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THE PARADOXICAL VISION: A LUTHERAN NUDGE FOR PUBLIC THEOLOGY Dr. Robert D. Benne Introduction
Some years ago, the well-known evangelical historian, Mark Noll, noted that the reigning vision of mainline Protestantism’s public theology has been shaped by the Reformed tradition. Drawing on H. Richard Niebuhr’s famous typology, he noted that the Reformed tradition aims at transformation — "Christ transforming society.” It seeks the Kingdom of God in America. It operates with a strong notion of personal sanctification, which it then applies to society. It tends toward Christian utopianism (When this vision is secularized, it still aims dangerously at a utopian goal). Noll complained that this dominant public theology is too utopian politically and tends to distort the mission of the church, making it an instrument of social transformation. He
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