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Wayseer

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Everything posted by Wayseer

  1. Paul's posts make sense - we cannot use a text written two + millennia ago as applicable for the 21st century. Sure, there is human wisdom in the biblical texts which continue over time, but most of it was written for the situation of the times. None of the authors could have possibly imagined that in 2013 humans would land a automatic robot on Mars and send back pictures and reports that I can access via something called a computer.
  2. Eric - you are free to make your own call - you have always been free to make your own call. Freedom is really hard to accept. What you believe does not concern me - what you do, does.
  3. I come into the thread rather late and I have not read every single post so forgive me if I repeat what has been already said. My own studies convince me that Jesus did not die for our sins. Sins do not need a death to fix up - they can be readily forgiven as Jesus demonstrates any number of times throughout the gospels. So the Father did not kill his only Son for something which can easily be corrected any time anyone asks to be forgiven. Further, the reason Jesus did not die in some bizarre ritualist sacrifice because of something someone (Adam) did way back when is because on careful reading of the Genesis account Adam did not sin, the serpent did not lie and Adam and Eve were not punished - they were protected. The only problem with gaining knowledge is the danger that humans might become Gods and thereby live forever. And if we did that we would never let our kids grow up. But there is a far more insidious aspect here - the claim that the Genesis story is historical fact. It's not, it's a story. Therefore confusing the death of Jesus, a real historical event, with a imaginative story does not make rational, or theological sense. In accepting what the Church tells us (Jesus made no such claim) we are effectively trying to convince ourselves that apples and snowflakes are the same things. We do not need 'salvation' from something that never happened. Mark finishes his account at 16:8 - no mention of salvation. The story in Luke 1 & 2 is just that - a story. Matthew is silent on the matter of salvation. There is no evidence in the gospels that Jesus intended to die to fix up Adams 'sin' and somehow rescue humanity. I know this sounds heretical - so be it. The theistic God of the Bible is dead. People do bad things because they choose inevitable to do so not because of something called 'original sin'.
  4. As Gardener quite correctly notes John should not have been included in the canon - it is far too gnostic and can have only been included for its many reference to Jesus as the Son of God - rather convenient. It must likewise be also remembered that John was written near the turn of the 1st century, some seventy years after Jesus and much theological thinking had flowed under the nascent Christian communities.
  5. Much depends on how one defines 'gospel'. Anyone interested in searching out the gospels should consult The Complete Gospels by the Jesus Seminar (Scholars Version).
  6. This is going to be a painful post - painful in all the right ways, but painfully never the less. I guess, looking backward over my life, I have been a spiritual progressive - living on the edge has become almost second nature. God, in whatever way such an entity might be conceived, has never been confined to the Church - either as four walls or as institution. God has always been dynamic - moving and urging me - a spiritual presence even when circumstances exist where such 'presence' is questioned. He/she/it has always been there - even in the absence - especially in the absence. Jesus knew this presence in absence and it takes some courage to stand in the abyss. Not, I hasten to add, that I am some paragon of courage. Rather, sometimes its a matter of 'crash, or crash through'. I'm in a 'crash through' phase now. The Anglican church I have been attending has been badly led. It is dying both physically and spiritually. I have persisted with attendance more out of some inverted sense of loyalty rather than anything else. I have talked myself into believing God somehow wanted me there. But I sorry God I just cannot play the pretend game any longer - I cannot pretend all your church has to offer me is Sunday School theology. You have led me this far and I know getting dumber is not part of your comic plan. I have been avoiding calling myself anything like a Progressive Christian - I am not sure the term is effectively an oxymoron. Yet, it is plain to see I just don't fit the mould my church asks me to squeeze into. I am aware than many, not all, by most, step around me. It seems that whenever I open my mount I cannot help but be 'progressive'. And being silent is not a habit I have developed. So, I am to move. To where I do not know but I cannot play the pretend game any longer. I cannot pretend that my church has more important things to say than does Professor Brian Cox. Ignoring things like the Higgs boson, the probability of life on Mars and dark matter does not make the elephant disappear. Ignorance may be bliss but it is also embarrassing. Progressive Christianity, as far as I understand the term, designates the spiritual adventurers. They are willing to take the risk - to accept the uncertainty - to feel their way. PC is a way where there is no way - a path than only opens when one begins the journey. It is an acceptance that one does not know but to stand still is spiritual death. So I will leaving those who refuse to move beyond their Sunday School theology. This saddens me. Silently I am screaming inside - it's so simply - just take one step I urge. But nothing is heard inside a vacuum. Resistance is futile as they are locked into their lifestyle and anything that might upset the regime is an unwelcome intrusion. So PC is also something else - a recognition that second best is not good enough - that pandering to the lowest common denominator is not a spiritual path but terminal. I will miss them and I will pray for them but I know their minds have been made up and the night is closing in.
  7. I'm much in the same boat. Spong is not criticizing the US culture - he is criticizing the inequity in power distribution that favours certain groups of people over others who are minorities and have little access to power. In this he is doing nothing more than what Jesus would have done. Spong is doing what the Church has consistently failed to do and in that I fully support him.
  8. You might check out the New Interpreter's Bible series in twelve volumes. Date of production is 1994 but it is solid and contemporary. Expensive but you can buy them as needed as individual volumes. Vol 8 on Matthew and Mark runs for over 700 pages. It also have heaps of notes, references, reflections as well as historical essays. It's worth the dough - and I am a critical student.
  9. Just to clarify my position. I follow JSS in that trying to adopt an apology for gay and lesbians to become accepted into the church tends to breath life into the 'debate' thereby legitimizing the 'debate'. I am not referring to the correction of social injustice.
  10. I'm a tad disappointed that this 'discussion' is taking place on the Spong board. I'm with JSS in that raising the matter gives legitimacy to the fundamentalists in that there is 'something' to defend. There is nothing to defend.
  11. Valid points David. However what I am pointing out is that I don't think the church has established trust - there are some broken fences than need mending. Indeed, I may 'not be listening'. I hope I am. But what I am hearing is 'more of the same'. It seems, to use another glaring generalisation, those who endeavour to 'do church' have not been, at least as far as I'm aware, taken into the confidence of the church and told that the church has got some things rather wrong. A bit of honesty is needed. The church will survive - but there will be changes. I will probably not live to see them - that's life. But, again from my perspective, it seems that if the church is to survive then it has to acknowledge science - and not in the off hand way that I have heard expressed as if science is another religion the church has to learn to live with. No. If the stories in the Bible are myths then such needs to be acknowledged. The events described in those stories happened in a real world yet they transcended time and space where the inner life, which is just as 'real' as science, is given meaning. Until we, those who 'do church', are liberated from the historical context that these stories are said to contain then we will forever be locked into some past dimension with little hope of moving forward. If such is to be the case then what we do is not religion but something else. The interesting fact is that I think many of those who 'do church' actually realise this - that those great stories are myths. Perhaps there is some cognitive dissonance at work here - we can actually accept that the church teaches 'history' while we read 'myth'. Perhaps many of us who 'do church' are more savvy than the church, which is one reason the church is still on 'hold'. But, the only way to get a younger generation to filling the emptying pews is start admitting a few relevant facts.
  12. I guess I'm, one of those who are not mature enough to recognize the maturity in other people and will not, therefore, be invited to the table. I'm sorry that it is all us poor people who are dragging the chain - holding the whole thing back - stopping progress etc ..... The church has no one to blame but itself. The church has been caught short by an increasing educated population that can now tell the difference between mushrooms and a compost heap - it has keep its parishioners in the dark and feed them of half-truths, if not outright lies.. The church is now busy trying to work out how to play catch-up. But I fear the horse has bolted - no one is listening any longer to what the church has to say. It is in danger of becoming irrelevant. The rather interesting, if not unfortuate, aspect is that science appears to adopting a somewhat similar blinkered process - it shows little interesting in talking to the 'poor' - now claiming that mantle previously held by the church. Someone did say all things go in cycles.
  13. Reading David's post I could not but help to think of those words - The poor will always be with you. I recognise those words as I'm pretty poor myself.
  14. Every moment we have that choice. Every choice involves an event. Every event involves a process. Every process involves an act of creation. Every act of creation involves GOD.
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