Like Larry, I found the most interesting part of this reading to be the above line. It touches on the problem of discerning ... how can you correctly interpret your religious experience and what if that experience contradicts the teachings of your church? This probably is not much of a problem for Quakers, as their respect for the individual's personal connection to God is very strong, but in the Catholic church, well, it's maybe a good thing that the Inquisition's in the distant past :-).
An example might be the conflict surrounding the alleged sightings of, and "secrets" given by, the Virgin Mary by six young people of the village of Međugorje. I have no personal opinion about the validity of the apparitions, but the subject does raise questions of how the church decides whether a person's religious experience is "truth".
- Our Lady of Medjugorje: The Burning Bush by Fr. William McNichols, SJ
9 comments:
Crystal wrote: "how can you correctly interpret your religious experience and what if that experience contradicts the teachings of your church?" But yes, it does concern a Quaker. The disagreement with the church doesn't concern me personally; I just rely on my own light.
What concerns me is that so many people have apparently such a small faith that they have to look to someone else to tell them what they believe.
That concerned George Fox also. He said, "we know what Jesus said and what Paul said, but what doth thou say? Has God spoken to you today? Have you spoken to God.
Hi Larry. I've noticed that many of the United Church of Christ sites have banner that reads ... "God is still speaking" ... sometimes I forget that can happen :-)
I'd like to thank kwakersaur for the wonderful job he did at KAMM this past Sunday, and I would like to thank him for showing me this site.
what if that experience contradicts the teachings of your church? This probably is not much of a problem for Quakers
I read this and agreed with it. Came back and read it again, and agreed with it again. Then stopped and said hold on there… It all depends on that word experience and how it is defined.
It's not all that uncommon for my experience (thoughts and so forth) to contradict the teachings of my church. I have a lot left to learn. When it occurs I stop and look at myself and say – ok lets look at this a bit deeper. How valid is my experience? Usually I decided that I have made a mistake. Perhaps I was presumptuous, failed to truly listen, or did not seek that of God in everyone. I will decide that there are many ways to examine this and I have chose one valid one among many and my stubbornness is misplaced. Sometimes I'll discuss it with others and maybe we will agree that the meeting has made a mistake, perhaps abandoning its principles in some form or other. It would be rare for me to set myself against the meeting alone. It always is something that has at least some importance to me. Big differences are quite important to me. I think that the key is that the teachings of Quaker theology is not based on doctrinal interpretations of the bible (at least not in the sense it is in other churches), so differences on interpretations are not going to cause problems. The testimonies, and the processes of discernment -solving problems at the Monthly Meeting level or individual level certainly are areas where one's experience can contradict the teachings of the meeting. When this happens I find that it can not be easily ignored.
Hi Edwin. A while ago I posted something on my blog about what catholics call the primacy of conscience ... the idea that a person should follow their conscience, even if it contradicts the teachings of the church ... it's in the catechism, yet you wouldn't believe the furor over it :-)
Thanx for the kudos edwin.
I've actually been falling down on the job on my web-presence stuff. The old kwakersaur stumbled from a weekend pastoral visit to late evenings on Monday and Tuesday and the BIG year end staff meeting (day-long -- yikes!) today.
A person's experience cannot be questioned.
How they interpret the experience, how they assign meaning to it, can...
Experience can be questioned...
Have you heard of that game where you question several people about an incident they each view simultaneously? Each person will relay the episode slighlty differently, focuing on different aspects, or simply reading it entirely diffently from others. Our minds can and do play with us, and create experiences that become a story of who we think we are and how we fit in the world. This becomes our narrative, the "Story of little me."
What is beneath these experiences, beneath our thoughts, and beneath our name and who we think we are? Come back to this, and find in the silence, somthing very trustworthy. God is this great silence.
I was thinking of religious experience - you know, that burning bush sort of feeling that's hard to doubt while it's actually happening, though you may question its veracity afterwards? I'd be the first to note that it's hard to discern about such an experience ... in the presence of God, or burgeoning brain tumor? :-)
As Meredith and Crystal have pointed out, our view of reality is very relative. It's especially relative to our (unique) individual experience.
I believe my faith hinges on two ideas, visions, doctrines, whatever you want to call it: God is good (and loving), and our purpose in life is to love God and our neighbor. (The word love here has a special meaning of positive regard and willingness to serve.
Every other religious idea I have to subject to the above. If congruent, then yes; otherwise, no.
Tillich refered to this as our 'ultimate concern', and gave it as a 'definition of God'. By this criterion everyone's vision of God is going to be different- relative to his unique experience.
Perhaps close to a third criterion for me would be that we respect the right and duty of others to hold to their own unique vision of God.
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