A Warning and A Call to Action

Been sitting on this for a full three weeks.

I read this on Friday, 8.21.2020, but held off doing anything with it. Today, 9-11, seems ironically, even horribly, perfect to share this —

The earliest Christians contended with syncretism in the form of Gnosticism, which blended elements of Greek philosophy and Zoroastrianism with Christianity, emphasizing the good-evil spirit-flesh divide as well as secret divine knowledge (Greek: gnosis is “knowledge”). Early church fathers such as Irenaeus and Tertullian battled Gnostic ideas, rejecting them as heresy.

At a time when church leaders are having to host digital church and try to meet members’ needs virtually, the idea of adding “fight heresy” to their to-do list might sound exhausting. But a core calling of church leaders is to speak the truth in love. It’s not loving to allow impressionable people to be taken in by falsehood. Nor is it loving to allow them to spread falsehood and slander to others.

— Those two paragraphs are tucked into this piece: https://www.christianheadlines.com/columnists/guest-commentary/qanon-the-alternative-religion-thats-coming-to-your-church.html?fbclid=IwAR0lRIPLABR-Vog3YuoDfZmy1YKaTrjIz-SfpQ3CGUGtWjiYwAHEf1jgKWo

Those two paragraphs are both a warning and a call to action. We avoid either one at great peril.