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"I don't want a 55 percent vote that would leave lingering resentment," he says.

As for Pinnock and Sanders, they plan to return to next year's meeting. And if the program committee accepts their papers, they will be addressing next year's theme: "Evangelicalism and Other Religions." It is another topic on which many ETS members feel they are out of step. "At least we won't be talking about Openness," Sanders says.

David Neff is editor of Christianity Today.

Copyright © 2001 Christianity Today. Click for reprint information.

Earlier this year, Christianity Today featured "Does God Know Your Next Move?" in which Christopher A. Hall and John Sanders debated openness theology.

opentheism.info offers, among other resources, a "frequently asked questions" page about openness theology.

See the discussion between John Sanders and classical theist Stephen Williams in our sister magazine Books & Culture.

Previous Christianity Today coverage of the openness theological debate include:

Has God Been Held Hostage by Philosophy? | A forum on free-will theism, a new paradigm for understanding God. (Jan. 9, 1995, reposted online May 11, 2001)

Truth at Risk | Six leading openness theologians say that many assumptions made about their views are simply wrong. (Apr. 23, 2001)

God at Risk | A former process theologian says a 30-percent God is not worth worshiping. (Mar. 16, 2001)

Did Open Debate Help The Openness Debate? | It's been centuries since Luther nailed his theses to a church door, but the Internet is reintroducing theological debate to the public square. (Feb. 19, 2001)

God vs. God | Two competing theologies vie for the future of evangelicalism (Feb. 7, 2000).

Do Good Fences Make Good Baptists? | The SBC's new Faith and Message brings needed clarity—but maybe at the cost of honest diversity. (Aug. 8, 2000)

The Perils of Left and Right | Evangelical theology is much bigger and richer than our two-party labels. (Aug. 10, 1998)

The Future of Evangelical Theology | Roger Olson argues that a division between traditionalists and reformists threatens to end our theological consensus. (Feb. 9, 1998)

A Pilgrim on the Way | For me, theology is like a rich feast, with many dishes to enjoy and delicacies to taste. (Feb. 9, 1998)

A Theology to Die For | Theologians are not freelance scholars of religion, but trustees of the deposit of faith. (Feb. 9, 1998)

The Real Reformers are Traditionalists | If there is no immune system to resist heresy, there will soon be nothing but the teeming infestation of heresy. (Feb. 9, 1998)

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November (Web-only) 2001, Vol. 45