He anticipated asking the question before he even went to the first class. He asked it the second class. 

"Despite the overwhelming continuity present in many of the ancient manuscripts, there still seems to be a lot of conjecture for something that is supposed to be regarded as being 'inerrant.' How can we rule out social, political, and selfish motivating factors for the canonical selection process of the ancient church fathers?"

I knew it would come up. Its why i took the class. Besides, it had come up before. I had asked it before, in a far more rigid context. I was in the back of the room, i remember. And i remember people turning round in their chairs after i asked it. 

But back to now; It came up in a class handout. It was a page with a table with seven or eight rows and about twenty columns. On the rows were listed famous early Christian figures of antiquity: Clement, Justin Martyr, Eusebius, etc, and in the columns were the included books in  their corresponding individual canonical New Testaments. Each one was different. 

I think i cared so much because this is MY tradition, MY belief, the beginnings of MY story being told to me in front of my eyes. Of course you want to be certain of its certainty. 

I have been thinking, both in the present events of today and the past occurrence at PBU several years go, whether, if I had held my peace, the question would have remained unasked, and the current Christian generation would have continued on with its often blatantly irresponsible ignorance of the historical foundations of the religion they so fervently attempt to both live out and spread to others.