quotes from Tomlinson

I'm reading Dave Tomlinson's Re-enchanting Christianity. I normally wait until I get to the end of a book before commeting, but this is so rich with pithy little thoughts that I have to report some of them. A proper review will follow.

One particularly striking section is about how we understand who Jesus is - this after a discussion of how to understand the bible and a contrast of 'literal realism', 'critical realism' and 'non-realism' in thinking about who God is.  I was left gasping for air after I got to:

Only the doggedly rationalist mind imagines that truth is equated solely with fact.

Well, if you put it that way, suddenly everything makes sense.

And then, there's the section on atonement.  After discussing a number of ideas, we get something which perhaps we can put ona par with Chalke's 'cosmic child abuse; line which caught so much flack.

Substitutionary atonement theory could be seen as a crime against divinity!

Ho ho.  Nice pun, but makes the point well: he quotes from Wink who says that this theory portrays God as a cruel and unforgiving patriach 'unable to love as a decent parent should, trapped in his own rules that force him to commit a ghastly crime.'

All in all, this isn't a book for those of a sensitively evangelical disposition.  But it's littered with food for thought.  I love it!