by Sandy » Wed Apr 25, 2012 11:52 am
An "informed opinion," with a full academic bibliography accompanying it, is nothing more than that if it is not accompanied by a Biblical text rendered in context, and interpreted according to sound hermeneutical principles. It is an "informed opinion," but it is difficult to utilize it in shaping the perspective or policy of a Christian church on an issue, especially if Biblical content is diminished because someone diminishes the spiritual authority it carries, or ignores it altogether because it just doesn't fit with the intended conclusion.
In the Christian life, discerning the will of God isn't an easy task. It is made much more complicated by the infusion of "worldly wisdom" in the form of conclusions drawn by people who have piled up a lot of papers behind them that are meaningless when it comes to spiritual discernment. You yourself (BDW) pointed out that there was no balance in this particular conference when it came to the "traditional" view. I have yet to watch a clip from this conference that contains any Biblical exposition at all. Lacking that, most of what you have here is nothing more than university gas.
I don't know where it came from, so I can't attribute it to its author, but I once heard a statement that said, "If academia were capable of reasoning the solution to humankind's problems, universities would be the most perfect, utopian places in the world."