Pastor Attempting To Expose Unquestioned Cultural Assumptions Exhibits Some Of His Own

The pastor in this sermon categorizes those opposed to masks as idolaters that have elevated personal freedom above science.

How about those that have turned science into an idol where the term is no longer viewed as a methodology to question claims in light of evidence but rather as a priestly guild whose edicts the uncredentialed are forbidden from questioning?

The minister also claimed that many are being crushed by student loan debt because of the idolatrous notion that a college education is part of the American dream. But would someone be allowed to be a minister in the Anglican church without a degree or even one acquired from a more affordable unaccredited yet still quality seminary or would such souls forever be consigned to the role of mere pewfiller?

In Part 2 on confronting the idols of culture, this pastor references the account of Gerhard Kitell, a German Biblical scholar accused of crimes against humanity for his opposition to Judaism during the Nazi regime.

Standing in contrast to German Christians such as Kitell deceived by notions of nationalism (one must stop and ask what this pastor might be making a veiled reference to), reference is made to Dietrich Bonhoeffer and Karl Barth.

Kitell is to serve as a warning as to the dangers of viewing scripture through the eyes of culture while Bonhoeffer and Barth are extolled as examples of viewing culture through the lens of scripture.

While Kitell might be viewed as a Nazi collaborator and Bonhoeffer and Barth as standing against tyranny, in terms of the issue of idolatry at hand, is this duo really much different than Kitell?

Both Bonehoffer and Barth denied the inerrancy of Scripture.

Bonehofffer tended to downplay the importance of individual salvation (so why even bother with the faith).

The teachings of Christianity were so important to Barth that it is believed that he not only carried on what amounted to a thirty year affair during in which Barth’s student and research assistant was brought into the horny professor’s marital home to be his concubine during which she also resided in the domicile along with his wife (where is the outrage from the MeToo movement over that one).

By Frederick Meekins