We take in his moving, provocative perspective on our enduring need for creeds. He insisted that strong statements of belief will be necessary if pluralism in the 21st century is to thrive. But the late, great historian Jaroslav Pelikan illuminated ancient tradition in order to enliven faith in the present and the future. The idea of reciting an unchanging creed sounds suspicious to modern ears. The following interview by Krista Tippett comes from her On Being podcast, April 23, 2014. Traditionalism supposes that nothing should ever be done for the first time, so all that is needed to solve any problem is to arrive at the supposedly unanimous testimony of this homogenized tradition." Tradition lives in conversation with the past, while remembering where we are and when we are and that it is we who have to decide. In an oft-repeated quote, Pelikan loved to say that "tradition is the living faith of the dead traditionalism is the dead faith of the living. A lifelong Lutheran, in 1998 Pelikan and his wife converted to Eastern Orthodoxy. His many books included the five-volume Christian Tradition: A History of the Development of Doctrine, and Credo. He was the Sterling Professor of history at Yale University for four decades, and also a president of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Jaroslav Pelikan (1923–2006) was the pre-eminent historian of Christianity in his generation.
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