Important to note: the scriptures are clear and definitive on behaviour that is specifically prohibited in the believer's life. Included in these behaviors is sexuality. I don't know Professor Leif but it sounds like his personal interpretation of scripture is to be established.
@@professorlief4804 Clear according to english language dictionary. There are "dos and don'ts." Smarmy "interpretations" aren't going to wash with Him when He returns.
@@wannamonslo9626 This isn't about smarmy interpretation to make reality what we want, it's the recognition that meaning comes through language. Who decides what the dictionary says? They get a group of people together and make decisions. Sometimes words take on new meanings. I'm not sure "clear" is always as "clear" as we'd like. I mean, for the longest time some Christians were opposed to buying insurance or taking out loans. Interpretation isn't a bad word, it's the human condition.
I don't think it's Bonhoeffer that is the difficulty here, it sounds like Christian apologetics were different at that time than what we see today. DB sounds to be reacting to what he was watching take place. If we long to go in deep with God, we know we are experiencing something spiritual and want to share the experience with others to compel them to come in, but we know that we don't want superstition, which is more related to religion.
@@grahampaice6914 I think his ideas are hard to understand from an Anglo-American rationalistic standpoint. The Franciscan priest Richard Rohr has somewhat rightly called Bonhoeffer a mystic. Perhaps a mystic of secularism?
The outworking of the gospel is secularism - the principalities and power Paul talks about are the way we imbue the creation with ideology, or to use a biblical term, idolatry. True spirituality is to free the world to just be the world. To live as human beings in relation to God and neighbor.
@@professorlief4804 I think it's deeper than just the world... both Luther and Francis saw the world as transparent to the Divine, in an "already" sort of state, and to develop a rich spirituality of divine immanence. Which is why Bonhoeffer is content to let the world be the world, why he finds irreligious people to be more interesting than Christians, and so forth. Because in many cases, religion, with its language of absolute transcendence obscures (eg, Karl Barth, which Bonhoeffer took issue with on several points). Barth wants to bring back Bible religion, Bonhoeffer wants to let God speak something new and fresh in the midst of godless world, precisely because it's godless, and not in spite of it.
Important to note: the scriptures are clear and definitive on behaviour that is specifically prohibited in the believer's life. Included in these behaviors is sexuality. I don't know Professor Leif but it sounds like his personal interpretation of scripture is to be established.
Clear according to whom? The interpretive process is always a part of reading scripture.
@@professorlief4804 Clear according to english language dictionary. There are "dos and don'ts." Smarmy "interpretations" aren't going to wash with Him when He returns.
@@wannamonslo9626 This isn't about smarmy interpretation to make reality what we want, it's the recognition that meaning comes through language. Who decides what the dictionary says? They get a group of people together and make decisions. Sometimes words take on new meanings. I'm not sure "clear" is always as "clear" as we'd like. I mean, for the longest time some Christians were opposed to buying insurance or taking out loans. Interpretation isn't a bad word, it's the human condition.
I don't think it's Bonhoeffer that is the difficulty here, it sounds like Christian apologetics were different at that time than what we see today. DB sounds to be reacting to what he was watching take place.
If we long to go in deep with God, we know we are experiencing something spiritual and want to share the experience with others to compel them to come in, but we know that we don't want superstition, which is more related to religion.
How are we going to let the world be the world if the world is building a culture without God and against God's will? I don't understand Bonhoeffer.
read a few of his writings....Papers from Prison....."God does not lead us to religion but to life"..Dietrich Bonhoeffer
@@grahampaice6914 I think his ideas are hard to understand from an Anglo-American rationalistic standpoint. The Franciscan priest Richard Rohr has somewhat rightly called Bonhoeffer a mystic. Perhaps a mystic of secularism?
The outworking of the gospel is secularism - the principalities and power Paul talks about are the way we imbue the creation with ideology, or to use a biblical term, idolatry. True spirituality is to free the world to just be the world. To live as human beings in relation to God and neighbor.
@@Magnulus76 Yes! My next series will be on St. Francis. I'm going to Italy in September to walk from La Verna to Assisi.
@@professorlief4804 I think it's deeper than just the world... both Luther and Francis saw the world as transparent to the Divine, in an "already" sort of state, and to develop a rich spirituality of divine immanence. Which is why Bonhoeffer is content to let the world be the world, why he finds irreligious people to be more interesting than Christians, and so forth. Because in many cases, religion, with its language of absolute transcendence obscures (eg, Karl Barth, which Bonhoeffer took issue with on several points). Barth wants to bring back Bible religion, Bonhoeffer wants to let God speak something new and fresh in the midst of godless world, precisely because it's godless, and not in spite of it.