August 5 Krum Star Article,
"All Other Religions are Wrong!"
The audio recording of this message may
be found here.
In an amusing tongue-in-cheek article found
mid-July on www.slate.com, readers found a bogus press
release that looked like this:
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Vatican Recall Hotline: (800) ASK-RATZ
July 10, 2007
VATICAN CITY—Pope
Benedict XVI today announced a voluntary recall of the
following consumer products. Consumers should stop using
recalled products immediately unless otherwise instructed.
Name of Products: African
Methodist Episcopal (A.M.E.), Amish, Anabaptist, Anglican,
Baptist, Calvinist, Christian Science, Congregationalist,
Episcopalian, Evangelical, Fundamentalist, Huguenot, Jehovah's
Witness, Lutheran, Mennonite, Methodist, Moravian, Mormon,
Pentecostal, Presbyterian, Puritan, Quaker, Seventh-Day
Adventist, Shaker, and Zwinglian Christian sects (frequently
labeled "Protestant").
This article then went on to state:
Hazard: Can fail to achieve
salvation on contact.
Incidents/Injuries: Widespread
reports of salvific malfunction and consequent exclusion
from the Kingdom of Heaven. Users complain of being rerouted
to Purgatory and in a few instances to the Fiery Pit.
Cause: Because Jesus Christ
subsists only in the Catholic Church of Rome™, adherents
to other faiths that self-advertise as Christian must
rely on infrequent guest appearances. Although He is omnipresent,
He can't be everywhere at once.
The pretend press release came from the
fact that Pope Benedict XVI has approved a document stating
that Catholicism is the only true way to salvation leaving
other Christian churches as false and flawed.
This summer, I’ve been working through
a series of objections that many young people have vocalized
as their reason for not affiliating with a church, despite
their growing interest in an active spiritual life:. So
we now approach objection number five: “The Church
arrogantly claims all other religions are wrong.”
Looks like that objection is right on target with the
affirmation of this long-standing principle by the Roman
Catholic Church. But that is certainly not the only religious
entity that has made such a declaration. Many groups over
the years have declared that they know or have the one
and only way to be reconciled to a holy God and only they
have the key to eternity in heaven rather than some other
far less attractive place. They are able to make these
pronouncements with great assurance. They know the answers
“for sure.”
Knowing something “for sure”
brings a sense of often longed-for security. We want to
know “for sure” that the special person in
our life really and truly loves us. We want to know “for
sure” that our decisions are right and will provide
the outcomes we wish for. We want to know “for sure”
that our religious choices really do offer eternal security.
I remember years ago when I began truly
serious study of the Bible. I immersed myself in the languages
in which the original scriptures were written. I sought
to live and breathe them, to work the Bible texts in a
way that I could pronounce many things “for sure.”
This was the beginning of a fascinating journey for me
into a great mystery. I discovered that my “for
sure” pronouncements ended up placing The Holy One,
the Creator of all, the lover of our souls who offers
the hope of salvation to all, into a tiny little box that
fit neatly into the compartments of my mind. I finally
realized I wasn’t particularly interested in a God
who could fit that well into the limits of my human mind.
What I was interested in was the opportunity to move deeper
into those holy and mysterious places that are opened
to us by the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ.
So which religious traditions are “right”
and which ones are “wrong?” We’ll talk
more about this on Sunday.
See you in church.
Christy
The Rev. Dr. Christy Thomas, Pastor, Krum
UMC
Questions or comments about this article?
Please contact me at christy@krumumc.org
or phone the church office at 940-482-3482.
