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Last Updated: Oct 23rd, 2006 - 13:05:15 |
Opinion
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Pastor Sandy Williams
Turning Around the Mainline
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| Pastor Sandy Williams and his wife Beverly |
REVIEW of Thomas C. Oden, Turning Around the
Mainline: How Renewal Movements Are Changing the Church (Grand Rapids:
Baker Books, 2006) by Pastor Sandy Williams.
The subtitle of Thomas C. Oden’s recent book may be more accurate than
the title: renewal movements are definitely changing the church, even if
they are not turning around the mainline. The Episcopal church is
visibly disintegrating while other mainline denominations are at the
very least declining in numbers and influence. There’s plenty of
spirituality, to be sure, but not as much enthusiasm for classical
Christianity.
Oden’s book is a report on the vitality of renewal movements within
mainline denominations. He rightly perceives that it’s not the loss of
numbers but the loss of orthodox faith that is most alarming in mainline
churches. Liberated denominational leaders and seminaries, he says,
“have virtually no immune system against heresy, no defense whatever
against perfidious teaching, and no criteria for testing the legitimacy
of counterfeit theological currency” (p. 26).
Jul 18, 2006, 12:00
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