Dr. McLelland replies: My vocation as philosopher of religion is to test and stretch the theories of theology. This demands speculative thinking. It is only through such “speculative” theorizing that we can appreciate the implications of our doctrines.
In this age of pluralism, my discipline has become philosophy of religions, in the plural.
In this article, I’m drawing on classical Christian resources, especially Logos Christology, with its universalist implication. In fact our church already holds a universalist doctrine of the Spirit: see Living Faith 9.2.1.
In my final column I intend to use a distinctively Presbyterian doctrine in support of my thesis.
I’d like readers who are doubtful to be patient and allow me to develop my thesis through the six columns. Along the way I hope to clarify the world religions we are discussing, since so often they are not studied before they are dismissed.
