28.11.03
College Football: Good article this week at Tailgate Fever. It put together a three part series this week, with earlier parts being a Cavalier fan's view of the game, and an analysis of the BC loss. Always amusing and informative. A must read for any Hokie. Nowadays, I swear by it. It is always something that I read on Fridays.
Letters to the Editor, from the Roanoke Times: I didn't get around to reading the local fishwrap until a couple of hours ago, and found an interesting letter about Anglicanism, and an issue to which I hadn't given much thought. But I also read something yesterday, and thought I ought to make a note of it, even if I only post; if I only post, I give it my tacit agreement unless I explicitly disagree. In any case, here's an interesting letter from C.S. in Roanoke, published yesterday:
Your newspaper seems to back every tax-and-spend fantasy of the Roanoke City Council.
The $18 million-plus stadium for high school football games, when we have a good memorial stadium paid for, is a prime example of wasteful spending.
Victory Stadium, unless I'm mistaken, is the home of a local high school football team. It also hosts the Stagg Bowl every December (the Stagg Bowl is the NCAA division III championship). To be honest, I haven't followed this as closely as some up in the Roanoke valley (I'm out here in the New River Valley, and the Roanoke paper is almost our local paper by default; Blacksburg is little more than a distant suburb of Roanoke, if even that), so I'm not aware of all the issues. On its face, however, it does seem wasteful, especially if they can make use of Victory Stadium for several more years.
The beautification effort all over the city of vacant lots, centers of busy streets and who knows what's next. Williamson Road, one of the busiest traffic streets, is giving up a center lane so that we can look at grass while waiting for the traffic to move. All well and good. We need some beauty in our lives.
We need even more a city council determined to reduce taxes rather than increase them. Is council really in favor of all these projects being paid for by new taxes on the poor and senior citizens? We pay too much now for council stupidity.
How about mounting a campaign to replace the whole lot of them, including spendthrift City Manager Darlene Burcham?
Support the idea of making Roanoke a low-tax city, not just a beauty spot for the rich.
Yeah, I agree with all that. But, since he advocates revenue cuts, in which parts of the budget would he use the associated and necessary spending cuts? I am not conversant in the City of Roanoke's budget, so I can't say one way or another where spending should be cut.
In today's letters, Tom from Galax points out that we shouldn't elevate reason above Scripture:
In his enlightening and thought-provoking commentary (Nov. 16, "Don't bind Scripture in a straitjacket of mere culture"), Michael Sitton reminded us that Anglicans have historically considered issues in the light of Scripture, tradition and reason.
He speaks of these as a three-legged stool. Without any one of the legs, the stool collapses. He then goes on to say that reason has been neglected in the current debate within the church on homosexuality.
Sitton then correctly observes that Scripture and tradition are affected by the cultures in which they arose. What concerns me is that he doesn't seem to acknowledge that reason is also affected by the culture in which the "reasoner" lives.
To be honest, I hadn't considered this about reason, but it is, in fact, correct. Reason has been used, over the centuries, in different contexts to prove different (even discordant) things. Prior to the 17th century, scientists used reason to prove that the universe was geocentric.
When one says that one's "interpretation [of Scripture] must be continually held up to the light of reason," it seems to imply that reason is all light with no darkness at all.
Without debating Sitton's conclusion on homosexuality and Christianity, I'm concerned about elevating reason above Scripture and the historic reflection on that Scripture, as if it were the pure and unstained standard by which we must live. To do so cuts off the other two legs of the stool, again leaving us with a very unstable place to sit.
This is an interesting point, which leads me to this question: am I wrong in stating that, considering that Christianity (of which Anglicanism is a part) follows biblical teachings, that biblical teaching (Scripture) should be given primacy? Since Tom suggests that we not elevate reason above Scripture because, by so doing, we chop the Scriptural leg of the church off, then one presumes that it also follows that we shouldn't elevate Scripture above reason. Likewise, tradition should be on the same plane (neither elevated nor depressed) relative to the others.
Of course, the real question comes when you have a Scriptural interpretation which differs from reason and/or tradition (or a rational interpretation which differs from a traditional/historical one). What, then, is the best theological solution to this? Is it to compare the interpretations of the three bases of the church, and take the view of some sort of "majority rule"? Is it to assert the primacy of one of the three bases, or would asserting the primacy of one base merely reduce the church to that single base, because of the fact that the other two bases would have to agree before actually becoming bases? That is to say, were you to assert the primacy of one base, then that (I argued just this, and that the independent base should be Scripture the last time I did such a segment) one base would be the only independent base, and therefore the only leg on which the church stands.
Ugh. So confused. And profoundly unsure of the answer, now. Perhaps I should pray on it. Or perhaps get the local Episcopal rector to discuss this with me, in the hope that I may better understand it. As a side note, the husband of the aforementioned Episcopal rector is on the Times' editorial board. Just thought I'd point that out.
I believe. Go Hokies!
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