I've officially failed to finish a post three times this evening. With thoughts on everything from Popper to The Incredibles to the End to Come to DDE, I'm not sure where to begin. Christmas "Bloggers Back-log" has officially arrived.
In the meantime, check out Andrew Sullivan's page for an interesting letter on John Stott. You'll have to scroll down to Thursday's posts to find it. I don't think I can link to the exact post.
Sullivan responds:
I too find the simple assertion of the literal truth of everything in the entire Bible to be, simply, impossible to understand, let alone believe. The myriad contradictions, myths, metaphors, and stories from ancient times can be understood in many, many ways. But the idea that they are all literally true, or that sexual ethics is the non-negotiable bedrock of Christianity, is impossible to take seriously for very long.
The task of the Church in the face of Post-modern literary critiques is to identify what constitutes the "literal meaning" of a text. We are well on our way (via the excellent work of Kevin VanHoozer) and I will (back-up and blockage overcome) post thoughts soon. However, I've also promised thoughts on Plato and Popper, so it may be a bit.