Please take off your shoes

I am teaching Asian Religions at the Mission Training Center. This is the reason why I picked Six World Faiths edited by W. Owen Cole. At this point, I don't have any idea who Cole is, but I will find out soon. I haven't done any book review in this blog, but this time I hope I can find the time to review some of the books coming my way. In any case, for now, I just want to share a quote by Max Warren, a famous Secretary of the Church Missionary Society, which Cole cites in his introduction.

Our first task in approaching another people, another culture, another religion is to take off our shoes, for the place we are standing on is holy, else we may find we are treading on men's dream. More serious still, we may forget that God was here before our arrival.

Quote of the day

"The Spirit of God is called the Holy Spirit because it makes our life here worth something living, not because it is alien and estranged from life. The Spirit sets this life in the presence of the living God and int he great river of eternal love... the operations of God's life-giving and life-affirming Spirit are universal and can be recognized in everything which ministers to life and resists its destruction." Jurgen Moltmann, The Spirit of Life, x-xi *The boys are our Pastor's twin sons

Quote of the day

"As for me, Jesus Christ is the scripture, the inviolable scriptures are his cross, death, and resurrection and faith through him."

Ignatius

Moltmann on Academic Theology

I started reading Jurgen Moltmann's Experiences in Theology. I agree with Frank it is fun and enjoyable to read and judging from the few pages I had read so far, the book's language is clear and simple but not simplistic. A characteristic very hard to find in a theology book. It is readable compare to Moltmann's early "contributions" to theology. For people like me whose first language is not English this is excellent.

I may response to this book while I go along by either posting quotes or making comments positively or otherwise. Meanwhile, here's an interesting quote:

Academic theology is nothing other than the scholarly penetration and illumination by mind and spirit of what Christian in the congregations think when they believe in God and live in the fellowship of Christ. By scholarly I mean that the theology is methodologically verifiable and comprehensible. Good scholarly theology is therefore basically simple, because it is clear. Only cloudy theology is complicated and difficult. Whether it be Athanasius or Augustine, Aquinas ot Calvin, Schleiermacher or Barth--the fundamental ideas of every good theological system can be presented in a single page. p. 13

Nietzsche on Christian freedom

They would have to sing better songs to make me believe in their Redeemer; his disciples would have to look more redeemed!.. Truly their Redeemers themselves did not come from freedom and the seventh heaven of freedom.

Karl Barth on archaelogical research

I do not like books that try to prove the rightness of the Bible by archaeological research, but the results of this research are an important help in understanding the biblical witness to Christ. However, no historical research can help us prove God's revelation as reality. Historical research will never be an approach to the Word of God. --Karl Barth

Karl Barth on fundamentalism as heresy

It's a tiring Sunday for us. I feel sick. The works in the field and the sudden change of weather from hot during the day and very cold at night is getting on us. All the family members got the common cold virus. I'll be sleeping early tonight. But I think it's good to post something before going to bed.

This one is from Karl Barth on heresy. Barth was asked this question in one of his discussions with English-speaking students in Basel about the chief heresies in his mind when he wrote the CD in 1932. He answered:

If I had to rewrite this volume, I might not be so polemical, although the heresies would be the same. I might have a more irenic spirit. I could look out on the present situation and ask: what should the Christian proclamation be in view of all these denominations in Ecumenical movement, etc? But maybe the way I said it is clearer. Liberalism is coming back today, especially in Europe. Look at Rudolf Bultmann; he stems from Father Schleiermacher! And look at the situation in Switzerland! And the old snake in Rome is still there! I might have mentioned a third heresy: Fundamentalism, Orthodoxy. In 1932 I did not know the Fundamentalists so well. The Fundamentalists says he knows the Bible, but he must have become master over the Bible, which means master over revelation... I consider it just another kind of natural theology: a view of the modern man who wants to control revelation.

John D. Godsey, Karl Barth's Table Talk, 40-41.

Karl Barth on motive for missions

The motive for missions is the concern for telling others that God has shown the grace to all. Take the example of St. Paul. He had to witness for he saw a world of people who had not heard the "good news." The church knows that God does not fail to show His grace. The church must proclaim... A true missionary can never believe that those who refuse the Gospel can really refuse. He does not know on what ground the seed falls. Only then can a missionary be really free. He is only an ambassador, not the king.

John D. Godsey,Karl Barth's Table Talk, p. 40.