Post by Josh on Feb 12, 2007 18:57:39 GMT -8
6/27/06:
"Separating God's sphere and ours in the Epicurean fashion- with a distant God whom you might respect but who wasn't going to appear or *do* anything within our sphere became very popular in the Western world of the 18th century (through the movement known as "Deism"), and has continued to be so in many places to this day. In fact, many people in the Western world assume that when they talk about "God" and "heaven" they're talking about a being and a place which- if they exist at all- are a long way away and have little or nothing directly to do with us. That's why, when many people say they believe in God, they will often add in teh same breath that they don't go to Church, they don't pray, and in fact they don't think much about God from one year's end to the next. I don't blame them. If I believed in a distant, remote God like that, I wouldn't get out of bed on a Sunday morning either."
From "Simply Christian" by NT Wright, p. 62.
"Separating God's sphere and ours in the Epicurean fashion- with a distant God whom you might respect but who wasn't going to appear or *do* anything within our sphere became very popular in the Western world of the 18th century (through the movement known as "Deism"), and has continued to be so in many places to this day. In fact, many people in the Western world assume that when they talk about "God" and "heaven" they're talking about a being and a place which- if they exist at all- are a long way away and have little or nothing directly to do with us. That's why, when many people say they believe in God, they will often add in teh same breath that they don't go to Church, they don't pray, and in fact they don't think much about God from one year's end to the next. I don't blame them. If I believed in a distant, remote God like that, I wouldn't get out of bed on a Sunday morning either."
From "Simply Christian" by NT Wright, p. 62.