A recent editorial
by the retiring Editor-in-Chief of the Right-Wing Evangelical journal
Christianity Today, Mark
Galli, has caused quite
an uproar, both among the Evangelical Right and some liberal commentators as
well.
Before dealing with that controversy, let's briefly take a look at "Evangelical
Christianity." It is a movement within Protestantism that is
trans-denominational, encompassing, among others, Methodism, Baptism, Pentecostalism,
and several different independent branches of Evangelicalism itself. In the United States, about a quarter of the population
consider themselves Evangelicals. Not
all of them adhere to the Evangelical Right, which is the noisy branch. In fact they are so noisy, and presently so
intimately connected to the Trumpites and the Trumpublican(©) Party, there is
no way of knowing just how many Evangelicals are Rightists.
In any case, common to the Evangelical doctrine is the
concept of salvation by grace, the importance of the processes of conversion/being "born
again," and the importance of the (English) Bible as representing the "inerrant word
of God." Now the latter would be of only theological significance if Right Evangelism
in particular did not want to use their interpretation of what that "Word" is to
determine major elements of the law that apply to all of us, as for
example, in the matters of abortion rights and the civil rights of the LGBTQ
community.
Dealing with this subject for the moment, it is my
understanding that not all elements of Evangelicalism refer to the same Bible
as the one that is "inerrant" (and that understanding, if true, certainly undermines the
concept of "inerrancy:" which one, exactly, is it[?]). But the common one
bearing that appellation is the King James version.
Click here for the full article.
Source: OpEdNews
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