A Contemporary Confessions for Modern Gnostics

Judging by its subtitle, I must confess that I had low expectations for Robin Phillips’ Rediscovering the Goodness of Creation. Some conservative cultural commentators, the secondhand Eric Voegelins of the world, use the term Gnostic in imprecise and polemical ways, making of it a theological black box into which they put everything they do not like, justifying their dislike with religious zeal. Suddenly, things like socialism and capitalism, environmentalism and climate change, ascetic sexual ethics and promiscuity—each choice depending on the commentator’s political biases—all become not just vicious or mistaken but heretical. This is unfortunate since, as Voegelin knew, Gnosticism authentically existed only once, in several distinct schools of thought, and genuine likenesses to it can be found in some, though not all, modern ideologies, even in the teaching and practices of some contemporary Christian traditions. Read Full Article »