After my last post, one of my gentle readers correctly pointed out that the version of Protestantism and guilt that I described was only one strand of Protestant theology--and historically hardly the most important.  John Calvin described man as "a five-foot worm," and Martin Luther wrote, "I am dust and ashes and full of sin."  The third of Luther's 95 Theses says "Penitence is null unless it produces outward signs in various mortifications of the flesh."  As an American literature professor, I often taught sermons and essays by Jonathan Edwards and other Puritan divines.  Edwards would hardly recognize the view of guilt that seems to dominate current Protestantism.  But that was part of the point: although the process Bethany sketches doesn't represent all of the Protestant tradition, it's been there since the beginning, and for the last hundred years or so, it seems to be most common Protestant view.  I've rehearsed the argument in my head since the last blog, and it seems to go something like this:  I've sinned.  I feel guilty.  But I believe in Jesus Christ.  He took all the world's sins on his shoulders.  Therefore, since I'm a believer, I'm still among the saved and on my way to Heaven.  Is this really the logic?  Is the sinner off scot free?  Am I missing something in this supposedly most logical explanation?

The whole notion that one knows that s/he is saved also seems repugnant.  Whenever I hear someone say, "Well, I'm a Christian so I know that I am going to heaven," I'm taken aback.  And, of course, there's always the implication that the speaker knows who is not saved.  I'm not sure it's a position that Calvin, Luther, or Edwards would endorse.  But I hear it frequently, always with what seems to me a smug assurance.  If I were an omniscient and inscrutable god, I think I would be angered by the arrogant assumption that a flawed human was onto my ways.

And of course this is generalized to the larger proposition that only Protestants or Catholics or Muslims or whoever can go to heaven, while the rest of the world is perpetually damned.  Catholics used to have the concept of Limbo--those born before Christ or ignorant of him who had lived a good life couldn't go to heaven, but neither were they condemned to hell.  But now the concept of Limbo is itself in limbo--it's no longer an official tenet of the Catholic Church, but members are free to believe in it if they wish.  Pope Francis almost gave the game away a couple of weeks ago when he said that one didn't have to be Catholic to be redeemed; "even atheists," he said, could be saved.  It took about 24 hours for the Church to "clarify" what he meant.  (Since he wasn't speaking ex cathedra, his statement wasn't infallible.)  His inclusive message, his spokesman said, applied only to those who had never heard of or had any contact with Catholicism.  Those who had and rejected, either explicitly or tacitly, the Church could not be saved.  Still, he could backtrack only part way.  For the first time, that leaves a lot of non-Catholics still eligible for salvation.   Too bad for me, though.

Je saute du coq à l'âne:  SCOTUS began handing down its June decisions yesterday with a case that split the traditional division of the Court: Scalia voted with the liberal wing, while Breyer voted with the conservatives.  Sometime soon this month, the Court should announce its decisions in the two landmark marriage equality cases.