellow professor at Union, NYC, not exactly a conservative source.
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| Schleiermacher went to Halle and taught at Halle - he midwifed the age of modern theology, Protestant and Catholic. |
Halle University - The Watershed, the Font of All Apostasy
If possible, I will write a long essay on Calvin ruining Protestantism, but Calvin is not an attractive figure for most theologians. The most obvious turning point, built on Calvin's foundation of rationalism, is Halle University, established to promote a Biblical piety.
Halle is the most influential birthplace of modern theology for several reasons. One is its role as the main center - not the only one - of Pietism. This noble experiment, like the Volstead Act, had the opposite effect from what was intended. Just as the Volstead Act began an era of lawlessness and booze (not just in WELS), Halle began an era of Biblical and doctrinal apostasy.
Secondly, Pietism had the advantage of not being a single denomination or having a single organization's figure. For example, the ELCA today traces back to Muhlenberg, from Halle. The Wisconsin Synod's most famous theologian is Adolph Hoenecke, who graduated from Halle University. The first bishop of the LCMS (Martin Stephan, STD) taught Justification without Faith to the first pope of the sect (CFW Walther, BA). The Scandinavians were also Pietists.
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| Woods, a Calvinist quoted above, explained Knapp's theology as Objective Justification and Subjective Justification. |
The beauty of Schleiermacher's work is obvious to the discerning. He taught faith without belief, using the words of Christianity while denying their meaning. When one of my friends on Facebook writes a book on Justification, he means universal absolution without faith, just as Karl Barth did. Some dabblers in theology believe Barth's criticism of Schleiermacher, but Barth saw the genius in using the words to destroy the religion from the inside. Barth and his mistress, Charlotte Kirschbaum, were Communists, and their epic work became the heart and soul of Fuller Seminary's apostasy from the Evangelical position.
An evangelical graduated from Moline High and became a religion professor. He was outraged that I considered Barth an apostate. Evangelicals love Barth. So does the far Left of modern theology. Who was president of the Karl Barth Society? Yes, Frank Fiorenza. He offered no apologies for describing the theologian's mistress as the main author of Barth's Church Dogmatics.
The blokes of the 19th century laid out the markers for modern theology:
- Heavily invest in debates about every thinker along the way, to start squabbles about trivia.
- Define grace as having no contingencies - not "if you believe, because that destroys the concept of grace."
- Be as ecumenical as the audience will allow, because that broadens the list of names dropped - to prove the excellence of the writer or speaker. "As Quistorp observed..." No one wants to ask who Quistorp is.
- Build up a list of inconsequential experts and make their work canonical. "Are you questioning the great F. Pieper?"
- Scowl and look around in anger in case anyone wants to question the great professor, who cannot be confronted with his errors.
- Move useful idiots into key positions, knowing their insecurities will make them goosestep together with the gang.
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| Jon-Boy denied that WELS taught this, when I quoted a banner for the public, "I am saved, just like you." You had already published this baloney. Naturally he showed up at Emmaus to support OJ. You owe Jay. |
