Charting a New Reformation, Part XI –The Third Thesis: Original Sin – The Myth of the Fall

Column by Bishop John Shelby Spong on 25 February 2016 15 Comments
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Question

What do you think of the book, Conversations with God, by Neale Walsh? It is interesting and I want to believe it, but really don’t.

Answer

Dear Janah,

Neale Walsh’s book has been very popular and has an appeal for a number of people. He writes in a lively and provocative style. He portrays a deity so engaged with human life that people feel comforted by his words. It has, however, a minimal appeal for me. That is not the fault of this book so much as it is an inability on my part to make most of the assumptions that he seems so easily to make. I cannot suspend my rationality. I cannot force my brain to operate within his universe. I am always questioning his presuppositions which keep me from ever accepting his conclusions. I am not able to turn off my skeptical mind. It is not the reality of God about which my skepticism is exercised, but by the way God is defined by him. I rejoice whenever people in search of meaning find it in any source, but theology is an ultimate mystery since it searches for a God who can never be described in human terms. I worry about those who believe they have arrived at “the Truth.” Neale Walsh falls into that category for me. So I am not a fan!

Thanks for asking.
John Shelby Spong

 

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15 thoughts on “Charting a New Reformation, Part XI –The Third Thesis: Original Sin – The Myth of the Fall

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