ThinkBlog

Welcome to the next generation of feel-good, pseudo-intellectual moral relativism.

“meaningoflife.tv” is just one more in a long line of sites full of people touting that, you know, come to think of it, the Bible’s actually wrong because it’s enormously inconvenient and basically pretty politically incorrect in this day and age. Why can’t a good Buddhist go to heaven? The question is rhetorical most of the times you hear it.

Most disturbing, though, and I think crucial to the relativist spread, is the last part of this all-too-common argument:

According to the New Testament, Jesus was born as a sign of God’s love for humanity–sent to Earth so that “whoever believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life,” as the gospel of John puts it. Over the years, this prerequisite for admission to heaven–believing that Christ died for your sins–has been a strong incentive to become or remain a Christian. But if God really loves humankind, shouldn’t He let, say, a good Buddhist or Jew through the pearly gates? God goes further than that, says Monsignor Lorenzo Albacete in this clip from his meaningoflife.tv interview: even atheists are eligible for salvation. This radical reinterpretation of scripture, Albacete notes later in the interview, has now become official Catholic doctrine (unbeknownst even to many Catholics).

Unbeknownst? Why would you not know what your church believes? Because it’s inconvenient, it feels better not to bother with it, and a whole host of other reasons. People have stopped asking these kinds of questions. How can we get them back?

Welcome to the next generation of feel-good, pseudo-intellectual moral relativism.

“meaningoflife.tv” is just one more in a long line of sites full of people touting that, you know, come to think of it, the Bible’s actually wrong because it’s enormously inconvenient and basically pretty politically incorrect in this day and age. Why can’t a good Buddhist go to heaven? The question is rhetorical most of the times you hear it.

Most disturbing, though, and I think crucial to the relativist spread, is the last part of this all-too-common argument:

According to the New Testament, Jesus was born as a sign of God’s love for humanity–sent to Earth so that “whoever believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life,” as the gospel of John puts it. Over the years, this prerequisite for admission to heaven–believing that Christ died for your sins–has been a strong incentive to become or remain a Christian. But if God really loves humankind, shouldn’t He let, say, a good Buddhist or Jew through the pearly gates? God goes further than that, says Monsignor Lorenzo Albacete in this clip from his meaningoflife.tv interview: even atheists are eligible for salvation. This radical reinterpretation of scripture, Albacete notes later in the interview, has now become official Catholic doctrine (unbeknownst even to many Catholics).

Unbeknownst? Why would you not know what your church believes? Because it’s inconvenient, it feels better not to bother with it, and a whole host of other reasons. People have stopped asking these kinds of questions. How can we get them back?