As Right Meets Left, Just Who Is Converting Whom?

Thanks for the coverage of the new “post-conservative” movement centered at Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena (“Jesus With a Genius Grant,” by Alan Rifkin, Nov. 23). However, I think the article missed precisely why Fuller reflects post-conservatism--namely the uncoupling of conservative Christianity from the old Protestant work ethic. The new knowledge class of academics, psychologists and “interculturalists” highlighted in the article has invaded the religious institutions of the old business class. Like the 2000 national election, in which the two politically left coasts were represented as blue dots and the heartland as red dots, there is a new “bluing” of evangelical Christianity. Who will end up co-opting whom remains to be seen.

Wayne Lusvardi

Pasadena

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If those at Fuller stick to teaching the inerrant word of God from the Bible, they will be graduating true Christian theologians. If they, like Fuller President Richard Mouw and professor Nancey Murphy, add their own ideas, they will be creating just another new religion with a dash of Christianity to make it look authentic. As Christ said, if you hold to my teachings, you are really my disciples. Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.

Dina Koehly

Santa Ana

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The seminary’s effort to “embrace both science and the Bible” recalls George Bernard Shaw’s observation that a Catholic university is a contradiction in terms. Science is the systematic study of the unknown. There are no a priori truths. Religion, on the other hand, is based on faith; faith, by definition, is belief in the unknown. With all of their modernization, Fuller’s “Post-Evangelicals” still begin with the premise that God exists, an assumption with no scientific validity.

Forrest G. Wood

Bakersfield

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For 10 years I taught French to Fuller’s theological scholars to help them unravel the mysteries of theological writings in the original language. It was a marvelous experience teaching at this crossroad of mystique and reality.

Christine Peterson

Woodland Hills