John Shelby Spong, “The Future of the Christian Tradition”, as given to the Jesus Seminar, (2006), p. 45.
“I want to
be a follower of Jesus. How do I accomplish that? It is not by conversion
activity or missionary enterprises, I assure you. I wish the church would get (out*) of the
conversion business. That business is, well intentioned but base born. It is, no matter how sophisticated its adherents
try to make it, finally nothing but an attempt to impose a religious tradition
thought to be superior, on those who are themselves as well as their beliefs
judged to be inferior.” (*This word is absent in text?)
Matthew 23: 15 (TNIV). Woe 2 of 7 that Jesus dumped on the church of his day.
“Woe
to you, teachers of the Law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You travel over land and sea to win a single
convert, and then you make that convert twice as much a child of hell as you
are.”
Conversion to
any religion, as in Christianity, is not about a discussion (love or respect) among equals, it is
only a surrender to a bully tradition. gg
G. Goslaw
Landers, Ca
