Okay, so my blog entry from last week about God’s and many christians’ attitude to the persecution and murder of children in Syrian prisons caused a bit of an angry reaction in some readers. Sorry about that. It was not really my intention.

So here is my reply, in particular to the preacher who took objection to my “ridiculously naive, unacademic and fundamentalist” interpretation of Romans 9:8 or Galatians 4:23 and John 14.6.

I admit to feeling humbled and challenged by what she and others wrote. Including those who wrote that I am bitter and sour and just want to get my own back on the church for what happened.

I’d like to deal with the second point first because it is more straight forward. I am not bitter and sour, largely because I have been attending an amazingly high quality therapy for the last three years that has helped me to come to terms with all that has happened. Through this therapeutic process, I have learnt both not to bear any grudges and to accept the full responsibility for what happened. I have absolutely no one to blame except myself.

If I were to have an agenda, it would be simply to provoke others to question seriously whether or not they are trapped in a sect, as I was, or whether  they are living  their lives in a liberated, responsible and meaningful way.

Now to the second question. We are often taught that the truth is an absolute, otherwise it cannot be truth. That is, however, a singularly western non-sequitur. And the objections of Frau Dr. D. that my suggested interpretation of certain Bible texts was arrogantly naive provides significant evidence for this.

I honestly believe that this woman is a very sincere, studious, devout Christian who truly believes in Jesus and in the text of the Bible. Her underlying conviction is that my suggested interpretation of is based on a specific culturally-determined interpretation of the texts that is out of kilter with reality, history and the most respected methods of textual interpretation. She argues, and this cannot be denied, that, according to the Bible, Jews, Christians and Muslims all have the same roots in the one and the same God.

Ultimately, what this has shown me is that, even if I were to accept that the Bible alone is the infallible word of God, the breadth of completely differing interpretations by sincere believers ultimately transforms infallibility into subjectivity.

Believers who want to argue differently set themselves up as arrogant know-alls with a superior level of revelation and the obvious result is division, persecution and conflict. Which is in itself an abomination in the eyes of a loving God. It also means that God’s word cannot ultimately be regarded as infallible since subjective interpretation takes precedence over his ability to communicate infallibly with his creatures. And how absurd is that?

So, back to the bizarre syllogism that the truth is an absolute, otherwise it cannot be truth. Ultimately, both Dr D. can be right in her interpretation and so can the fundamentalists.

Therefore, paradoxically, there is a reality even higher than the truth itself, and it is this: that the truth is always subjective. I rest my case.

‘Even if you are a minority of one, the truth is the truth.’  Mahatma Gandhi