MLK Draft - The Weakness of Liberal Theology

Transcript

M[artin] L[uther] King. [Page 2] The Weaknesses of Liberal Theology Last week we concluded that one of the great weaknesses of liberal theology is that it becomes so involved in higher criticism, in many instances, that it fails to answer certain vital questions. Today we will discuss another weakness of liberal theology which is equally pernicious. This weakness lies in its failure to contact the masses. Liberal theology seems to be lost in a vocabulary. Moreover, it seems to be too divorced from life. This tendency to move out of the market [Crossed Out: -] place of everyday life has led liberal theology to become so theoretical that it forgets the practical. This is certainly a danger to any system of theology for it presupposes that all life is theory, when in reality theory is not effective until it can be reproduced in the realm of [Page 3] the practical. This is certainly a point of warning, for it is the danger that faced the scholastics when they lost their heads to logic. Liberal theology will [Circled Text: only] be recognized [Insert Text: only] when it begins to grappel [grapple] with the problems of the unsophisticated man.