Stereotypes serve no good purpose and says more about the one doing the stereotyping than the one being stereotyped. There are also stereotypes of atheists which I also reject as bias. As a Deist I reject dogma, receive no supernatural directive, and am a huge fan of philosophy in general. As I reject the dogma of hell I do not act out of fear, but out of a sense of what's right. How do I know right from wrong... observation, experience, and common sense... which I am guessing is similar as how you came by your morality.
If I understand you correctly, your faith is limited to belief in god/creator, since you reject religious dogma. the only difference between us then would be that I do not have faith in god/creator, and naturally reject religious dogma. I am an agnostic atheist.
First of all let me tell you, that you need to make finer distinctions. It’s well possible to adhere to a liberal theology in the tradition of Schleiermacher and co. and to be politically conservative/neoliberal. And one can be quite a conservative, traditionalist Christian and be politically liberal/left-wing. Personally – while I tended to be increasingly sympathetic towards theological neo-orthodoxy in recent years (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neo-orthodoxy ) – I could probably both be described as a liberal Christian and as somebody who is politically liberal/left-wing. My political views are very much based on my religious ones. I believe that as a Christian I have to stand up for peace, social justice, mercy and compassion with the weakest of the weak in society. Neither I nor more conservative Christians among my acquaintances, believe God to be a benevolent dictator. We believe Him to be a loving father who liberates us. Also both politically/theologically liberal and conservative Christians believe we ought to love God and to love our neighbor like ourselves. They just often disagree on how exactly to best love God and their fellow-men.
Thanks for your perspective it has been of help. Schleiermacher sounds interesting as I had not heard of any who sought to reconcile the Enlightenment with Christianity. I will have to read up on him.
