Error and Renewal

So I am making my way through this trilogy written by Hans Kung, and since I came across the books in different places, I have read them in the wrong order. But this final volume, actually his first volume, is on Judaism. And today I read some of his thoughts on why the church failed the Jews during the rise of National Socialism. He was talking about the concept of infallibility and how, even when there is no formal infallible statement being made, such an infallible church has the greatest of difficulties in acknowledging errors. You've all done that stupid move that begins by pulling a loose thread in a woven fabric only to suddenly see a line develop, pull away and soon a hole exists in the fabric where there wasn't any earlier. An infallible church is afraid to admit error because things start coming unwoven and soon there are holes, holes that once were all neatly woven into the fabric of official pronouncement. I came from a church that could not admit error. To say that they were wrong about this made people wonder whether they were wrong about that, and you can see where such a tendency leads.

But I thought to myself why must it lead there, why does it not rather lead to a pulling out of something that was woven in mistakenly, a flaw in the fabric, a place where it will not long retain much strength or sustain any close scrutiny. Pull out that flaw and replace it with truth. This is not like putting a new patch on an old garment, it's like creating the garment new and whole from the start. The admission of error is always the door that leads to repentance, and repentance leads to renewal, and renewal is that which always carries us into the future with no baggage or regrets brought along.