DOWN WITH SOLA SCRIPTURA! 

 

But I do not allow a woman to teach or exercise authority over a man, but to remain quiet. (1 Timothy 2:12, NASB)

Evangelicalism Opening The Same Door Of No Return As Did Mainline Denominations 

Christianity21 is less a conference and more a happening, an event—a gathering of voices and ideas that will shape the future of our faith.

We live in a time of epochal change. Many find this change exciting; for others, it’s a challenge. Call it globalization, pluralization, or postmodernism, this change affects our economy, politics, government, and education—all of society. And, of course, our faith and our churches are not immune to change.

So we have gathered 21 of the most important voices for the future of Christianity—21 voices for the 21st century—to speak into our future as people of faith in this age. They represent a diverse array of backgrounds, interests, and passions, and they will provide a wide range of innovative and challenging presentations. (Online source)

 One of these “most important voices for the future of Christianity” who’ll “speak into our future” in order to “shape the future of our faith” is Nadia Bolz-Weber aka the Sarcastic Lutheran who’ll be speaking on “Authority; Authenticity and A**holes.” 

Bolz-Weber wants us to know her blog features: “The cranky spirituality of a postmodern Gal. Emerging church ala Luther” and that she’s:

the mission developer for House for All Sinners and Saints in Denver, Colorado. We are an urban liturgical community with a progressive yet deeply rooted theological imagination. (Online source)

That’s Emergence-speak informing us that Rev. Nadia Bolz-Weber is pastor-priestess of this particular emerging House for All Sinners and Saints (HFASS, their abbreviation [get it?]) Lutheran church, affiliated with the Evangelical Lutheran Church of America, and consisting of:

a group of folks figuring out how to be a liturgical, Christo-centric, social justice oriented, queer inclusive, incarnational, contemplative, irreverent, ancient – future church with a progressive but deeply rooted theological imagination. (Online source)

And today (as of this writing) HFASS even had their 1st Annual Blessing of the Bicycles as well. “Pastor” Nadia Bolz-Weber also happens to be author of the book Salvation on the Small Screen? 24 Hours of Christian Television. One Amazon reviewer, who purchased a copy of it after attending a reading hosted by Bolz-Weber, further fills us in that:

Nadia Bolz-Weber is a tall, brash, heavily tattooed Lutheran pastor from Denver who speaks with the sarcastic delivery of a stand-up comic. It turns out she used to be a stand-up comic and her blog is entitled The Sarcastic Lutheran. Her writing is in some ways reminiscent of Anne Lamott. I attended a reading from the book by the author and was intrigued enough to purchase a copy. I’ve just finished it and found it to be a quick and entirely fun read.

The set-up for the book is this: Bolz-Weber, a blogger and essayist on Jim Wallis’ God’s Politics site, was asked by a publisher to watch TBN (Trinity Broadcast Network) for 24 hours straight and then write about the experience. (Online source)

Yeah, there’s another one of those shocks; this “Lutheran vicar” Bolz-Weber is aligned with Red Letter Christian Jim Wallis and writes for his God’s Politics blog. And here’s another example of those interlocking concentric circles. Peter J. Walker, who lists his occupation as “Loudmouthery,” tells us he’s:

An M.Div student at George Fox Seminary & freelance writer, I am trying to re-dream the Christianity I’ve grown up with, unsatisfied in the easy answers I’ve received. I am a Charter Contributor at Wikiletics.com with Leonard Sweet, I have partnered with Off The Map in Doable Evangelism efforts, and am a contributing writer in several books through NavPress and Abingdon Press. (Online source)

The Mad World Of Emergent Familiar Faces In The Same Ol’ Worn Out Places

In his post Nadia Bolz-Weber: “Emerging Church Definition” at his blog Emerging Christian Walker tells us that his friend Ted “pointed me to a really cool lady on the blogosphere Nadia Bolz-Weber, for Sojourner’s www.SOJO.net.” One of these books Walker’s been involved with would be Out of the Ooze: Unlikely Love Letters to the Church from Beyond the Pew authored by Christian universalist Spencer Burke of the popular, influential, and quite aptly entitled, Emergent Church website The Ooze.

Walker contributes a chapter to Burke’s book called “Cultural Refugees in Gay Nightclubs.” Well, in Walker’s aforementioned post quoting Bolz-Weber’s musings on the Emerging Church, just who do you suppose we find in the combox; none other than practicing lesbian “Christ-follower,” co-leader of Richmond Emergent Cohort, and budding lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgendered, queer (LGBTQ) activist Adele Sakler, aka Existential Punk:

Existential Punk said… i LOVE NAdia and she is a big supporter of Queermergent. (Online source)

Again, no surprise that Sakler would love Bolz-Weber, or that this “queer inclusive” Lutheran “pastor” would be a big supporter of the Emergence Christianity group Queermergent. What is a bit of mild surprise would be that Tony Jones, who first made sure we knew about Sakler in his Beliefnet blog post Announcing Queermergent, didn’t include her as a presenter at his Christianity 21. But as far as Bolz-Weber is concerned, she also wants us to know that she’s a big fan of philoso-theologian Peter Rollins, whom Sakler has told us helped her greatly in rejecting Scripture’s authority so she could feel good in her sin.

Homopression; not loving Sakler enough to tell her the truth, very nice. Under “books and magazines I dig” Bolz-Weber lists “pastor” Rollins’ book How (Not) to Speak of God and then says of Rollins, whose also a good friend of Emergence Christianity icon Rob Bell, “Pete is an emerging church pastor of the Ikon community in Belfast, Ireland. I can’t recommend this book enough.” Bolz-Weber, who tells us that before she became an “ELCA pastor” she was “a professional f**k-up“, also doesn’t want us to think that she’s trying to “be an elitest a**hole” but this Lutheran vicar does have some strong feelings about the Emerging Church:

The emerging churches that I have encountered have, to a great extent, been comprised of urban, post-modern, progressive young adults who are missionally minded, committed to community and spiritual practice while figuring out what it means to be followers of Christ in the messy, ambiguous world in which they find themselves…

I suspect that the way in which the emerging church will, in the end, influence the broader church is in this post-Christendom reorientation toward mission and context…which would be an amazing contribution. (Online source)

Sounds like a noble cause, right? Wrong; in the end all we’re really getting here is more rebellion against the authority of God’s Word. We know Bolz-Weber is not a pastor-teacher sent by Jesus because God has already told us that His senior teaching elders aka pastors would be men (see—1 Timothy 2:12-14). And the “mission and context” of this Emergence Christianity is simply a reimagined form of spiritually dead liberal theology i.e. a postliberalism that bears striking similarity to the religious rhetoric of Living Spiritual Teacher and “Progessive Christian” scholar Marcus Borg. 

The wise will flee from these mystical Emerging dreamers  in love with themselves (see—2 Timothy 3:2) and with their mythical mush god with a man-shaped hole in its heart…

See also:

NADIA BOLZ-WEBER: SERMON ON JUDAS AND GRACE GONE WILD

NADIA BOLZ-WEBER ON PHILLIP AND THE ETHIOPIAN EUNUCH AT QUEERMERGENT

ROB BELL, PETER ROLLINS, AND QUEERMERGENT’S ADELE SAKLER

APPRISING MINISTRIES WITH A PEEK AT THE COMING SOTERIOLOGY OF EMERGENCE CHRISTIANITY

NOT THE GOSPEL OF JESUS ROB BELL; IT’S NOT ANYWHERE NEAR IT

WHY NO CONDEMNATION FOR CHRISTIANS WHO ARE HOMOPRESSIVE?

 THE EMERGENCE OF EVANGELICAL INCLUSIVE ORTHODOXY AND EMBRACE OF GLBTQ CHRISTIANS