blogging about beliefs

Matt Ritchie does it again! I've thoroughly enjoyed his Untangling the Gospel series of blog posts. The most recent one hit on some topics that I've mused upon at various times in life. The idea of beliefs and doctrines - which is which, which is important, how do we know what we hold, and other similar questions - was probably the most influential line of thinking in moving me philosophically outside the realm of what I would call the "doctrinally focused" church. What I mean by "doctrinally focused" is essentially that a group of people are more concerned about what they should believe rather than how they should believe. The following quote, from Kevin Smith's Dogma, I think drives home the idea - in this situation, associate their use of "belief" as doctrine.

Rufus
... the factioning of the religions. He said that mankind got it all wrong by taking a good idea and building a belief structure on it.

Bethany
Are you saying that having beliefs is a bad thing?

Rufus
I just think it's better to have ideas. You can change an idea. Changing a belief is trickier. People die for it, people kill for it.

Not to say that being able to flip-flop on issues is to be applauded, but more along the lines of understanding what those ideas are that you hold onto and live for so that you can adjust to the times, cultures and events as necessary. After all, when learning to multiply, rote memorization of the multiplication tables only gets you so far - you need to understand the concepts and principles behind the math if you want to make real progress.

Oh yeah, and check out Matt's Untangling the Gospel 9: You'd Better Believe It!