As I was reading I was looking for a point – this sleuthing ensued from the non qualification of the 'Liberalism' Peter confers on us - and yes, unfortunately there was no point as most of the commentary here agrees. Rather than blaming liberalism Peter should Google or similar the term ‘fascism’ and use that as inspiration in his next superior lament. For the term ‘Fascism’ is a closer approximation to our reality than ‘Liberalism’ has, is, and ever will be under the auspices he describes.

Glorfindel said: "Western civilization is in decline because of its denial and now ignorance of its own roots."

Here is where is choose to diverge from religious types, as a rule.. this whole "we'll all be ruined, we're going to hell in a handbasket" (a theme prominent in Sells's original post) stuff really irks me, who says Western civilisation is in decline? Based on what metrics is this statement supported? When, pray tell, would be a better time to have been alive in a Western civilisation? I am pretty happy to be alive right now, with access to such wonders as the internet, modern medicine, and a relatively good justice system etc.

And this "I'm with Ivan (The Brothers Karamazov) when he tells his brother "If God doesn't exist, then everything is permitted." That's where 'liberal' present culture has brought us."

Rubbish I'm afraid. Nowhere in secular humanism is a "no holds barred, anything goes" doctrine advocated. You talk of Western society's ignorance of its roots - how about the (likely in my view) hypothesis that all religions have appropriated self-evident ethical truths from a secular humanist base? I am an atheist (bad word but unfortunately used prevalently) yet I don't act as if anything were permitted. Not because the great sky-daddy will smite me with lightning bolt tomorrow or bin me on judgment day, but because it is SELF-EVIDENT that living in such a way maximises happiness, over the long term (c.f. instant vs delayed gratification).

And this "Kant (Critique of Pure Reason) says wisely "There can be no proof of the existence of God, but it is all our interests to behave as if he exists.""

I guess I do act as if He exists, just not for your reasons.. the challenge is to encourage people to live fulfilling lives, not under threat of eternal hellfire, but by educating them as to the benefits of so doing. Then again threatening people with damnation if they don't buy your message is a lot simpler, isn't it?

Don't worry, Glorfindel, he will.

>>Disregard the anti-Christian abuse from humanists, relativists, nihilists, those who deny the actual or even desirable existence of anything outside themselves.<<

You fail to mention those of us who ask him civilised questions about his sermons.

We are disregarded too.

You don't refer to those who are devout Christians who take up the cudgels against some of his more tendentious pronouncements - usually Catholics, by the way.

They are totally ignored too.

But I'm sure that you will get a warm response.

You also deliver the classic generalization that religious people clasp to their collective bosom, the mantra that appears so often, that it conceivably justifies their entire existence.

>>The bloggers who abuse you, and Christianity, have no idea of the difference between good and evil, of what is really important<<

This is of course the automatic defence deployment that has at its root a complete failure of logic.

Only if you narrowly define Christianity as "good", and non-Christianity as "evil", can this statement possibly be true.

>>I'm with Ivan (The Brothers Karamazov) when he tells his brother "If God doesn't exist, then everything is permitted."<<

The first problem with this statement is, of course, that Ivan did not actually say this.

The second problem is that Ivan does believe in God - he tells Alyosha so. Given that he would not support the first premise, that God does not exist, the succedant "everything is permitted" is null.

What you have is pure Dostoevskian irony.

But I expect that you and Sells share the purist Christian's contempt of anything logical

Harm minimisation is not lacking in morality, just the opposite. A friend once said she felt hard done by, as a diabetic, for not being able to access free syringes, and if she signed up as a drug user she would be better off.

It was not until a friend's child stabbed herself with a syringe found in a playground that she realised that there was some merit in the needle exchange program. The program does not imply approval of illicit drug use but in a complex world morality sometimes just means bowing to the greater good and taking pragmatic measures to inhibit the spread of a deadly disease.

Hardly anything immoral in that.

Several posters have asked what the "point" of Sells' article is. Granted, its a bit hard to find, buried as it is in an avalanche of discursive verbiage. Sells sets up a strawman argument on the nature of liberalism in the first 1,300 words of his article until he reaches his point,

which is <<It comes as no surprise that liberalism has infected the church, particularly in what has come to be called “Liberal Protestantism">>

So, to sum up:

Liberalism=Nihilism

Liberal Protestantism=Liberalism=Nihilism

So, any "Liberal Protestants" out there like to debate Sells on this?

Sells,

How do you define “Liberal Protestantism”? In everyday denominational terms, which are the Liberal Protestant churches?