If I've posted this in the wrong section please move it, I wasn't really sure where this belongs.
I'm addressing Christianity more here, since while I do try to make an effort to learn about the theology of other faiths I'm neither as well read nor have I met as many Christian theologians as I have those of other faiths.
I've noticed something very strange when I talk to believers or read theology. Whenever I went to church, or when I spoke to the average layman from another denomination I always heard God preached as a personified objective being. As in he was an entity that thought, intervened and was otherwise sentient. They way it was described was fairly clear, "he wills", "he is" etc.
Now as I've come to know more believers, either meeting them through work, study or whatever; my last boyfriend was an Anglican seminarian they never talk about God like that outside of a service or a mass. God becomes suddenly far more abstract, the "summation of all being", "the perfection", or even "the omega point in the evolutionary chain". While I know there was a "God is dead" movement in theology back in the 90's and there have always been figures like Shelby Spong lurking on the corners of the liberal Christian scene this puzzles me. This isn't restricted to the liberal wing, the conservative wings of theology do this too in apologetics and when explaining something about their faith.
This might sound silly but is it possible many believers who actually have studied their faith have actually discarded the idea of a God, and just don't know it? Very often I sit there reading something they've written and thought "If you minus calling this idea Jesus this could probably pass as conservative philosophical speculation" since it's very rare God as a thinking being comes up. I often suspect a great deal of clergy are atheists, since really after so many years training for the priesthood what else are most of them qualified to do? The pay isn't all that bad for some of them either, my last boyfriend was just a trainee essentially and he got lots of freebies from the church in accommodation, bills payed for him and lots of other goodies that didn't come out of his wages.
What do you make about it? I enjoy reading philosophy, and I do try to keep up with what theology says since the fields often cross over and it's something that keeps coming up.
I'm addressing Christianity more here, since while I do try to make an effort to learn about the theology of other faiths I'm neither as well read nor have I met as many Christian theologians as I have those of other faiths.
I've noticed something very strange when I talk to believers or read theology. Whenever I went to church, or when I spoke to the average layman from another denomination I always heard God preached as a personified objective being. As in he was an entity that thought, intervened and was otherwise sentient. They way it was described was fairly clear, "he wills", "he is" etc.
Now as I've come to know more believers, either meeting them through work, study or whatever; my last boyfriend was an Anglican seminarian they never talk about God like that outside of a service or a mass. God becomes suddenly far more abstract, the "summation of all being", "the perfection", or even "the omega point in the evolutionary chain". While I know there was a "God is dead" movement in theology back in the 90's and there have always been figures like Shelby Spong lurking on the corners of the liberal Christian scene this puzzles me. This isn't restricted to the liberal wing, the conservative wings of theology do this too in apologetics and when explaining something about their faith.
This might sound silly but is it possible many believers who actually have studied their faith have actually discarded the idea of a God, and just don't know it? Very often I sit there reading something they've written and thought "If you minus calling this idea Jesus this could probably pass as conservative philosophical speculation" since it's very rare God as a thinking being comes up. I often suspect a great deal of clergy are atheists, since really after so many years training for the priesthood what else are most of them qualified to do? The pay isn't all that bad for some of them either, my last boyfriend was just a trainee essentially and he got lots of freebies from the church in accommodation, bills payed for him and lots of other goodies that didn't come out of his wages.
What do you make about it? I enjoy reading philosophy, and I do try to keep up with what theology says since the fields often cross over and it's something that keeps coming up.
