Transforming Theology: All the Answers

From Reclaiming Church, p. 59: Christians sometimes aruge that this dynamic history of transformation ended with Jesus Christ. In him, it is said, we have finality and completeess, so tha tonce the meaning of this event was settled by the church no further transformation has been desirable. Change after the kerygma was proclaimed, the canon closed or the creeds fixed is heresy. For those who think this way, renewal is indeed the correct response. Although there may be room for contiuing to interpretation and reformulation for the sake of intelligibility in different cultural contexts, there is nothing of relevance to be learned from other sources.

If God created the world to change, grow, evolve... why shouldn't our faith and our practices as the church? and are we to assume that we (or they) knew all there was to know of God at the time of the canon, creeds or even Christ? Did they have a complete knowledge of all future times, future cultural pressures on faith and future perspectives?

Similarly, we can't assume that we have all the answers for all of time either. We have to do the best we can with what we know, but I think it's a contant pursuit. Thus, "transforming" rather than "formed" or even "transformed."

As for renewal, we've settled into this pattern of renewing behavior or ideas, but we haven't done a very good job of changing anything substantial or teaching people to think. Behavioral change for the sake of fitting in has contributed to the problem. This fits with the westernized interpretations of much that we believe in oldline churches.