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Merry Christmas Myth: ELCA Leader Says Virgin Birth and Nativity Story Did Not Happen

12/20/2012

26 Comments

 
What do you know . . .  An ELCA leader doesn’t believe what the Bible says; this time its about Jesus’ birth.  Surprise and Merry Christmas!  (Do they celebrate Christmas in the ELCA any longer?)

Here is what was said by Rev. Dr. Don Carlson, Assistant to the Bishop of the Texas-Louisiana Gulf Coast Synod, concerning the two accounts of Jesus’ birth in the gospel of Matthew and the gospel of Luke:

“They are very different stories which are quite incompatible with one another. . .I certainly do not believe they are ‘historical’ in any modern understanding of historicity. . .I think that the stories are made up. (I’m retiring at the end of May anyway so don’t waste time with the heresy accusations.) They are myth” (read here).

Here is what Rev. Carlson had to say about Christ being born of a virgin:

“Focusing on the virgin birth issue, we need to remember that accounts of virgin or miraculous births were not uncommon antiquity. However, we also need to remember that such accounts were intended to express something about the character of the person born. They were a ‘character reference’ or ‘credentials.’ They were not intended to explain where the individual got 23 of his or her chromosomes. An understanding of fertilization and pregnancy in antiquity was, let’s say, ‘agrarian’ at best.” (read in the same article linked above)

Toward the end of his blog/article Rev. Carlson gives this advice to pastors: “tell the old mythic story in a way that. . . it is heard anew”.  In order to prove his points in the blog, the Assistant to the Bishop recommends a discussion of the birth narratives by the controversial Marcus Borg. (find out more about him here)

Pastor Steve Shipman, director of LutheranCORE addresses those who teach like Rev. Carlson.  Rev. Shipman wrote:


“If a person chooses not to believe the Virgin Birth, they are free to do so.  But they have no right then to claim to be a teacher or believer in Christianity.  The faith once delivered to the saints is not a cafeteria from which we can pick and choose what pleases us.

If Jesus were born in the usual way, then what does it mean that He is 'the Word made flesh'? How can God be his Father in the way the Church has always proclaimed, if he is biologically the child of both Mary and Joseph (or even, as certain blasphemous legends suggest, of Mary and some other man)? Some early Christians made arguments for what is called ‘adoptionism,’ which taught that Jesus wasn’t born Son of God but was adopted into that role at his baptism by John. This was quickly rejected as heresy, because then the good news of the Incarnation simply can’t stand.

And it does matter for our salvation that ‘God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself.’ It does matter that ‘the Word became flesh and dwelt among us.’ If Jesus is just a good human being, even a perfect human being, He cannot save us but would only have saved Himself. But because He is God among us, taking our humanity into the life of the Holy Trinity, we have a marvelous hope for this life and the next.”   (read here)

What I am reporting isn’t just one ELCA leader preaching heresy.  No. Rev. Carlson’s article was posted on the website and blog of Michael Rinehart, bishop of the Texas-Louisiana Gulf Coast Synod of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America.  Bishop Rinehart is responsible for the article’s posting on his blog and he is culpable for what it says.  ELCA Presiding Bishop Mark S. Hanson, the ELCA’s Church Council and all high-ranking ELCA leaders are also responsible and culpable for what he (and others) say and/or for allowing theologically false-teaching to be preached. Allowing this heresy is the same as promoting it yourself.  They are accomplices and are leading people away from God’s Truth and way from Christ.

People who don’t believe basic Christian truths and historic stories in the Bible are running the ELCA, teaching in the seminaries, preaching in the pulpits and “teaching” you about Christianity.  Honestly, I believe Satan has infiltrated the ELCA and placed his people in leadership positions.

Here’s some more information on Assistant to the Bishop Rev. Dr. Don Carlson:


  • Some of Rev. Carlson responsibilities as Assistant to the Bishop are “Call Process, Candidacy, Theological Education, Leadership” (see here).
  • Carlson, a gay man, has been pushing homosexuality issues in the ELCA for years.  (link provided upon request)
  • As Exposing the ELCA has reported, Rev. Carlson has said a number of unBiblical things in the past (see here and here)

26 Comments
Gene Henderson
12/20/2012 06:52:36 am

What then is the life and duty of an ELCA pastor if other than selling sludge to the unconfessing.

Reply
Kent Wallace
12/20/2012 03:28:09 pm

This so sad. For the last several Advents I have been researching and preaching on all the astonishing HISTORICAL evidence for the accounts of Matthew and Luke. Those say it is not historical are lazy scholars who have simply parroted what they were told by their equally lazy professors. For example, King Herod the Great did not die in 4BC but rather January of 1BC. Quirinius arrived in the East around that same time holding a special Imperium from Augustus himself as the Mentor of the emperor's grandson and heir.
When you look in 3BC - 1BC the astronomical show in the heavens is amazing. The political tension between Rome and the Parthian Empire was palpable and fully explains Herod's fear when "Magi from the East" arrived looking for "the King of the Jews"
There is no other word for "pastors" like this than FOOL!

Reply
Didaskalos link
12/21/2012 02:34:49 am

Decades ago, mainline denominations had only an occasional heretic (e.g., John Shelby Spong) to embarrass them. Now, heresy is the natural order of things for denominations like the ELCA, the Episcopal Church, and the United Church of Christ, all of which are rife with heretics at every level: national leaders, college and seminary professors, pastors and local bishops.

Two pastors who wrote a book about spiritual abuse in churches counseled that when a denomination's or church's body (the parishioners) is sick but the head (the leadership) is sound, there's reason to stay in the church. When the head is fatally diseased, it's time for the members of the body to "Go forth from Babylon! Flee from the Chaldeans!"

Reply
Ex-ELCA
12/21/2012 07:02:26 am

How come sludge like Rev. Dr. Don Carlson have well paid calls in the church, paid for by dead people who donated money to support the confession, and yet confessional pastors like myself have nothing? It makes me sick.

Reply
Didaskalos
12/21/2012 10:30:44 pm

And aren't we impressed by his puerile, in-your-face insouciance as he boasts about his self-absorbed heretical maunderings: "I’m retiring at the end of May anyway so don’t waste time with the heresy accusations."

Here's what the wolves in pastors' and bishops' clothing *don't* have:

"Therefore, you shepherds, hear the word of the Lord: “As I live,” declares the Lord God, “surely because My flock has become a prey, My flock has even become food for all the beasts of the field for lack of a shepherd, and My shepherds did not search for My flock, but rather the shepherds fed themselves and did not feed My flock; therefore, you shepherds, hear the word of the Lord: ‘Thus says the Lord God, “Behold, I am against the shepherds . . . I will deliver My flock from their mouth, so that they will not be food for them.”’” (Ezekiel 34)

In the last three years, at least 574,199 of the Lord's flock have been delivered from the predators in ELCA clerics' clothing.



Reply
Pr. Don Carlson
12/23/2012 09:33:10 am

Dan,

When I write things such as "so don’t waste time with the heresy accusations" I am writing to church leaders in our synod, most of whom are rostered, and many of whom I have known for almost 40 years, I am writing to people that know me well.

You, however, save for what seem to be, from my perspective, rather jaded and biased interpretations of my writings or what others have written about me, you do not know me at all. You know nothing of how I long have labored in the vineyard, what I have denied myself in order to do so, or what I have suffered for the sake of the Gospel. Yet you quite freely denigrate me and I am referred to as "sludge" by others responding to your blog; responses which you have approved. What ever happened to Luther's explanation of the 8th Commandment?

I want you to know that I confess either the Apostles' or the Nicene Creed. I fully believe in the virgin birth. I do, however, believe that the doctrine of the virgin birth is a statement about the mystery of the incarnation; that Jesus Christ is True God and True Man. I do not take it to be a scientific biological statement. It is a confession of faith and a witness to the true faith.

What is more, I fully believe the witness and testimony of the birth narratives found in Luke and Matthew. I just do not believe that they are "newsreel footage."

Matthew has Mary and Joseph living in Bethlehem and Jesus is born there. After the visit of the Magi, they flee all the way to Egypt to escape Herod's wrath. After Herod's death they try to return to life in Bethlehem but deem it unsafe since Herod's son is on the throne; so they go "hide out" and make a new life in Nazareth.

Luke has them living in Nazareth and they travel to Bethlehem for the census. After Jesus is born, they then travel to Jerusalem for the presentation in the temple, after which they return home to Nazareth.

My point was that they are very geographically and chronologically divergent stories. Each evangelist has a different, yet very truthful, theological testimony about Jesus that he wants to make and I fully believe both of them. However, I do not feel compelled to harmonize or conflate them; a practice that I believe does injustice to the particular testimony and theological truth of each gospel writer.

I also thought it a bit disingenuous when you stated that I suggested "a discussion of the birth narratives by the controversial Marcus Borg." The blog to which I referred was about a discussion between Borg and N.T. Wright; a fact that was omitted, unless one went to and read my post. In fact, the quote I lifted out of that discussion in my post was a lengthy one by Wright, not Borg.

I do find some of Borg's writings very useful and insightful, especially when he helps people read and hear the Biblical texts with 1st century eyes and ears rather than imposing on texts our 21st century viewpoints. I certainly do not agree with everything he says as you seem to infer. I also find the work of N.T. Wright most worthwhile and helpful.

I was not going to respond, but finally felt that I must. I hold you no ill will, but do wish that you would not so blithely use (and I feel abuse) my writing to buttress your opinion of the ELCA. Although we probably do disagree on a number of things, we still are brothers in Christ.

'The eye cannot say to the hand, ‘I have no need of you’, nor again the head to the feet, ‘I have no need of you.''

A blessed Christmas.

Don

Reply
Dan - Exposing the ELCA
12/26/2012 02:27:51 pm

Rev. Carlson,

I appreciate you taking the time to write and explain some of your thoughts behind what you wrote in Bishop Rinehart's blog.

It does seem to me that you are backtracking on what was said in your original blog. You said the two accounts of Jesus’ birth in the gospel of Matthew and the gospel of Luke were “made up" and "They are myth.” You essentially said the same thing about the virgin birth.

One thing that I appreciated about your writings is that you did not hide your true thoughts and beliefs on Scripture. I wish all ELCA leaders would be so forthright and honest. I believe it is every ELCA member's right to know what their leaders, who guide and instruct them, believe.

Regarding N.T. Wright, I would include some of his teachings to be controversial too (see http://www.christianpost.com/news/nt-wright-wrong-about-eternal-torment-85983/)

A blessed Christmas to you also,

Dan

Reply
Don Kriefall link
1/12/2013 03:10:54 am

Rev. Carlson,

This is a comment I made to Bishop Rinehart that he deemed inappropriate to publish. And yes, I read your entire post.

The question is not about heresy, the question is why would one pledged to uphold the Christian faith argue to delegitimize the very tenets of the faith. Jesus Christ was the word made flesh, God Himself come to the world to take upon Himself the punishment for a sinful humanity that He loves beyond measure. Without the Virgin Birth, Jesus resurrection means nothing and your faith is useless. You call God a liar. For what purpose? I would expect to hear a similar argument from one attempting to debunk Christian truths. I will pray for you, a lost soul obviously influenced by the evil one. Bishop Rinehart, shame on you for giving credibility to this troubled soul that has betrayed His pledge to God. Forty years ago I accepted Christ’s invitation to accept His grace and forgiveness. I pray that somehow you can reconcile your relationship with our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

Lois Gronberg link
3/25/2014 08:35:32 am

You need to decide what you believe.......

Kathy S
12/27/2012 03:08:26 am

Rev. Carlson -- I also disapprove of comments that call you "sludge" -- this is not a Christian attitude. I am not attacking you personally.

It doesn't matter whether you are writing to other pastors or to laity -- your teachings must be clear. It is very simple to see how BOTH birth narratives can be historically true -- life is complicated, reality is complicated, and the stories are abbreviated accounts.

But this is not the point. By calling the Scripture "myth" you undermine the Faith. I just read you new post today about the "rich" Jesus. I am a Lutheran from the North, but I have never, never seen a person excluded from a church for being poor or from a non-white group. Against whom are we building fences? Which persons? What are you saying? BTW -- I have tried to comment on Bishop Mike's blog, but I have been blocked. Now who's the outsider?

Reply
lois gronberg link
12/23/2013 09:59:18 am

It appears that Rev. Carlson doesn't know what he believes for sure. This is typical ELCA trash.

Reply
Don Kriefall link
3/27/2014 11:50:59 am

http://commonsenseforasenslessworld.blogspot.com/2014/01/house-of-cards.html

Reply
Chad
12/25/2012 03:44:17 am

People often suppose that Jesus was half human and half God, but Christian orthodoxy teaches that he was fully human and fully God. (Consult the Athanasian Creed. The English translation in the Lutheran Book of Worship says "existing fully as God, fully as man," though some translations render it "perfect God and perfect man.")

Reply
Chad
12/27/2012 08:25:42 am

I agree with one statement Rev. Carlson made: "[Accounts of virgin or miraculous births] were not intended to explain where the individual got 23 of his or her chromosomes."

MATTHEW HENRY'S COMMENTARY (published 1721) says of Matthew 1:18-25, "The mystery of Christ's incarnation is to be adored, not pried into. If we KNOW NOT THE WAY OF THE SPIRIT in the formation of common persons, nor HOW THE BONES ARE FORMED IN THE WOMB OF any one THAT IS WITH CHILD (Eccles. xi. 5), much less do we know how the blessed Jesus was formed in the womb of the blessed virgin."

The fact that we know more about conception today than in 1721 only makes us likely to make unwarranted inferences that biblical writers did not intend.

Reply
Kathy S
12/28/2012 02:21:39 am

What!? This is crazy. Are you trying to tell me that in 1721 -- or in 1 A.D. -- people didn't know how babies were made? If the Virgin Mary was not a virgin -- literally, the way we all understand it -- then she was having sex outside of marriage. Wait! I get it! If the Virgin Mary could have sex outside of marriage, then so can all of us! It's not a sin! Isn't it wonderful to live in times of such enlightenment.

Reply
Chad
12/29/2012 07:08:12 am

Kathy,

Of course people knew in the first century that a virgin birth was miraculous--they knew that the male was required for reproduction. What I'm talking about is the modern knowledge that half of an individual's genes are contributed by the father and half by the mother. This knowledge did not exist before Gregor Mendel's expiriments with pea plants in the 1860s. For that matter, the knowledge that conception is the union of a sperm cell and an ovum is also modern. Sperm cells were discovered by Antony von Leeuwenhoek (1631-17230). The ovum was discovered by Karl Ernst von Baer in 1827.

Didaskalos
12/29/2012 11:36:08 pm

What medical science knows today makes the virgin birth even more miraculous and wonderful, something only God could and did do. On the one hand, we have a miraculous conception by Mary, a virgin who had not known a man when Jesus was conceived and whose husband Joseph did not have relations with her until after Jesus was born.

On the other hand, Jesus was not a mutant human being. Except for the fact that He -- because He was a "holy seed" -- was born without sin, He had all the human attributes we have: chromosomes, organs, everything. "Therefore he had to be made like his brothers in every respect, so that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in the service of God. . ." [Heb. 2]

That's an even more miraculous aspect of the virgin birth to my thinking: that the eternal, uncreated Son of God who participated in the creation of the world -- "the only-begotten Son of God, begotten of the Father before all worlds; God of God, Light of Light, very God of very God; begotten, not made, being of one substance with the Father, by whom all things were made" -- was somehow "distilled" (I can't come up with a word that fittingly captures the miracle of what happened) by the power of the Father and the agency of the Holy Spirit into a seed that united with an egg in Mary's womb to produce our God-Man and Savior.

No wonder Christina Rossetti wrote awe-struck stanzas like these in "In the Bleak Midwinter":

"Our God, Heaven cannot hold Him, nor earth sustain;
Heaven and earth shall flee away when He comes to reign.
In the bleak midwinter a stable place sufficed
The Lord God Almighty, Jesus Christ.

"Enough for Him, whom cherubim, worship night and day,
Breastful of milk, and a mangerful of hay;
Enough for Him, whom angels fall before,
The ox and ass and camel which adore.

"Angels and archangels may have gathered there,
Cherubim and seraphim thronged the air;
But His mother only, in her maiden bliss,
Worshipped the beloved with a kiss.

"What can I give Him, poor as I am?
If I were a shepherd, I would bring a lamb;
If I were a Wise Man, I would do my part;
Yet what I can I give Him: give my heart."

Reply
Kathy S
12/29/2012 11:19:55 am

I must be really dense, but what does this have to do with the Doctrine of the Virgin Birth? Do you believe in the miraculous way in which Jesus was conceived, or, like the Modernists, want to explain it away -- along with about half of the Scripture?

Reply
Chad
12/30/2012 06:45:39 am

Kathy,

You're the one who said the writer of Ecclesiastes was crazy, and that we know no more about conception today than in the first century. Until you concede your error, you needn't concern yourself further with what I believe.

Reply
Kathy S
12/30/2012 02:39:34 am

Didaskalos -- that is beautiful. My comment was a response to Chad.

Reply
Janet Muldoon
1/1/2013 03:20:40 am

What's new? I was born in 1942 and I have come to believe tons of men and women in this day and age do not believe in miracles because they have come to believe humans are little Gods especially many in the modern day clergy. If I need to know something, I Google the Bible. It was written by men of faith. I have had enough of those who spend full time attempting to discredit or disqualify the Holy Word of God in an order to make themselves look better and smarter than God and Gods faith inspired men who wrote it. Either the Bible is true or it is false. If it is true than it is entirely true. Anyone who denies Biblicle Truth, is not a man or women of God. I have read the Bible chapter by chapter and verse by verse. You do not have to be a brain surgeon or doctor of theology to understand it. I spent over 50 years caring for the sick, injured, dying, mentally ill, and those giving birth.... guess what... I believe in miracles without a doubt and the miracles I have witnessed are thanks to God. Every flower that blooms is a miracle. We need some gardeners and farmers to teach in the seminaries instead of a bunch of heathen social scientists walking in circles like Pavlovs dog. It is time to cut the spin and look TRUTH in the face.

Reply
Kathy S
1/1/2013 10:19:26 am

Janet -- I was born in 1945, so I, too, have seen a lot; and I've read the Bible cover-to-cover several times. In my case, in the 1980s, I worked for a while in a faith-based drug re-hab house in Miami, FL. That opened my eyes. The one question the recuperating addicts had was: Is the Bible true? (Is it from God?)

Now I tend to be a liberal, free-thinking type, but that changed me. I started trying to prove the historical truth of ALL Scripture, and you know what? It's not that hard. The Hebrew of the OT has many different meanings, and I see the NT as a hologram -- different snapshots of the same events.

I believe liberal theologians like Carlson and David Lose are trying to appeal to what they perceive people want. They are wrong; very,very wrong.

Reply
Chad
1/3/2013 04:34:43 am

Kathy,

Excuse me, but what does all of this have to do with the Virgin Birth? Oh, I get it. Chromosomes, sperm cells, and ova are completely off topic, but your life story adds relevant information to the discussion. Do you believe that JESUS' mother is The Blessed Virgin, or do you believe that title belongs to YOUR mother?

Stacey
1/2/2013 11:28:30 pm

Pastor Don: I very much appreciate the fact that you commented on this article, and I wish that people would not resort to name-calling when discussing these things, as it helps neither side.

I do, however, have some questions about some of your statements about the historicity of the Matthew and Luke birth accounts. Where does Matthew state that Mary and Joseph were living in Bethlehem? Matthew 2 states that Jesus was born there but doesn't give a reason for that, so it is not necessarily incompatible with Luke's account of why they are in Bethlehem. Also, regarding the subsequent travels of Mary and Joseph, according to Leviticus, Mary would have had to wait 33 days before they could make the presentation and offerings in the temple. The flight to Egypt, on the other hand, could have taken place anytime in his first two years, as Herod's slaughter of the innocents included males 2 years and under. Now certainly, travel wasn't fast, as we are accustomed to it, but it doesn't seem to be to be outside the realm of possibility that both the presentation and the flight to Egypt could have taken place within Jesus' first few months (as women were back up and around much more quickly after childbirth) and his first two years. Of course, the Gospels don't give us an exact timeline for everything. The only point that I can see is that Luke tells us Mary and Joseph returned to Nazareth after the presentation, but Luke does state that this happened after they have done "everything required by the law of the Lord," - a vague phrase at best - which could include other things and not necessarily an immediate return. Given the fact that in the next account Luke gives us, Jesus is 12, it doesn't seem that Luke is giving us a blow-by-blow account of this time, so other events (such as a flight to Egypt) could have taken place. Both Gospels have them ending up in the same place.

Which brings me to my other point. You claim that the writers didn't intend their accounts to be historical, in the way that we define that term. But by the same token you then select items that fit your own "historical" attempt to prove that these stories are "made up." If we are going to be honest about the historical aspect of these accounts, then I think the most important point is that the Gospel writers weren't interested in giving us a detailed timeline. So you can no more use the "historical" arguments to prove that these stories are made up, than I could use the "historical" argument to prove that they are true.

In the end, I don't see as many contradictions in the stories as you do. And because of the gaps the Gospel writers leave, and because with God "all things are possible," I see no reason to doubt the factuality of either of these accounts. That seems to me to be the essence of faith in the first place. Attempts to point out alleged historical inaccuracies are based on the same reasoning as attempt to "prove" historical accuracy, and are simply destructive to acceptance of the truth of God's Word.

Reply
Kathy S
1/3/2013 11:21:21 am

A wonderful comment, Stacey, both in tone and content.

Reply
Janet Muldoon
1/7/2013 02:15:32 am

So well said... Stacy, thank you as many, such as me, are so frustrated with having to cope with those who doubt and need concrete answers for everything. Many are like St Paul before his dramatic conversion, "bull headed" and blind. I am used to working with teens. All they understand is the truth in plain, simple English. If anyone is offended with what I write, so be it.

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    Prove all things; hold fast that which is good.  
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    Dan Skogen

    Former ELCA seminary student and former ELCA member who is fed up with the ELCA's consistent mockery of God's Word.


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