{"id":225,"date":"2009-03-23T16:31:55","date_gmt":"2009-03-23T16:31:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/windowsanddoors\/2009\/03\/tony-blair-on-the-power-of-fai.html"},"modified":"2009-03-23T16:31:55","modified_gmt":"2009-03-23T16:31:55","slug":"tony-blair-on-the-power-of-fai","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/windowsanddoors\/2009\/03\/tony-blair-on-the-power-of-fai.html","title":{"rendered":"Tony Blair on the Power of Faith"},"content":{"rendered":"

For British Prime Minister published an Essay entitled Our World, God’s Neighborhood<\/a>, in which he argues that faith will be as important in the 21st century as political ideology was in the 20th. Right or wrong, about that claim, Blair also uses the essay to share his views on the meaning of John’s Baptism of Jesus and of the latter’s ministry in general. That’s not as crazy as it might sound, given that the essay is a version of his remarks at the opening of a Baptism center along the Banks of the Jordan River.
\nAmong his comments, were the following:<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

And what was it that John in his ministry, and Jesus Christ in his, represented to the world?
\nFirst, that doctrine, whilst a support, can never be a substitute for the essence of faith which is: the demonstration of God’s love; of its power; of its mercy; of its plea to us to break free of our narrow confines and to discover the meaning of life.
\nSecond, the honesty of it, the witness to truth even though truth meant death; John because he refused to countenance the behavior of Herod; Jesus because he refused to deny his nature or his mission, preferring to lose his life when so easily he could have yielded to Pilate and kept it.
\nThirdly, what was this baptism that John gave to those masses by the River Jordan? It was a baptism of renewal, and renewal open to all who would submit to God. And as for Jesus, his Ministry was not bounded by race or tribe but was boundless. His love reached out. It was not hoarded. It was freely given.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Is this a good summary of the faith? Does it ring true? Could not very similar claims be made by pretty much any faith? If that is the case, does that mean that Blair has actually said nothing of importance, or could it be that he has cut to the heart of all traditions using the tool of his choosing i.e. Christianity?
\nAre our faiths at their best when they are at their most unique or when they are at their most universal?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

For British Prime Minister published an Essay entitled Our World, God’s Neighborhood, in which he argues that faith will be as important in the 21st century as political ideology was in the 20th. Right or wrong, about that claim, Blair also uses the essay to share his views on the meaning of John’s Baptism of…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":133,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,1,4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-225","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","category-politics","category-religion"],"yoast_head":"\nTony Blair on the Power of Faith - Windows and Doors<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/windowsanddoors\/2009\/03\/tony-blair-on-the-power-of-fai.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Tony Blair on the Power of Faith - Windows and Doors\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"For British Prime Minister published an Essay entitled Our World, God’s Neighborhood, in which he argues that faith will be as important in the 21st century as political ideology was in the 20th. Right or wrong, about that claim, Blair also uses the essay to share his views on the meaning of John’s Baptism of…\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/windowsanddoors\/2009\/03\/tony-blair-on-the-power-of-fai.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Windows and Doors\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2009-03-23T16:31:55+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Brad Hirschfield\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Tony Blair on the Power of Faith - Windows and Doors","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/windowsanddoors\/2009\/03\/tony-blair-on-the-power-of-fai.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Tony Blair on the Power of Faith - Windows and Doors","og_description":"For British Prime Minister published an Essay entitled Our World, God’s Neighborhood, in which he argues that faith will be as important in the 21st century as political ideology was in the 20th. Right or wrong, about that claim, Blair also uses the essay to share his views on the meaning of John’s Baptism of…","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/windowsanddoors\/2009\/03\/tony-blair-on-the-power-of-fai.html","og_site_name":"Windows and Doors","article_published_time":"2009-03-23T16:31:55+00:00","author":"Brad Hirschfield","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/windowsanddoors\/2009\/03\/tony-blair-on-the-power-of-fai.html","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/windowsanddoors\/2009\/03\/tony-blair-on-the-power-of-fai.html","name":"Tony Blair on the Power of Faith - Windows and Doors","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/windowsanddoors\/#website"},"datePublished":"2009-03-23T16:31:55+00:00","dateModified":"2009-03-23T16:31:55+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/windowsanddoors\/#\/schema\/person\/dec8532a46bb6f29d8866269e398424d"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/windowsanddoors\/2009\/03\/tony-blair-on-the-power-of-fai.html#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/windowsanddoors\/2009\/03\/tony-blair-on-the-power-of-fai.html"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/windowsanddoors\/2009\/03\/tony-blair-on-the-power-of-fai.html#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/windowsanddoors"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Tony Blair on the Power of Faith"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/windowsanddoors\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/windowsanddoors\/","name":"Windows and Doors","description":"Beliefnet Voices - Rabbi Brad Hirschfield","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/windowsanddoors\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/windowsanddoors\/#\/schema\/person\/dec8532a46bb6f29d8866269e398424d","name":"Brad Hirschfield","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/windowsanddoors\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/windowsanddoors\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/612\/612c840fab7383fcd474af006f999c1fx96.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/windowsanddoors\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/612\/612c840fab7383fcd474af006f999c1fx96.jpg","caption":"Brad Hirschfield"},"url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/windowsanddoors\/author\/brad_hirschfield"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/windowsanddoors\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/225","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/windowsanddoors\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/windowsanddoors\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/windowsanddoors\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/133"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/windowsanddoors\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=225"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/windowsanddoors\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/225\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/windowsanddoors\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=225"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/windowsanddoors\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=225"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/windowsanddoors\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=225"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}