The Cultic Mind

The Gospel According to Granny Herald

The NZ Herald editorial writers have put the paper's prejudices, ignorance, and Unbelief on display.  The paper has presumed to pontificate officially about what it clearly knows little.  The occasion is a cult-watch organization taking Brian Tamaki of Destiny Church to task over his alleged denial of the resurrection of our Lord.  (Tamaki has denied the allegations.)

The editorial writer, however, apparently disbelieves Tamaki's denial, commending him for being in "good company".

The editorial column of a newspaper is no place to debate the substance of the matter, but it is worth noting that Tamaki is in good company.  Debate about the literal truth of the Bible's narratives - Noah's Flood, the Immaculate Conception, the New Testament's miracles - goes back a few centuries.

Our own most distinguished theologian, Sir Lloyd Geering, was charged by the Presbyterian Church with "doctrinal error" (read heresy) in 1967 for suggesting that resurrection was not resuscitation. Far from ending up in the Outer Darkness, he received our highest honour, the Order of New Zealand.

Our "most distinguished theologian"!  Let us be clear.  The reason Geering has received public honours is precisely because he is an Unbeliever.  Had he been an orthodox, genuine Christian he would be mocked and despised in this pagan country.  When you receive public honours and adulation from the hands and mouths of non-Christians, it's time to worry.  (Incidentally, while Geering has been lionised by Unbelief for his public denial of the resurrection of our Lord, his subsequent "theological" writings have been a confused mess of pottage--pablum, desperately seeking significance. A sandwich short of a picnic.)

But the writer wants to scale yet greater heights.  The editorial acknowledges that Cultwatch represents "conservative and orthodox Christianity",  believes in the bodily resurrection of our Lord, and insists upon it as an unequivocal and central doctrine of the faith, but in so doing it shows its true colours--it is itself acting like a cult.

And in so violently denouncing what he [Tamaki] said, Cultwatch displays the kind of hostility to spiritual inquiry normally associated with the closed minds of cultists.

In the mind of the editorial writer the only true faith is sceptical--questioning and disbelieving everything.  To believe is to have the closed mind of a cult member.  The orthodox Christian faith is a cult; sceptical Unbelief is the true faith.  The editorial writer's prejudice and ignorance accurately reflect the regnant superstitions of our Age.

Prejudice, ignorance, and superstition--there is the real "closed mind of a cultist".