Thursday, July 12, 2007

Dishonest heretics

But heresy is not so great a sin as dishonesty. A heretic who acknowledges that he is such, is a better man than he who pretends to be orthodox while subscribing to a creed which he dislikes, and which he saps under pretense of removing it and adapting it to the times.

W. G. T. Shedd

Quoted in Gary L. W. Johnson [ed.], B. B. Warfield: Essays on his life and thought, p. 240

2 comments:

Drew Costen said...

That's good to hear, seeing as I consider heresy to often be a virtue. :)

As I like to say, just because something is labelled "orthodox" doesn't mean it's true. Heresy is often just the rejection of commonly accepted error.

Hiraeth said...

But at leat you are honest about it. Interestingly, J. Gresham Machen and Shedd both admired Unitarians for their honesty. Unlike many, they have the common decency to reject openly such things, rather than twisting language so they can continue to draw fat paychecks from churches whose congregations would be shocked to hear what they say in private.