I have concluded that:
- hell as traditionally rendered is biblically indefensible and morally reprehensible,
- everyone will make it to the afterlife party eventually,
- believing in the Trinity and the virgin birth are not dogma but options, albeit ones I believe,
- monogamous same-sex marriage is a societal good,
- the universe is 13.8 billion years old,
- all biblical talk that seems to point to the Second Coming has already been fulfilled in the Transfiguration, the Cross, the Resurrection, the destruction of the Second Temple, and the conversion of the Roman Empire, and/or will be fulfilled for each of us when we die,
- abortion should be legal during some of pregnancy, and
- the Bible contains factual errors,
yet I still feel like a conservative Christian. It probably has something to do with me maintaining in my Christianity a robust vertical dimension. God is real, personal, and knowable. It seems so many who hold positions similar to those I outlined above jettison theology altogether—or at least any theology they feel comfortable sharing or acting on in any social context—limiting their observable Christianity to horizontal, that is, human-to-human relationships.
As such, it’s often hard to feel at home anywhere.