Please excuse me if I bristle a little here. Why are preterist perspectives labeled as dogmas? Enarchay, you made some very dogmatic statements about the resurrection. That fine, but let us all admit we have strong opinions on things.

I believe there are fundamentals Christians across denominations should be able to agree on, so I think there is a difference between debating eschatology and whether or not resurrection is bodily. For example, the early Christians did not all come to an agreement on a coherent eschatology, but most if not all of them stood against the Gnostics who denied bodily resurrection.

The question then is: what are the fundamentals of Christianity? It seems many within the emerging church are weary of trying to answer a question like that because of the baggage the answerer brings with him and the division (warranted or unwarranted) his answer may cause. However, if we let the line between Christian and non-Christian – dare I say, orthodoxy and heresy – fade too much, we will not be able to tell the difference between the two anymore.

To elucidate the point I was trying to make in my previous post, consider debates between Jehovah’s Witnesses and fundamentalist heresy-hunters. Both have strong convictions, but the convictions are structured into denominations. It seems to me that some preterists – and I didn’t really think this about you through your post – structure their beliefs into a system (labeled preterism) to which they try to recruit others. Equally, their opponents (like the heresy-hunters) attack them for the structure without even addressing the beliefs of which it is composed. I think the problem with some preterists and anti-preterists is they come to Open Source Theology with the structure or an attack against the structure instead of discussing the hermeneutics or beliefs that make up the structure. Does that make much sense?

I had some trouble trying to get my thoughts into coherent writing, so please forgive me, especially if you thought I was attacking you.