The catechistic impulse is strong. At best, it is a good way to step through a belief system and understand what is meant at each point. What is God? Are there more Gods than one? How many persons are there in the godhead?
But there is always a way to do a good thing in a bad way. The kind of systematic method that a catechism uses can tempt one to think that we who use it now possess a complete system that exhausts all knowledge. The answer to every question is somewhere in that catechism if only we are clever enough to tease it out. And having All Knowledge is a heady thing.
But if learning the catechism makes you feel that way, you're in trouble. There is something like a catechistic exchange in the gospel:
Student: What must I do to inherit eternal life?
Master: What does the Scripture say?
Student: Love the Lord your God &c. and your neighbor as yourself.
Master: Right. Do this and you will live.
Student: But who is my neighbor?
The student, we are told, asks because he wishes to justify himself. "I need approval on a definition that puts me in the right."
As if having the all the right answers makes you all right.
Labels: Federal Vision
