I'm curious if anyone here is familiar with Wm Abraham's books, especially Canonical Theism. This is a project apparently started at Perkins/SMU that tries to totally sidestep all issues of "epistemology," or how do you know what you know? We're so accustomed to the idea of having to demonstrate (depending on where you line up on questions of bible, authority, experience, etc.) that either the Bible is TRUE or show that true knowledge of the divine comes from within (experience) or through consensual social agreement (reason) or expanding sources of knowledge (tradition, RC) that the idea of honoring all the church's ecumenical canons (Bible, creeds, patristics, organizational canons, leadership canons, iconography, etc.) as a means of grace, spiritual direction and formation is a truly remarkable project. It appeals to me as a way of avoiding the endless and repetitive arguments over biblical interpretation and hermeneutics. This website, http://www.inhabitatiodei.com/2009/02/26/canonical-theism-30-theses/ lists the 30 theses that Abraham and others have put together and they're also in the book.
It seems particularly pertinent to Disciples and our ilk because of the poignancy of a movement begun to bring unity based on a restorationist strategy (like almost every reform movement since 1517) but limited to an epistemological understanding of the scriptures as some kind of unique, unappealable source of divine revelation, rather than as they were first understood by the church which formed them, one among other canons that bring God to us and provide a trustworthy means of grace and salvation.
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