A Sound of Sheer Silence

So, I thought that was now going to turn to discussions of God, but I think there is something else that is worth getting out of the way from the beginning, and that is what it means to "believe" in God or some faith tradition, and how one goes about doing that.  In other words, what it means to have faith.  Because I think there is a fundamental divide here in the way this is presented, a divide that is not between people who believe and people that don't, but between one of sort of believers (and, somewhat ironically, the most vocal critics of those same folks from the non-believer side) and another. On one presentation, faith is something that is fundamentally alien to all other aspects of the human experience.  It is not something that we reason toward, and it is not based on our normal encounters with people or objects.  Instead, it comes from "outside" of us and imposes some sort of new reality on our otherwise mundane experiences.  Basically, we are going

This weekend, there was a dust up on so-called Weird Anglican Twitter, or WAT.  The question was whether clergy (in this case, in the Episcopal Church) should be required to "really believe in" the Creeds.  As a matter of doctrine, this is not a disputed issue--the answer is an unambiguous "yes."  But one will find those in the Episcopal Church, including clergy, who think that this should not be the case, and that the Creeds are either optional or even an affirmative impediment. I had, and have, Thoughts about this question.  And, indeed, I had a whole post drafted weighing in on the topic.  But then, last night, I saw a Tweet from Mother Joyce, who is a wonderful presence on WAT and Twitter generally.  I would really encourage you to read the whole thread , but the sum of the idea is captured in the first line. something that I think is interesting is, in general when we have these awful fights, how scared everybody clearly is that the thing they feel is of utmost