Saturday I was up in bitterly cold Minneapolis where I addressed a gathering of Covenant pastors and lay folks on reading the Bible in a postmodern context. This was the first time I've spoken about the stuff I've been writing for my book called The Blue Parakeet: Rethinking How You Read the Bible. I'll not summarize everything, but I want to suggest there are some major shifts going on right now that are altering how many read the Bible and I hope my book can give us some grounding for rethinking how we do what we do.
First, I want to thank Jim Fretheim and the good folks of the Northwest Conference of the Evangelical Covenant Church for the invitation and for the willingness to let me think through some of these ideas with them.
I met a bundle of folks who regularly read and comment on this blog; this is becoming one of my highlights of speaking events. (I met the pastor who wrote me the "pesky Calvinists" letter.) And it was good to see Pastor Dave Clark of Faith Covenant Church who was the host pastor.
Second, I began with how I think the postmodern generation is reading the Bible more and more and here are my six reflections. They partly overlap; they are not comprehensive; but still, I'm seeing such things:
1. De-throning science as the sole Story.
2. En-throning a subjectivity as part of the real Story.
3. Embracing a local story as part of the real Story.
4. Epistemic humility about what one concludes from the Bible.
5. Acceptance of myth and fiction as capable of truth-telling.
6. Admission of cultural influence on all texts, even the Bible.
I focused on three words that are helping us all -- postmodern or not -- rethinking how we read the Bible: Story, Listening, and Discerning (I'm concerned about "picking and choosing" but I hope I can say some surprising things about this in the future).
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Thanks Julie.
By the way Scot - it is never "bitterly cold" in Minneapolis, merely pleasantly nippy. My biggest disappointment with current location is the mild winters.
@RJS (#41): I hate to disagree with one of my favorite posters, but Minneapolis is so "pleasantly nippy" (your term) that the city fathers have constructed a huge, multi-block network of second-floor crosswalks between buildings and across streets just so the citizens won't have to go out in the "nip." :)
Bob,
Not only that but - outside of the city - apartment buildings and motels without garages often have plugs available for engine block or dipstick heaters.
And in places streets are plowed on the lakes for access to fish houses.
But nothing matches the beauty of a walk on a bright sunny January day over the crunchy snow.
RJS,
A walk on crunchy snow ... exactly the comment Kris made to me two evenings ago -- under the sky with light flaking. Loved it.
A Minnesotan misleads half the country, and a Chicagoan backs her up. Me, I'd rather walk on the beach in the tropics. But that's probably just me. (Sorry, off-topic.)
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