Credo 8/17/2020

 

Credo 8/17/2020

                I want to continue to share some insights from William Coffin. Here is a quote from the chapter on Faith, Hope, Love. “It is bad religion to deify doctrines and creeds While indispensable to religious life, doctrines and creeds are only so as signposts. Love alone is the hitching post. Doctrines, let’s not forget, supported slavery and apartheid; some still support keeping women in their places, and gays and lesbians in limbo. Moreover, doctrines can divide while compassion can only unite. In other words, religious folk, all our lives, have both to recover tradition and to recover from it!” (pg 9).

                When my family moved to Lincoln, I was only 15. My previous religious education was in a variety of Sunday school classes of different denominations. Neither of my parents attended church services unless I was to be involved. That changed. In Lincoln, our family became involved in a church together in a Christian Church, Disciples of Christ. As I was going through membership classes-similar to confirmation in the UMC-, it was taught that there are no doctrines before God and no dogma before Christ. I may have that wrong, but the idea was that doctrines and dogma can be useful but not at the expense of love of God and love of neighbor. One reason that I became an UMC, was Westley assertion that the greatest things we can strive for is love, God and neighbor. I think of the scriptures of Jesus talking about the good Samaritan, the woman at the well, the faithful women disciples, and even those sinners he ate with. I would hope that in all we do as a people and as a church hitches our reins on the post of love.