Anecdotally verifiable, may I say. When someone's top 5 or 10 favorite hymns are all American Protestant hymns, it's almost a guarantee that they at least have American Protestant sympathies in their theological understandings. Hymns teach hermeneutics, hermeneutics form doctrine.
Why do people think that God would never do or say anything "mean?"
Why do people think that everybody who checks the "Christian" box on demographic forms is saved?
Why do people think that the point of Christianity is to feel good?
Their hymns taught them to read the Bible that way.
Correct. It is not for nothing that the hymnal is placed next to the Bible (and catechism for Lutherans) as the center of piety. This will be explored further in a future essay.
Anecdotally verifiable, may I say. When someone's top 5 or 10 favorite hymns are all American Protestant hymns, it's almost a guarantee that they at least have American Protestant sympathies in their theological understandings. Hymns teach hermeneutics, hermeneutics form doctrine.
Why do people think that God would never do or say anything "mean?"
Why do people think that everybody who checks the "Christian" box on demographic forms is saved?
Why do people think that the point of Christianity is to feel good?
Their hymns taught them to read the Bible that way.
Correct. It is not for nothing that the hymnal is placed next to the Bible (and catechism for Lutherans) as the center of piety. This will be explored further in a future essay.