Phyllis Tickle's Analysis

Answer – Phyllis Tickle borrows an amazing analogy from an Anglican bishop named Mark Dryer to describe an occurrence that happens around every 500 years in the church; in which, the changes of the culture forces the church evaluate beliefs and doctrines (Tickle 152). Specifically, Tickle says, “It is the business of any rummage sale first to remove all of the old treasures that belonged to one’s parents so as to get on with the business of keeping house the new way” (Tickle 535-536). Her point can be seen in the example of the church teaching the earth was flat and the center of the universe, only to find out through Copernicus’ theory; and the later the sailing of Columbus, that the earth is round and not the center of the universe (Tickle

She states, the cable of meaning, “keeps the human social unit connected to some purpose and/ or power greater than itself”

(Tickle 344). The cable is the means in which people answer the big “why” questions of life. What is more, Tickle’s cable is not a simple single strand; but rather, her cable is made of the case, a mesh sleeve and three strands. The outer case represents the “story” how history brought them to this point. The mesh sleeve represents more of what the majority of people in that society believe about life. Then, the first of the three strands represents spirituality, in which Tickle defines as “those experiences and values that are internal to the individual or to the individuals who compose a society” (Tickle 368-369). The second strand is corporality, which is evidence of religion (Tickle 371). The final strand is morality defined by the basic values and standards within a stated society. To apply this thinking to current culture and even my personal life, the issue of divorce would be evidence of any area that the church pulled out of the strands to reevaluate a belief before inserting it back inside the cable. For instance, my parents were divorced when I was a child and my mother was given somewhat of a cold shoulder within the church and prevented from leading in certain areas of the church. However, as time passed the church

We live in a culture where the individual is allowed to define his or her own truth. Specially, truth “has shifted the focus from epistemology, the question of how we discover truth, to hermeneutics, the question of what assumptions one brings to the pursuit of truth” (Barrett, 40). In other words, people’s experiences form their truth. Also, most people bring what they want to be true and then search for the evidence to support that truth. Perhaps a great example in current culture is the area of sexual identity. It is currently acceptable to identify with any gender one choses and any opposition is considered