Christianity is heading for a full allegorization

[Belacqua]

I'm not too big on having an ideology.

If we go by good old Merriam Webster, then ideology isn't a bad thing. It would be hard to avoid having one.

ideology:
a : a manner or the content of thinking characteristic of an individual, group, or culture
b : the integrated assertions, theories and aims that constitute a sociopolitical program
c : a systematic body of concepts especially about human life or culture

Since we all have characteristic ways of thinking, and these ways of thinking are always derived from our culture, I don't see how we can be said NOT to have an ideology. 

Especially if we have strong beliefs about how the world could be better, then that's our ideology.

I think every belief ought to be questioned. Every idea ought to stand on its own two legs... not be propped up by some institution or ethos.

This strikes me as an extremely ideological statement. It says how people ought to think and how they should be in relation to their local institutions and ethos. It takes a stand against people with a different ideology -- for example, those who think they should be humble in the face of authority. 

The idea that we have an individual responsibility to evaluate and pass judgment on all claims is historically associated with liberalism. (And here I'm using the term in its historical sense; American media use the word differently.) 

It's also completely impossible for any idea to "stand on its own two legs." Every idea we hold, or every new idea we hear of, is woven into a system of beliefs from the moment it comes to us. An idea will be propped up by some institution or ethos -- whether that's science, or religion, or a social ideology like liberalism. 

What you said earlier is also a sort of prime example of how liberalism approaches texts:

Treat it like Lord of the Rings or any other fictional work.

THEN see if there is any value in it. Like I said... just like we do with Greek mythology.

Approaching the Bible, The Lord of the Rings, and Greek mythology all in the same way is, to me, bizarre and consumerist. All of these works were created and used in fundamentally different ways. 

The different parts of the Bible were written for different purposes, but have been treated and interpreted as sacred by very serious people for a very long time. The Bible as we read it now is not just the text -- we read it through the lens of all the interpretations that have come since it was new. The Lord of the Rings is a pastiche of real epics, written for children. For an adult to take it seriously now would indicate a serious developmental issue. Greek mythology has never existed just on its own. It is presented in other works, including Homer, Plato, Dante, Botticelli, Rembrandt, Freud, Nietzsche, etc. These are concepts woven into the fabric of Western thought, with varied and often contradictory uses. To know what the myths mean in any given context requires background knowledge, not just personal opinion. 

If we approach all of these things in the same way, we deracinate and devalue what it really is. To make it into some kind of Baskin Robbins "choose your favorite" is liberal consumer society at its worst. 

To detach a text from all of its history, institutional use, and social nuance, is to take away nearly everything it means. Then once we've completely deracinated it, and approach it with our own personal interpretation, we can easily use it to mean whatever we want it to. It easily becomes a method to reinforce prejudice, rather than teach something new. In fact this is the trouble with Bible reading today -- both fundies and fundie atheists just imagine it means whatever they imagine, and don't take the trouble to work on it.