"i have no idea where you fit!"

a student and i were chatting it up yesterday afternoon in my office. he actually had needed a copy of something that i had in my office, and i was happy to make it for him, but our conversation quickly turned to things theological. he is going to be attending my most recent alma mater and i was happy to help him with letters of reference, etc.

in the course of our conversation we covered over a great many things including my views on eschatology and salvation, what the concept of "the kingdom" means to me, and some political identifiers or labels. he informed me that he and some of his peers had been discussing a few of us older guys, alums of our fraternity, and where we stood politically and theologically. he said for several them they were easy to label. conservative, liberal, sort of moderate, and then he said the conversation turned toward me. he informed me that when my name came up and his peers asked him where he thought i stood he simply said, "i have no idea where he fits!"

labels are easy identifiers. they help us categorize people for easy use, but they can be deceptive. i told him i don't believe in traditional labels, and therefore find myself to be outside of them, generally speaking. i explained to him that on some issues i tend toward what would be considered a conservative viewpoint and on others a liberal stance. and that is ok.

after we finished talking i couldn't help but to think that part of what got us to our current economic situation has to be our need to label and adhere to those labels as though they make us and tell us who we are. and that seems to not only be trifilingly simple theology, but also simply bad logic.