I've Been Thinking

Amy Jill Levine writes, in her book The Misunderstood Jew: The Church and the Scandal of the Jewish Jesus…

When the proclamation [that if you don’t accept Jesus as Lord and savior, you will go to hell] is then accompanied by the insistence the Christians believe in a God of mercy and compassion the entire dogmatic system becomes, to non-Christians, absurd.

I couldn’t agree more. And, such a system often becomes absurd even to Christians.As a result, we struggle to articulate a theology that is not absurd, that is not based, almost solely, around ideas of heaven and hell, salvation and damnation.

Perhaps the gift of the liberation theologies is their concern for liberation of the oppressed here and now, no longer holding on for a a reward in heaven; mercy and compassion are shown here and now, with resultant reward occurring here and now. And, perhaps the kingdom of God/heaven being brought forth here and now.

In Christology at the Crossroads, Jon Sobrino writes…

Let me say right here that my starting point is the historical Jesus. It is the person, teaching, attitudes and deeds of Jesus of Nazareth insofar as they are accessible, in a more or less general way, to historical and exegetical investigation.

Such a Christology may not lead to the exclusivity of a soteriology built on dogma and doctrine, built on Christ and not Jesus.