{"id":964,"date":"2013-02-15T04:41:25","date_gmt":"2013-02-15T04:41:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/beta.dminlgp.com\/douthat-oprahdoxy\/"},"modified":"2013-02-15T04:41:25","modified_gmt":"2013-02-15T04:41:25","slug":"douthat-oprahdoxy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/douthat-oprahdoxy\/","title":{"rendered":"“Douthat & Oprahdoxy”"},"content":{"rendered":"

http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=Rr_5wDmX3kY<\/a><\/p>\n

Oprahdoxy…is it as bad as Douthat imagines? \u00a0Has it turned U.S. Christians into throngs of heretics?<\/span><\/p>\n

In the book Bad Religion: How we Became a Nation of Heretics, Ross Douthat, a conservative Catholic journalist, writes a synopsis of the history of Christianity in its various forms and denominations from the 1950\u2019s to the present. He delivers interesting points with humor and passion. However, his \u201corthodoxy\u201d which he so desperately believes is the answer for the current \u201cheretical\u201d Christian church, and ultimately for every human on the planet is never fully explained. Instead he criticizes the \u201cfeel good\u201d theology of Joel Osteen, the \u201cgluttony\u201d of the \u201cfarm to table\u201d movement (i.e. gardening), and the \u201cmystical pantheism\u201d of the \u201cGod Within cult.\u201d Interestingly enough the \u201cGod Within\u201d movement that Douthat discusses is exactly what brought me back to a Christian faith. After leaving a legalistic, almost unbearably heavy-handed Christian tradition it was the biblical scriptures stated from a large New Thought church pulpit and an African-American pastor in Los Angeles that gave me hope in being a believer in the Bible and ultimately the Christian faith again. Orthodoxy, depending on how it is interpreted, can sometimes feel more like the squeeze of a boa constrictor more than the warmth of loving arms depending on how it is communicated. However, I do agree with his point that the \u201cGod Within\u201d movement can lean towards a self-centered narcissistic practice with devastating results for practitioners and their families if left without some kind of moral structure.<\/p>\n

I agree there needs to be a \u201cskeleton\u201d to house the \u201cspirit,\u201d and orthodoxy might provide this type of structure for the body of Christ. The phrase Christianity is about a \u201crelationship, not a religion\u201d has taken root and turned into the idea that \u201cI\u2019m not religious, I\u2019m spiritual,\u201d hence the buffet of philosophies and ideas about Christianity. However, even if the Christian church developed in the United States with a set orthodoxy, the interpretations and diversity of thought would not change. The \u201cunified\u201d Roman Catholic Church remained for centuries partly due to the facts that lay people could not read Latin, and the \u201cUniversal Church,\u201d with its backing from the Roman Empire, could be very \u201cpersuasive\u201d in its modes of conversion. As Douthat explains when describing the \u201cthreat of global warming\u201d and its effect on \u201cmystical pantheism,\u201d \u201c\u2026every successful religion needs \u2013 a crusading spirit, a rigorous set of \u2018thou shalt nots,\u2019 and a piping-hot apocalypse.\u201d (Kindle, 4583) Well, that sounds fun\u2026sign me up! Wayne Dyer\u2019s interpretation of the Tao (Way) sounds more like Jesus than that.<\/p>\n

In Douthat\u2019s final chapter he states that his hope throughout this book, \u201c\u2026has been to persuade even the most skeptical reader that traditional Christian faith might have more to offer this country than either its flawed defenders or its fashionable enemies would lead one to believe.\u201d (Kindle, 5650) He also explains that, \u201cAnyone who seeks a more perfect union should begin by seeking the perfection of their own soul. Anyone who would save their country should first look to save themselves.\u201d (Kindle, 5657) I think his first statement would hold more weight if he had focused more on what traditional Christianity has to offer instead of his aggressive posture against the modern day faces of Christianity and the \u201cGod Within\u201d folks. His second statement rings more of a Hindu or Puritan philosophy with its goal of \u201cperfection.\u201d<\/p>\n

Overall, Bad Religion was a fun read with its smattering of topics and names from Teresa of Avila to Oprah, from Reinhold Niebuhr to Paulo Coelho; and I commend him on his effort to \u201cright the wrongs.\u201d It is written with a journalistic spirit and Catholic undertone; and includes an idealistic hope regarding traditional Christian orthodoxy and it practice as a solution to many of the issues in the United States. \u00a0<\/p>\n

Do you think Oprahdoxy has caused more harm than good in the U.S.?Do you think traditional Christian orthodoxy can work for every person on planet Earth? Do you think it is possible that every person would interpret the orthodoxy in the same way? Do you think there should be one world religion?<\/p>\n

Douthat, Ross. Bad Religion: How We Became a Nation of Heretics. New York: Free Press, 2012 (Kindle)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=Rr_5wDmX3kY Oprahdoxy…is it as bad as Douthat imagines? \u00a0Has it turned U.S. Christians into throngs of heretics? In the book Bad Religion: How we Became a Nation of Heretics, Ross Douthat, a conservative Catholic journalist, writes a synopsis of the history of Christianity in its various forms and denominations from the 1950\u2019s to the present. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":47,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[2,7],"class_list":["post-964","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-dminlgp","tag-douthat","cohort-lgp3"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/964","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/47"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=964"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/964\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=964"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=964"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=964"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}