religion staying relevant.

[__wayfarer]

If our religious insitutions are again to position themselves where they make a significant contribution to human affairs and insight, our institutional leaders need to fundamentally rethink their role. Instead of envisaging themselves as the originators of dogma that provide certitude to the insecure sectors of their flocks, they need to start thinking of their role as pastors and servants who help us negotiate the uncertainty, the Mystery and incertitudes of Life. Their role is not primarily a role of inventing dogmas that provide some aura of certitude. It is a role of encouraging us to "sit comfortably - in spiritual equilibrium" with both those things we have discerned about life with some certitude but, more importantly, with those vastly greater number of things to which we don't presently have any clear answers.

- http://www.catholica.com.au/editorial/020_edit_210808.php