All Saints Adult Formation Class: Do I have to believe? Part I

I’m finding that my initial plan to visit each new church one time isn’t enough to come to an appreciation of them. Going forward I will spend 3-4 services at each location, assuming I like them.

I went to three services at All Saints over the past month as well as one adult formation class called: Do I have to believe? I’d like to talk about that class experience in two parts.

Dragon and I attended together and it was billed as a happy hour. 43 people came out on a Friday evening to discuss this topic. What a success! There was tons of food and drinks, including, yes, wine, and a very engaged and friendly group.

First I’d like to talk about the way the group leader framed the conversation about belief because I found it very helpful. He was a philosopher by training from an evangelical Christian educational background. I wish I could just play what he had to say but there was no graceful way to stop him long enough to ask if I could record him so we’ll have to go by my notes.

He talked about six kinds of belief:

1. Comfortable belief. These are folks who believe the party line of the Episcopal Church, are happy with those beliefs, and good for them. He didn’t want those people to feel alienated.
2. “Will” to believe. This is making a choice to believe: in God, in the Trinity, in the miracles of the New Testament, you name it. A woman spoke up that “will” in German means “want to.” In other words, choosing the path that one wants to believe in church doctrine and therefore chooses to put their eggs in the Episcopal basket.
3. Faith. Ah, faith. He talked about Trust, Faith, Commitment, and Hope. Belief can play a bigger or smaller role for folks who choose the road of faith. The facilitator brought up an interesting point about faith. He talked about how theologians dislike the idea of faith connoting belief without evidence but instead that faith engenders ways to belief.
4. Shrinking the content of belief. In other words, choosing to believe less than what the church officially stands for until it fits what you personally feel comfortable with.
5. Reinterpret traditional beliefs. In other words, to apply contemporary knowledge to historical Christian or Episcopal beliefs in an attempt to modernize them or bring them into alignment with today’s understanding of the world.
6. Christianity as a Way or Movement. This one was referred to repeatedly but I didn’t really understand it.

One woman spoke up and said this was very intellectual and brought up the emotional experience of God and belief.

I’ll speak in my next post about the group discussion but I wanted to start out with this very helpful summary of ways one can approach the beliefs of any church to find s way to fit yourself into them.