The Emptiness of Liberal Theology

Michie · May 3, 2024

Liberal theology can make Christianity just another, fuzzier form of atheism.

In a 2009 speech given at an atheistic conference, Daniel Dennett coined the term deepity to refer to statements that seem profound at first glance but upon closer examination turn out to be trivially true at best (“Love is just a word”) or just nonsense (“Have faith in faith”). Some atheists say theology is just a bunch of “deepities,” but this is like saying meaningless “junk philosophy” shows that all of philosophy is worthless.

Indeed, you can find “junk theology” that disparages good theology in a 2019 New York Times interview with Serene Jones, a Protestant minister and president of Union Theological Seminary. Here are a few of her “deepities”:

“[The] empty tomb symbolizes that the ultimate love in our lives cannot be crucified and killed.”
“Living a life of love is driven by the simple fact that love is true.”
“The message of Easter is that love is stronger than life or death.”

When I hear this kind of talk, I think of the episode of The Simpsons where Rev. Lovejoy is selling ice cream flavors such as “Blessed Virgin Berry” and “Command-mint.” He then offers Lisa “Unitarian ice cream” and hands her an empty bowl. Lisa remarks, “There’s nothing here,” to which Lovejoy responds, “Exactly.” Unitarians who have “no shared creed” are just one example of theologies that sound lofty and good but are without any support beyond mere sentimentalism.

A good way to expose the emptiness of these “deepities” is to ask some simple questions: How is love stronger than death? What makes love “true”? In doing this, you can show that the person is just dressing up secular, hopeful thinking with religious language.

I also notice that adherents of liberal theology often defend their position by casting traditional concepts of God and faith as being for simpletons. However, their hasty dismissals often reveal their own simplistic grasp of theology. For example, Jones says, “Crucifixion is not something that God is orchestrating from upstairs. The pervasive idea of an abusive God-father who sends his own kid to the cross so God could forgive people is nuts.”

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