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"...this gap between popular theology and its sources ought to receive more attention than it does..."
ReplyDeleteCount me interested. After quickly skimming Fr. John's site (https://ruleoffaith.org/) I read "The Year of the Spoon", which raises several important points, not the least of which is the "totalizing" tendencies of 'popular theology'.
I know pastors are always struggling against these sources - orthodoxinfo.com on the one hand, Public Orthodoxy on the other...
Yet, I can't feel but a little uncomfortable with the more traditional top down, scholarly (or even spiritually) 'elitist' model of the 'educated' priest/deacon trained in seminary by the good (e.g. Hopko), the questionable (e.g. Met. Ware) and the bad (e.g. some modernist women with a reform agenda) being the *only* source (for the "average parishoner") of what in the end is still a 'popular theology' because of all the human limitations of this or any other model. In other words, I am glad you can't put the internet genie back in the bottle even if it is a thorn in the side of more than a few "liberal" AND "conservative" deacon/priests/bishops out there.
Thanks
DeleteOne more thought: My experience tells me that the sources of 'popular theology' for the vast majority of the faithful is much more likely to be NPR or Fox News than any explicit Christian (let alone Orthodox) source...
ReplyDeleteWe are Orthodox! We do not do "popular".
ReplyDeleteI am shocked, I tell you, shocked!
https://www.facebook.com/sainttikhons/videos/vb.362591286235/256650225769823/?type=2&theater
ReplyDeleteShort and to the point, possibly too dense for the "average" keyboard warrior.