The Problem with Ecumenism (11.09.23)

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Plain Bible Teaching Podcast

This week we’re talking about ecumenism. This is the movement to promote unity among various religious groups despite differences they have with one another in their doctrines and practices. In a recent episode, Kristofer Gardana joined me to talk about the temptation for churches to welcome anyone and everyone who comes to them. This is related to that topic, but has more to do with churches joining together with other churches and cooperating in various activities, ministries, and events. Is this something our local churches should be doing? We’re going to consider this today.Continue Reading

The Problem with Ecumenism

Hand shake

Ecumenism refers to the movement to promote unity among various religious groups despite differences in doctrines and practices. Often the focus of this is among “Christian” denominations, yet some want to extend this more broadly to include other religious groups as well. This can be seen in the growing number of outreach activities, ministries, and events shared by different “faiths” who, in previous generations, would not have fellowship with one another. One manifestation of this can be a deemphasis on evangelism since that would imply that someone needs to be taught and converted to the truth rather than accepted in their current condition.

Many people see these kinds of efforts as being unquestionably good. After all, with everything that the Bible teaches about unity, how could ecumenism possibly be a bad thing? Unfortunately, the “unity” promoted by ecumenism is not the same type of unity that is described in the Scriptures.Continue Reading

American Individualism and Ecumenism in Religion

On January 14, 2009, The Christian Science Monitor posted an article about the growing trend in this country of those who claim to be Christians deciding on their own what they will believe instead of relying on some church or denomination. The following paragraph does a fair job summarizing the main points in the article:

“A sizable majority of the country’s faithful no longer hew closely to orthodox teachings, and look more to themselves than to churches or denominations to define their religious convictions, according to two recent surveys. More than half of all Christians also believe that some non-Christians can get into heaven.”

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