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Old 04-29-2006, 01:36 AM   #20
JessiPollo

Join Date
Oct 2005
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420
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I cannot see how your example of Christ sitting with sinners or His saving work has anything to do with reading a deeply heretical book which has led many souls astray, endorsing it as a good read, and then supporting it by going to see it in the theaters. Are we to accept such actions as Christlike 'engagement with sinners'? Is this the way Christ led by example? He did not shun the sinner, as you mention, but He did shun the sin.
There is a certain degree of round-and-round to which one will come in discussions like this. Setting that aside, since you make many good points, I'd simply say this: most people probably know what adultery is. Should someone approach who is engaged in adultery, genuinely seeking conversion and change, most people likely can respond, to some degree or another. Should an individual come, however, deeply engaged with and submersed in modern-day neo-gnosticism, what will your response be?

The example I see overwhelmingly in the fathers of the Church is to know the world - including the thought processes that are enshrined in the things that are popular for a time. Look at the actual content of the works of an Irenaeus, or an Epiphanius, or an Athanasius, or a Maximus. None ever suggests all their flock should go out and imbibe in the culture simply for its own sake; as before, the fact that some people are not in a position to encounter such material without it posing serious problems to their spiritual life, and who thus should not do so, has, I think, been a given from the beginning of this conversation - no one has ever suggested otherwise.

But to call down shame on people who do... this seems to step too far over the line.

INXC, Matthew
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