:: St. Stephen's Musings ::

:: Friday, July 09, 2004 ::

Complexity, Divorce, Saints, Imputation: Random Friday Musings

* How many times have you heard sentiments such as, "We need to forget all this complicated theology and philosophy and just return to simple childlike wonder!" I love this rejoinder: "We need to forget about all these complicated trees, bushes, plants and shrubs and just return to simple seeds!"

The subtle, but important, difference between complication and complexity seems to fly right over most of our heads. Sadly.

* Thomas Valentine has a short but informative page on "Divorce and Annulments: The Difference between Orthodox Christianity and the Latins"

* Don't you get this feeling every now and then? Maybe it's just me!

* Gregory Orloff, (a regular reader and commenter on numerous Orthodox blogs) has created a beautiful electronic pamphlet, complete with icons, summarizing the lives of North American saints.

* Here's a question on the nature of the word "imputation" that was brought up in a theology discussion group:

Adams's sin gets imputed to us, right? I can't agree, but I follow the line of thought so far; it's based upon a mistranslation of Romans 5:12. Then our guilt gets imputed to Christ, yes? I can follow that, too, without agreeing. It's the next part that throws me: Christ's righteousness gets imputed to us. But wait a second--what righteousness? By imputation, isn't He guilty of every sin that ever got committed?

A follow up question is this--is a soteriology couched in concepts of "merit" (either ours *or* Christ's) inherently unstable?

* I apologize for the lack of substantive writing the last week or so. I am trying to keep on top of the massive amount of reading I have to do for class, working on an essay (soon to be published) on the Transfiguration, and various other projects.

:: Karl :: 7:33:00 AM [Link] ::