Re: [asa] discussion of concordism essay

*If you are going to lump all evangelicals under "a tight
understanding of
inerrancy that makes YEC easy, concordism difficult, and TE almost
impossible", the please define precisely what you mean.*

Charles, thanks for the comments. My meaning was a bit unclear, I
see. I'm
not claiming to define what the term "evangelical" *should* mean. I
consider myself an "evangelical" and agree with most if not all of the
qualifiers you mention about "inerrancy." What I was trying to
describe is
what I perceive to be the center of gravity in evangelical thought,
and why
that center of gravity presents such problems on origins questions.
I guess
even that's difficult because it begs the question of what is
"evangelical"
or of whether there really is any definable "evangelical" coalition.
But as
I see it, if we were to look at seminaries and Bible schools in the U.S.
that self-define as "evangelical," major evangelical denominations
such as
the SBC, and popular evangelical preaching, we'd see that the trend is
towards a "tighter" view of inerrancy, like that in the Chicago
Statement,
than what you or I might be comfortable with.

One good piece of evidence about how I'm viewing this is the controversy
that surrounded Fuller Seminary's position on inerrancy. Fuller is a
strong
exception to the "tighter" view of inerrancy, but Fuller's more
moderated
position was and is a point of fighting words in the evangelical
community.
Maybe you've seen the statement about Biblical authority and
inerrancy on
Fuller's website (here:
http://www.fuller.edu/provost/aboutfuller/believe_teach.asp). I feel
very
comfortable with that statement and feel it's largely correct. But in
saying that publicly, I've probably disqualified myself from teaching
at a
large percentage of evangelical institutions in the U.S. Or maybe I'm
wrong, and my personal experiences in a few very conservative
churches is
tainting my perceptions here?

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Received on Thu Sep 14 13:03:18 2006