Theological Outlook

Not even the most fervid Scot could claim today that his countrymen were all theologians , as they were alleged to have been in a former age . For in Scotland , as elsewhere , theology has fallen on evil days . De throned from her queenly position among the sciences , she has become , to a painful extent , the plaything of the witty and the scornful . Theology is no longer the imposing authority behind the preacher which it used to be . The popular sermon scarcely even hints at doctrine , except sometimes to deride it . And there are many who see in this want of theology the tragedy of the Church today . Vigorous religious life never fails to give expression to a correspondingly vigorous theology , and the absence of the one accounts for the lack of the other . But still no preacher can express his thoughts or carry conviction to his hearers without speaking theology , either nebulous or clear . But with belief in an infallible Bible widely denied, the ancient seat of authority is gone , and no system of dogmatics can be written which would be acceptable to so many differing views . There is , therefore , no one theology in Scotland today ,but a mosaic of many theologies .
And these too , can be traced to their origins . Donald Maclean  D.D. 1927.