DOCTRINE

In his book God Is Not One: The Eight Rival Religions that Run the World, author Stephen Prothero begins his chapter on Judaism with these two sentences:

"Judaism begins and ends with a story. If Christianity is to a great extent about doctrine and Islam about ritual, Judaism is about narrative." 

Those words gave me pause ... IS Christianity "to a great extent about doctrine"? 

IS a striving for right belief (orthodoxy) what defines us?

(That would explain the thousands of distinct denominations within what is supposed to be a united Church body.) 

Maybe Prothero is correct and doctrine does define us. But should it?

And is right action (orthopraxy), then, merely a secondary consideration at best?

Matthew 7:15-20 quotes Jesus as saying, 

"Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they are ravenous wolves. You will know them by their fruits. Do men gather grapes from thornbushes or figs from thistles? Even so, every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit. A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a bad tree bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. Therefore by their fruits you will know them."

Doctrine should never be separated from practice, even in our imaginations. 

Right doctrines will always be evidenced by right actions.