Still Running Off at the Keyboard

IDEAS HAVE CONSEQUENCES

We need to remember that. When strange ideas are put forth supported by unity in diversity and interreligious dialogue, some people are going to believe them. This book represents some of the strangest ideas I've seen yet in the realm of interfaith dialogue.

David M. Sherman E.O.H.N. has reviewed the book GOD/GODDESS - THE ASTROLOGER by Jeffrey Armstrong. His review can be read on Armstrong's website. The review demonstrates where interreligious dialogue goes when there are no restraints. Armstrong is attempting to convince his readers that Christianity, Judaism, and Eastern religions all believe in astrology, reincarnation, and karma. He has managed to convince himself that somewhere in the distant past of Christianity this was so. He even quotes Fr. Peter Stravinskas from an article in "The Catholic Answer" (Vol. 15, no. 1, page 19) in which he says Fr. Stravinskas wrote:

The Church, on the other hand, has never had a completely negative assessment of astrology, even coming up with the Latin adage, "Astra impellunt, non compellunt" ("The stars impel, they do not compel!") - that is, to assert some influence of the stars on human character and/or behavior is not necessarily problematic from the Christian point of view, so long as one does not regard that influence as determinative of human actions in a fatalistic sense."

"This condition", Sherman assures us "is certainly met by a proper understanding of 'Vedic Astrology' as reflected throughout Mr. Armstrong's book."

What does Sherman propose we do about this commonality between East and West?

...Our entire Christian world-view of religious history needs to be scrapped, and we need to start-over [sic] with a non-ethnocentric view of history, which includes the Eastern Bhakti Traditions, in the same kind of 'fraternal' dialogue, we currently enjoy with Judaism. Every work like Mr. Armstrong's, that increases our understanding of The Eastern Bhakti Traditions in relationship to these thorny interfaith issues, is an important contribution to dialogue.