My conservative side is showing

from w
Yesterday's Age had a full page advertisement from a 'church' that used to be a fine place of worship corner of Collins and Russell Street Melbourne. Used for the Uniting Church conferences at one time, but these days the shift to 'humanism' from being 'Christian' puts them on the fringe of conservative Christian values. Life is meant to be lived well - I can go along with that, but Francis McNab, the elderly leader there, psychologist and minister, has thrown out nearly all of the 'traditional' Christian beliefs. To take out a full page in the Age is provocative of course and will appeal to many people who want to be modern. Okay, that's alright to examine Biblical stories, the magic in some of them, but I am convinced that McNab has gone too far with his 'New Faith' because it isn't faith at all, but a diminishing of the spiritual in the world to just secular. A couple of years ago he astonished many of us when his group put a billboard across a major road proclaiming that the Old Testament Commandents were terrifying and negative. It's okay I think in a discussion group to ask questions, but it is bad manners to do this and to poke fun of the historical story of Christian faith.

I wonder who paid for the advertisement which surely would have been about $14,000 for a full page in the Saturday supplement! And apparently not once but four times.

Now, I've been told, that to go to St Michael's Uniting Church on a Sunday morning, there is little to indicate heresy - there are hymns, Bible readings, organ recitals, and so on, so the text of the advertisement promoting the New Faith is inconsistent with what their worship indicates. It's a puzzlement, as someone says in a musical!