Respect Identity? Not.

In his recent post on Gal 3:27-28, Loren suggests that Paul gradually matured by dropping the formula of Gal 3:27-28 and reasserting distinctions between genders and ethnic groups, in effect moving from an apocalyptic naiveté to a realism demanding "respect for identity":

"Paul's world was one in which different ethnic groups, genders, and social classes could get along only by preserving their identities rather than eliminating them. Attempts to eliminate actually encourage groups to reassert their identities in overly aggressive ways, especially in competitive honor-shame societies. Paul matured by gradually relinquishing the formula of Gal 3:27-28."

This sounds like a mere historical/cultural assessment, especially when prefaced by Loren's disclaimer that Gal 3:27-28 actually "appeals to his modern Unitarian sensibilities". The lie can be dismissed out of hand. Loren likes the idea of breaking down barriers as much as he looks forward to a new crop of hemorrhoids. I suspect his notion of a Unitarian church is one where oppressed women docilely trail their husbands ten feet behind, and then sit in absolute silence, while a few pews over Caucasian feminists boss their husbands while patronizing -- and "respecting" -- these victims of patriarchy; or where pacifists and jihadists bond over a mutual hatred for the U.S. government, again, oxymoronically "respecting" each other.

The alarm can't be sounded loudly enough: multicultural liberals have become the prime bedfellows of social conservatives. Thus Nick Woomer:

"Amongst both conservatives and multicultural liberals, there is a desire to preserve supposedly traditional or authentic ways of life that are threatened by outside groups or forces. The multiculturalist 'preservation impulse' is identical to the fascist one, except that it's addressed to members of non-dominant, often oppressed, groups."

Listening to these liberals, you would think that western arrogance and imperialism are worse crimes than jihads and clitoradectomies.

But back to Paul. The apostle didn't mature in Romans, as Loren claims; just the opposite. Galatians is his most mature letter (if he has one) precisely because it is so offensive. His failure in Galatia, rightly spotted by Mark Goodacre, owed to ideas, however apocalyptically accidental, that were light-years ahead of his time -- ideas still doomed to fail in many places because the thought of breaking down barriers is so threatening. When people like Loren wake up to cosmopolitanism as a true agent of progressivism, liberals will finally be on the same page, free to rejoice in cultural genocide.