Re: Addendum: a holy spirit

----- Original Message -----
From: "caeruleancentaur" <caeruleancentaur@...>


> Wow!  I had no intention of starting yet another flame.  My apologies
> to all who took offense where none was intended.
Qualify that "all."  I didn't take any kind of theological offense.  :)  And
thank you for your personal apology in your other letter.  I consider my
"sensitivity" (the whole "woman" issue) to be a fault, and a paranoiac one,
and I struggle against it.  To play the gender card never wins friends.  I
retract it completely.  I've made many many friends on this list, even
though I'm a "difficult" number.  It's a great list, and a forgiving one.

> It seems as though
> a discussion of the Scripture of any faith is taboo, since it always
> leads to someone taking umbrage.
What a pity.

> For the record, I am a Roman Catholic priest with an M.A. in theology
> (with a concentration in Scripture) and an M.A. in comparative
> religions.  However, I am not a professional scholar or teacher, but
> merely the pastor of three small parishes in the Blue Ridge Mountains
> of the Diocese of Richmond, VA.  The study of Sacred Scripture, like
> that of linguistics, has its schools of thought.  It is virtually
> impossible, at least in the study of Scripture, for all the scholars
> to have a concensus on the meaning of various passages.
That is so.  I've encountered it in my feeble little dabblings in theology.
I can well imagine scholars throughout the ages arguing over whether this is
THE Holy Spirit or a Holy Spirit.  Dispute has always been part of theology,
it seems.

> Having said this, I will now cease and desist from responding to any
> other messages that touch upon religion.  It seems safest this way,
> lest ire by raised again within the group.
That seems a great shame.  We should be able to talk intelligently about one
of the most important texts in human history without getting so angry about
it.  Currently, there are others, I see, who are far more INTENTIONALLY
inflammatory than you have been, without, it seems, having even read the
texts in question.  But Teoh and Joe have given some good, succinct
rejoinders on that front, so none of the rest of us need get involved. ;)

Pax,
Sally