2008 Woodie Awards
Purism and Protestantism
Jerrel Allen
Issue date: 4/12/07 Section: Editorials & Viewpoints
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My mother surprised me with a phone call today. Usually her calls are accompanied by a short report on the church activities at my home church. Today, I was shocked to hear that she had reached an epitome.
She thought that maybe I wasn't all that wrong about organized religion.
I was surprised, partly because my mother had been so orthodox for most of my life (excluding of course my parents' time in college-I actually don't remember that much church from then), and because I think she had a bit of a misconception about how I felt about organized religion. Indeed, I had not even brought up the question to her in a long while; partly because I was unsure of my own opinions on the matter and because most of our previous conversations about it ended poorly.
I prodded her a bit for the answer and I made the conclusion that she was judging my current philosophy on how I felt when I was 16 years old. I suppose it isn't surprising to note that I was a lot different two years ago, but I suppose a woman of her years merely thought of me like any other adult-set in one's ways after a certain point in one's life, unable to change but with something life-altering like a mid-life crisis or death in the family.
Anyhow, she told me that I was very right about how the organization of religion essentially took away its true meaning. My mother has never dabbled in the realm of the existential past protestant philosophy, but even within this limited scope she made an amazing realization, one that, I, myself, had not come upon.
Sola scriptorum, a term which exclusively used among theologians, is a philosophy upon which the original protestant churches were built. It dictates, in layman's terms, that the interpretation of the word of God ultimately rests within a person and his or her personal relationship with God. That is, no one else can tell you how to believe in God. Originally, the reason why the title 'protestant' was bestowed upon non-Catholic (or non-orthodox) Christians was because these people, armed with nothing better than a printing press, and the ideas of sola scriptorum, protested the spiritual structure of the Catholic church. What Protestants did not realize, however, is that in the process, many of them created their own webs of untruths and strange interpretation. That, of course, added to the original philosophy of self-interpretation, led to the fragmentation of the protestant church in its earliest years-certainly the disunity among protestant churches is not a new development.
She thought that maybe I wasn't all that wrong about organized religion.
I was surprised, partly because my mother had been so orthodox for most of my life (excluding of course my parents' time in college-I actually don't remember that much church from then), and because I think she had a bit of a misconception about how I felt about organized religion. Indeed, I had not even brought up the question to her in a long while; partly because I was unsure of my own opinions on the matter and because most of our previous conversations about it ended poorly.
I prodded her a bit for the answer and I made the conclusion that she was judging my current philosophy on how I felt when I was 16 years old. I suppose it isn't surprising to note that I was a lot different two years ago, but I suppose a woman of her years merely thought of me like any other adult-set in one's ways after a certain point in one's life, unable to change but with something life-altering like a mid-life crisis or death in the family.
Anyhow, she told me that I was very right about how the organization of religion essentially took away its true meaning. My mother has never dabbled in the realm of the existential past protestant philosophy, but even within this limited scope she made an amazing realization, one that, I, myself, had not come upon.
Sola scriptorum, a term which exclusively used among theologians, is a philosophy upon which the original protestant churches were built. It dictates, in layman's terms, that the interpretation of the word of God ultimately rests within a person and his or her personal relationship with God. That is, no one else can tell you how to believe in God. Originally, the reason why the title 'protestant' was bestowed upon non-Catholic (or non-orthodox) Christians was because these people, armed with nothing better than a printing press, and the ideas of sola scriptorum, protested the spiritual structure of the Catholic church. What Protestants did not realize, however, is that in the process, many of them created their own webs of untruths and strange interpretation. That, of course, added to the original philosophy of self-interpretation, led to the fragmentation of the protestant church in its earliest years-certainly the disunity among protestant churches is not a new development.
Viewing Comments 1 - 1 of 1
Reynaldo Cabrera
posted 4/14/07 @ 10:18 PM CST
I agree with your position, and find it enlighten.
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