BrotherRog

http://www.sojo.net/index.cfm?action=news...._050209_mclaren Revisiting the Passion of the Christ by Brian D. McLaren Maybe it's because I spent time last summer in Burundi, the poorer twin sister of Rwanda that shares a similar history, tribal makeup, geography, culture, and terrifying undercurrent of genocide. Maybe it's because while I was there, I met Anglican priests serving in Rwanda who told personal stories of the tragedies there - and their efforts to bring healing and reconciliation in the aftermath. Maybe it's because (some readers may be tempted to write me off after reading this sentence) I was so frustrated by last year's promotional hype surrounding Mel Gibson's The Passion of the Christ - and I was so frustrated by the movie itself, though I know many found it moving and spiritually edifying. Maybe it's because I have deep concerns about the alignment of major sectors of Christianity with "red-state Republicanism," and I worry that a kind of modernist, nationalist neo-fundamentalism is trying to claim all Christian territory as its sovereign domain. For whatever reason, when I walked out of the 2005 film Hotel Rwanda this thought wouldn't leave me: If we really had the mind and heart of Christ, this is the movie we would be urging people in our churches to see. In fact, I can't think of a more worthwhile experience for Christian leaders than to watch Hotel Rwanda and then ask themselves questions like these: Which film would Jesus most want us to see, and why? Why did so many churches urge people to see Gibson's film, and why did so few (if any?) promote Terry George's film? What do our answers to that question say about us? What were the practical outcomes of millions of people seeing Gibson's film? And what outcomes might occur if equal numbers saw Hotel Rwanda - as an act of Christian faithfulness? In what sense could Hotel Rwanda actually be titled The Passion of the Christ? What do we make of the fact that a high percentage of Rwandans who participated in the 1994 genocides were churchgoers? What do we make of the fact that a high percentage of the Americans who ignored the 1994 genocides (then and now) were and are churchgoers? What kind of repentance does each film evoke in Western Christians? Why might the kind of repentance evoked by Hotel Rwanda be especially needed during these important days in history? It's been well over a week since I saw the film, and I still feel a churning inside me, a disquiet, a rumble in my heart that feels to me like "the burden" that the old prophets used to speak of, maybe even a simmering heat reminiscent of Jeremiah's "fire in my bones." And now, I realize that even raising these kinds of questions has possibly stimulated defensive and divisive temptations in many readers. "This guy must be a liberal," some readers are thinking. "Go get 'em, Brian!" others might be saying. And then I go back to the film again. And I think about Tutsi and Hutu locked in a cycle of fear and aggression, insult and revenge, attack and counterattack. And I also think of the Twa - the literal "little people" of our world - whose story is so little known and who suffer in the crossfire between the larger, more powerful tribes. And I think about how our community of Christian believers is divided by tribes also caught in long-standing cycles that seem to defy reconciliation: Protestant, Catholic; liberal, conservative; red state, blue state; contemporary, traditional; postmodern, modern; seeker-driven, seeker-sensitive; purpose-driven, tradition-driven; and so on. And I go back to the film and think of the hotel and its manager, himself a Hutu but one who loves Tutsi as well. I think about his distinction early in the film among family (who deserve help) and non-family (whom one can't worry about), and how in the course of the genocide he comes to see that all neighbors are family. And I wonder why so few of us see our neighbors in the Christian faith in anything close to a similar way - not to mention our non-Christian neighbors who may also be modern-day prostitutes, tax collectors, and Samaritans. I wonder what kind of tragedy it would take to bring us to the insight gained by that hotel manager. Then I realize that, in some ways at least, the tragic tsunami of Dec. 26, 2004, did that. I didn't hear anyone saying, "Let's raise money for Baptists in Indonesia," or "Let's send help to Evangelicals in Sri Lanka," or "Let's be sure no liberals get any of our help, or any Hindus, or Buddhists, or Muslims." I think about the words of a Sri Lankan - whether he was a Buddhist, Hindu, Muslim, or Christian, I don't know - who said that a wave of destruction had crashed upon them, but when he looked to the horizon he saw another wave rising: an even taller, deeper, and more powerful wave of compassion. And then I realize that's why Hotel Rwanda seemed to me an even more Christian film (forgive me if this sounds crazy to you - but try to understand) than The Passion of the Christ. It evoked in me a wave of compassion for my neighbors around the world, whatever their color or tribe, whatever their religion or politics. And I hear our Lord saying, "As you have done it to the least of these...you have done it to me." For a wave of compassion to arise, we know there must first be a wave of repentance. How odd that re-thinking (which is what repentance means) must precede emotion, but then again, perhaps it is bad thinking that numbs and steels us, and blinds and distracts us from the sufferings of our neighbors. I wonder if I can look to the horizon and see, by faith, a wave rising, a wave we could call "the compassion of the Christ." Could that wave rise and catch us all, bringing us together for the sake of the least of these, whom Christ is not ashamed to call sisters and brothers, whom he loves with the greatest passion of all: compassion? Brian McLaren is the founding pastor of Cedar Ridge Community Church in Spencerville, Maryland. This article originally appeared in Leadership Journal.

Des, I don't think that phrase is in the Bible, rather, its a Benediction/Blessing: BENEDICTION The grace of God, deeper than our imagination; The strength of Christ, stronger than our need; And the communion of the Holy Spirit, richer than our togetherness, Guide and sustain us today and in all our tomorrows. Amen.

Reading the Bible Again For the First Time, by Marcus Borg The Good Book: Reading the Bible with Mind and Heart, Peter Gomes

I am the pastor of a UM congregation. We are not one of the mega-churches (like Church of the Resurrection in Leawood, KS or the big UM churches in Houston, TX). FYI, the average UM church (and frankly the average Church of any sort) in the U.S. has but 100 in attendance on Sunday mornings. The church I serve has about 300 attending on Sundays. We offer two services, a traditional and a contemporary one complete with a really good praise band/team. People feel comfortable wearing casual or formal clothing at both of the services. I'm not sure that our congregation is "the norm", but we are proof that there's some mainline congregations worth checking out. : ) This congregation is not yet prepared to become an official TCPC congregation, but we're making progressive progress. I do know of at least one TCPC United Methodist congregation nearby, Green Mountain UMC in Lakewood, CO.

True enough. Pastors especially need to take this lesson to heart. They simply cannot please all the people all the time - nor should they. The sooner they learn this lesson, the sooner they'll sleep better at night and the less likely they will be to burn out.

re: Spirituality may be personal, perhaps, but Christianity is social/relational/communal: A story: One day, a man who had been active with a congregation stopped attending worship services or being active in any of the Bible study or support groups, or other ministries of the church. After a two months passed, a woman in that congregation stopped by that man's home to visit with him. The man let her inside and they sat down beside his warm fireplace. The woman asked the man how he was doing and what's been going on in his life. The man started sharing about things and as he did, the woman reached over and grabbed the metal tongs in the fireplace kit and reached into the fireplace and pulled out a burning ember and set it down on the brickwork floor in front of the fireplace. The man continued to share as that ember gradually died out and went cold. A few minutes later, still listening attentively, she pulled out another burning ember from the fireplace and laid it by the other one and they watched it too grow cold and die out. She did this a few more times as she listened to the man share about his life. After a while, the man said, "You know, I think you'll start seeing more of me back in church again." ------- The moral of the story is that God created God's children in God's image and part of that means that we are relational creatures who thrive best only in intentional relationship with others. If we leave our communities, we (and they) are less than they should be - and in time, we grow cold and fade out.

Beach, Actually, George W. Bush was raised as an [/b], he "became" a United Methodist (on paper) when he married his wife who was raised as a Methodist. He then "came to Christ" via the influence of Billy Graham and via participation in a mens' Bible study group. I agree that is is really more of a Southern Baptist at heart and in practice. It should also be noted that he participates in weekly tele-conferences with several Baptist leaders and that he denied meeting with United Methodist Bishops who saught to meet with him before he waged his war with Iraq. Indeed, GWB is the first U.S. president to refuse to meet with Methodist Bishops. I think that George Jr. and Dick Cheney are intentionally Methodists - on paper - for political expediency; i.e. to come across as being more mainstream and mainline in order to woo those voters.

Seems to me that "moderate" Christian forums take place across the nation in droves every Sunday during the adult Sunday School classes in most mainline churches.

I'm not sure about a genetic predisposition, but I do feel that family of origin and social life experience dynamics play are highly influential upon one's affinity (or lack thereof) to various forms of religion - and of various forms of Christianity. visit http://www.amazon.com and read the description and reviews of James Folwer's famed work, Stages of Faith. The point isn't to be elitist and say that "progressive" Christians are at a higher stage of faith then conservative ones, but rather, it points to how how people think theologically correlates to the various theories of physcological development.

IMO, for many progressives, the alleged miracles performed by Jesus (or anyone esle in the Bible) are rather moot points; i.e. that the various opinions that people have about them are things that we feel shouldn't make or break one's faith in God or in Jesus the Christ.

IMO, wealth in and of itself is not sinful but it is problematic; i.e. it does tend to sway people into thinking that they don't need God and that they somehow deserve to hold onto their wealth. Studies have long indicated that poorer congregants tend to give a higher percentage of their income to their churches than wealthy ones do. Moreover, indeed, I do think that many Christians tend to scapegoat homosexuality (something that affects but 5-9% of the population) so that they don't have to look at a sin that affects the vast majority of Christians, namely, Greed. ======== CAMEL SWALLOWING 101, by Drew Dyck Swallowing a camel is tricky work - almost, some would say, impossible. For starters, camels are hotheaded. An aspiring Swallower faces the Herculean task of wrestling the obstreperous creature into submission. And camels are clever. One hint of your intention to consume and a camel takes to thrashing, making the swallowing step excruciating. Even after subduing the camel, you still face the highest hurdle – the sheer size of the beast. You can probably imagine stretching your mouth wide enough to accommodate a tail, or perhaps even a hoof. But the head and haunches (not to mention those massive humps) present a formidable challenge. Some literature suggests the animal be dismembered, citing the paltry capacity of the human mouth and esophagus. The subsequent instruction, however, allows for no such concession. We will not acquiesce to constraints of anatomy. We mean to swallow camels; not camel parts. No, despite the impediments, after this short lesson you will be able to ingest the entire creature. The inherent difficulty of the job demands an interdisciplinary approach. My most startling breakthroughs came when I employed techniques perfected in other fields. For instance, I discovered helpful analogies in the practices of many Christians. Now, we all know that without prudent editing, the commands of Christ can be quite unsettling. They call for bizarre action: treating the beer-soaked bum on the corner like the Son of God, caring for total strangers, loving enemies, abandoning violence. Such commands are clearly outlandish. Unfortunately they are also clearly in the bible. Like swallowing a camel, remaining a Christian while ignoring these central aspects of the faith is no easy task. It involves tremendous discipline and ingenuity. And yet it is accomplished on a wide scale, with relative ease. When I stumbled upon this phenomenon I knew I had the answer. By carefully extrapolating their methodology I met with unmitigated success in the practice of camel consumption. Soon I had swallowed my first desert dweller, humps and all. The primary tactic is distraction. Here I must confess my deep indebtedness to Christian friends. For most churchgoers, focusing on the lofty mandates found in the gospels only leads to cognitive dissonance and bowel irritation. In an effort to avoid these problems, one Christian I know hides virulent racism behind a perfect tithing record. Another scrupulously avoids alcohol while nursing a grudge against her neighbor. Still another uses flawless church attendance to exempt his antipathy for the poor. You can learn much from their example. As you attempt to swallow your first camel, avert your eyes from the beast. Busy yourself with a useless, but tedious task - something that demands your full attention. Remember the examples mentioned above and do likewise - simply focus on something easier to stomach and whoosh, the camel will slip right down your throat! The distraction technique has a paradoxical beauty: the smaller and less significant your preoccupation, the larger the camel and the more effortlessly you can swallow it. As I like to remind my students: Aim small to swallow big. Strain out the gnat and the camel will go down like candy. However, the distraction method will only take you so far. You must still do your stretching exercises. Because forcing a full-grown camel down your throat is nearly a physiological impossibility, increased flexibility is of the utmost importance. Again we turn to the Christian example. Theological flexibility is crucial for a Christian walk that dispenses with the teachings of Christ. It calls for a very supple hermeneutic. I remember the unbridled awe I felt hearing one preacher justify decadent living in the name of Jesus – a homeless, marginalized Jew. “You’ll be rich,” he promised his parishioners, “because Jesus was rich.” Wow, I thought, as my credulity stretched and snapped. That takes flexibility. He had transformed the servant Messiah into a ruthless, esurient billionaire. Don’t laugh. That’s no easy task, especially in a world where one-third of the population goes to bed hungry. The preacher knew the value of rigorous stretching. He had also conquered the gag reflex. For such an expert, a 900-pound camel is a mere dinner mint. Well, now you know the technique, but the application is up to you. I hope you’re getting hungry. Shut your eyes. Open your mouth. Then tackle your camel with confidence. Just remember the procedure outlined above. If you execute just right, you may never even realize what you’ve done. (Drew Dyck is a freelance writer currently pursuing his Masters degree in theology at Fuller Theological Seminary.)

Good stuff.. and here's what I said about this book at www.amazon.com: ------ The following is my review of a similar book called Ten Things I Learned Wrong in a Conservative Church by John Killinger. In it I mention my thoughts about Stealing Jesus and Rescuing the Bible from Fundamentalism: ---------- Here is the review of that book that I posted at amazon.com: Authored by a former prominent Southern Baptist pastor and professor who was once deemed a "rising star" in that denomination, this book provides the wisdom, insights and learnings of a veteran pastor who is now able to reflect back upon the experiences of his truly dynamic career. This work offers the general public insights into our nation's largest Protestant denomination that only a well positioned insider could possibly have discerned. I read Killinger's book over the course of only two days. It is very well written and truly compelling - you can't wait to read what he has to say next! The work is somewhat similar to that of Bruce Bawer's "Stealing Jesus: How Fundamentalism Betrays Christianity" as well as to the popular "Rescuing the Bible From Fundamentalism" by John Shelby Spong, but is more balanced, less dense, and much less strident in tone than the others. I am tempted to assert that Killinger, in a few places, may have "overstated" or "overly generalized" in his remarks about the ways and practices of the Southern Baptist Convention, but it could well be that he isn't. If not, then this work shines a truly needed exposing light upon the denomination that is most represented in our current U.S. Congress - and that currently has "the keys to the kingdom" of current U.S. foreign and domestic policy. In this United Methodist pastor's opinion, this work ought to be required reading in all mainline seminaries and I highly recommend it for adult Sunday School or church book club discussions. Other books of a similar nature include: "Theological Crossfire: An Evangelical/Liberal Dialogue" by Clark Pinnock and Delwin Brown; "Liberals & Other Born-Again Christians: Many Minds, One Heart," by Sally Geis; "The Good Book: Reading the Bible with Heart and Mind," by Peter Gomes. For those who are currently reconsidering their theological commitments, I recommend exploring: "Good Goats: Healing Our Image of God," Dennis Linn; "The God We Never Knew: Beyond Dogmatic Religion to a More Contemporary Faith," Marcus Borg; "God of the Possible: A Biblical Introduction to the Open View of God," Gregory Boyd; "Most Moved Mover: A Theology of God's Opneness," Clark Pinnock; "The Powers That Be: Theology for a New Millennium," Walter Wink; and "Grace & Responsibility: A Wesleyan Theology for Today," John Cobb, Jr.

A rose by any other name is still a rose... : )

Now, for a lighter treatment of these matters.. -------- How the Grinch Stole Marriage by Mary Ann Horton, Lisa and Bill Koontz (with apologies to Dr. Suess.) Every Gay down in Gayville liked Gay Marriage a lot...... But the Grinch, who lived just east of Gayville, did NOT!! The Grinch hated happy Gays! The whole Marriage season! Now, please don't ask why. No one quite knows the reason. It could be his head wasn't screwed on just right. It could be, perhaps, his Florsheims were too tight. But I think the most likely reason of all was His heart and brain were two sizes too small. "And they're buying their tuxes!" he snarled with a sneer, "Tomorrow's the first Gay Wedding! It's practically here!" Then he growled, with his Grinch fingers nervously drumming, "I MUST find some way to stop Gay Marriage from coming!" For, tomorrow, he knew... All the Gay girls and boys would wake bright and early. They'd rush for their vows! And then! Oh, the Joys! Oh, the Joys! And THEN they'd do something he liked least of all! Every Gay down in Gayville the tall and the small, would stand close together, all happy and blissing. They'd stand hand-in-hand. And the Gays would start kissing! "I MUST stop Gay Marriage from coming! ...But HOW?" Then he got an idea! An awful idea! THE GRINCH GOT A WONDERFUL, AWFUL IDEA! "I know what to do!" The Grinch laughed in his throat. And he went to his closet, grabbed his sheet and his hood. And he chuckled, and clucked, with a great Grinchy word! "With this beard and this cross, I look just like our Lord!" "All I need is a Scripture..." The Grinch looked around. But, true Scripture is scarce, there was none to be found. Did that stop the old Grinch...? No! The Grinch simply said, "With no Scripture on Marriage, I'll fake one instead!" "It's one man and one woman," the Grinch falsely said. Then he broke in the courthouse. A rather tight pinch. But, if Georgie could do it, then so could the Grinch. The little Gay benefits hung in a row. "These bennies," he grinned, "are the first things to go!" Then he slithered and slunk, with a smile most uncanny, around the whole room, and he took every benny! Health care for partners! Doctors for kiddies! Tax rights! Adoptions! Pensions and Wills! And he stuffed them in bags. Then the Grinch, with a chill, Stuffed all the bags, one by one, in his bill. Then he slunk to the kitchen, and stole Wedding Cake. He cleaned out that icebox and made it look straight. He took the Gay-bar keys! He took the Gay Flag. Why, that Grinch even took their last Gay birdseed bag! "And NOW!" grinned the Grinch, "I will pocket their Rings." And the Grinch grabbed the Rings, and he started to shove when he heard a small sound like the coo of a dove. He turned around fast, and off flew his hood. Little Lisa-Bi Gay behind him sadly stood. The Grinch had been caught by small Lisa-Bi. She stared at the Grinch and said, "My, oh, my, why?" "Why are you taking our Wedding Rings? WHY?" But, you know, that old Grinch was so smart and so slick He thought up a lie, and he thought it up quick! "Why, my sweet little tot," the fake Shepherd sneered, "The judges are evil, the other states weird." "I'll fix the rings there and I'll bring them back here." It was quarter past dawn... All the Gays, still a-bed, all the Gays still a-snooze when he packed up and fled. "Pooh-Pooh to the Gays!" he was grinch-ish-ly humming. "They're finding out now no Gay Marriage is coming!" "Their mouths will hang open a minute or two then the Gays down in Gayville will all cry Boo-Hoo!" He stared down at Gayville! The Grinch popped his eyes! Then he shook! What he saw was a shocking surprise! Every Gay down in Gayville, the tall and the small, was kissing! Without any bennies at all! He HADN'T stopped Marriage from coming! IT CAME! Somehow or other, it came just the same! And the Grinch, with his grinch-feet ice-cold in the snow, stood puzzling and puzzling: "How could it be so?" "It came without lawyers, no papers to sort!" "It came without licenses, came without courts!" And he puzzled three hours, till his puzzler was sore. Then the Grinch thought of something he hadn't before! "Maybe Marriage," he thought, "doesn't come from the court. Maybe Marriage...perhaps... comes right from the heart. Maybe Marriage comes from all the words the Gays say. Words like Husband, like Wedding, and Spouse who is Gay." And what happened then...? Well...in Gayville they say that the Grinch's small brain grew three sizes that day! And the Gays had their Weddings. They promised for life. They swore to be faithful, to Wife and her Wife. The Husbands were happy, to each other they vowed To be Out and be Honest, be Gay and be Proud. They told all their neighbors and friends of their Spouse, They told of their Marriage and sharing their house. They said "We got Married." They shouted it loud. Their marital status was "Married and Proud." And the minute his heart didn't feel quite so tight, He whizzed with his load through the bright morning light. And he brought back the rings, cake and Gay birdseed bags! And he... ...HE HIMSELF... hung the Gay Rainbow Flag! ... The Lord looked down, at the proud and the tall, and said "These are my children, and I love them all."

I commend the author of this article. Very savvy and insightful. I hope some of our more conservative Christians heed his words.

http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2004/0.../010/13.60.html Christianity Today, October 2004 Pick Your Shibboleths Wisely Do we really want to be known as the generation who gave marriage over to the government? By Daniel A. Crane | posted 09/20/2004 9:00 a.m. We continue our series on the meaning of marriage with another point of view. Though most evangelicals oppose same-sex marriage, they do not necessarily agree about how exactly to oppose it or how strongly to work against it. Here Daniel A. Crane, assistant professor of law at Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law at Yeshiva University in New York City, explains his concerns regarding this issue. —Editors With same-sex marriage licenses pouring out of City Hall in San Francisco before they were declared invalid, state courts inundated with claims of entitlement to same-sex marriage, a federal constitutional amendment proposed to define marriage as a heterosexual union, and the presidential candidates trying to mollify as many constituencies as possible on this hot potato, same-sex marriage certainly has our attention. Indeed, it's becoming a shibboleth. A shibboleth is a single issue by which a political candidate or party is judged. The word comes from the biblical story of Jephthah and the Gileadites in Judges 12:4-6. Jephthah had routed Israel's foes from Ephraim and was determined to cut them down to the last man. The Ephraimites weren't obviously distinguishable from the Gileadites by physical appearance, and some tried to sneak through Jephthah's lines. So Jephthah devised a clever test: Any man trying to ford the Jordan was required to say the Hebrew word shibboleth, which means "a torrent of water." Since the Ephraimites mispronounced the word as sibboleth, they were easily identified and slaughtered. When it comes to politics, we evangelicals love our shibboleths. There is a certain convenience in evaluating political candidates, organizations, and movements by their stand on some discrete social issue—think abortion, creationism, and Prohibition. Though reductionist, the shibboleth approach isn't necessarily irrational. If the shibboleth follows closely from a particular worldview, then it may be a reliable predictor about how the candidate, organization, or movement will react to other issues that people haven't had time to think or ask about. But, before using a shibboleth, we had better be certain that it accurately encapsulates our worldview. The costs of choosing an improper shibboleth are high. Since the purpose of shibboleths is to create a broad rule of action by generalizing from a narrow assumption, error on the assumption means multiplication of the error many times over. This is why I believe same-sex marriage is a dangerous shibboleth: It reinforces the status of government as the custodian of the institution of marriage. If the church not only abets but actively furthers the notion that marriage owes its legitimacy to the state's approval, then the battle for the family is all but lost. The Divorce Analogy Let's take for example the law of divorce. In the 1950s, C. S. Lewis and J. R. R. Tolkien debated Britain's divorce laws, articulating starkly different views on marriage. Tolkien believed that Christian teachings should shape Britain's legal definition of marriage, while Lewis held that secular marriage and Christian marriage are two very different things. For Tolkien, "no item of compulsory Christian morals is valid only for Christians. The foundation is that this is the correct way of 'running the human machine.'" Tolkien believed that Lewis's arguments for separation between the secular and religious institutions reduced marriage "merely to a way of (perhaps?) getting an extra mileage out of a few selected machines." For Tolkien, "toleration of divorce—if a Christian does tolerate it—is a toleration of human abuse." Since Lewis married a divorcée, first in a civil ceremony for one set of reasons (compassion) and some time later in an ecclesiastical one and for another set of reasons (love), it is not surprising that his views were different. Lewis believed in "two distinct kinds of marriage; one governed by the state with rules enforced on all citizens, the other governed by the church with rules enforced by it on its own members." Thus, for Lewis, Christians should be willing to tolerate civil rules about marriage that didn't meet biblical standards, since secular marriage was to be governed by an entirely different set of rules. Who was right, Lewis or Tolkien? In my view, Jesus answered the question directly. Matthew 19 records that some Pharisees put a tricky marriage question to Jesus: Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife for any reason, good or bad? The Pharisees saw a good chance to trip up Jesus, since he had already spoken out against divorce in the Sermon on the Mount, yet the law of Moses permitted divorce without enumerating a list of permissible reasons. Indeed, the only condition specified in Deuteronomy 24:1 was that the wife had become "displeasing to him because he finds something indecent about her." In avoiding the trap, Jesus differentiated between God's original plan for marriage, set forth in Genesis, and the human institution of marriage. Moses, Jesus explained, granted the Israelites a right to divorce because their hearts were hard, not because divorce was part of God's plan for marriage. Jesus' treatment of the marriage issue is significant because it recognizes that the spiritual institution of marriage is quite distinct from the legal institution of marriage—even though the legal institution is directly ordained by God. The legal institution of marriage accommodates sinful man's faults; the spiritual institution transcends them and aims for the highest ideals in marriage. Further, the legal institution of marriage cannot be soft-pedaled on the grounds that Moses' law instituted the bare minimum necessary to ensure morality, whereas the spiritual institution goes further and dispenses grace. As Jesus put it rather bluntly, the man who follows the law of Moses and gives his wife a certificate of divorce might cause her to commit adultery (if she remarries). Thus, Moses' law tolerated divorce even though, spiritually, it opened the door for people to become adulterers. In Jesus' view, there unquestionably was an important distinction between the legal and spiritual institutions of marriage. The harms of equating the spiritual and legal institutions are large. Even if a union between the two were possible in a theocracy, it certainly wouldn't be possible in a pluralistic democracy where hearts are arguably harder than they were in Moses' day. The two institutions cannot merge, but what happens when the church treats them as though they were merged? Sadly, recent history reveals the answer. Years ago many Christians began to view marriage solely through the legal lens. If no-fault divorce is the rule of the day, then Christians find it easier to break their marriage vows whenever they feel so inclined. The example of divorce suggests that Christians have already lost much ground on marriage and the family by failing to distinguish secular family law clearly from God's perfect plan for man and woman. This is why it is alarming to see many Christians insist that defeating legal recognition of same-sex marriage is necessary to preserving the institution of marriage. If that is true, it must be because marriage owes its definition and legitimacy to the state—a proposition that Jesus squarely denied and that should frighten anyone who takes seriously the Genesis prescription. Making It Work If the church must clearly distinguish between the legal and spiritual domains of marriage, where does that leave us on same-sex marriage? One might like to see the government get out of the marriage business altogether, leaving the definition and consecration of marriage to private choice, meaning, in our case, the church. But that isn't a terribly realistic option today, since the idea of marriage so thoroughly permeates our legal system. The words marriage or married appear more than 500 times in federal statutes, more than 900 times in federal regulations, and thousands of times in state statutes. The concept of marriage flows through numerous statutory and regulatory schemes, including areas as diverse as taxation, military service, Social Security benefits, adoption, and agriculture. If the government can't get out of the marriage business altogether, then perhaps we, as Christians, ought to take the lead in reconceiving the notion of civil marriage as distinct from holy matrimony. Perhaps we should abolish the word marriage altogether when speaking of the license granted by the state and instead appropriate the civil union terminology that has been created to deal with the same-sex issue. When asking about the definition of marriage or civil unions for legal purposes, perhaps we should take a functional, rather than normative, view. If a legal definition of marriage is necessary because we need to know who should be included in a health insurance plan or how we should assess potential adoptive parents, then the definitional question should be asked with respect to the objects of the legislation, not based on a transcendent conception of marriage. For example, a statute dealing with health insurance benefits may be intended to extend health coverage to uninsured individuals in the same household as the primary insured. Since the object of the legislation is to make health insurance available to a wider group of people, it might make sense to recognize a wide group of civil unions as eligible for inclusion under the statute. Maybe even short-term or temporary civil unions should be recognized for that purpose. On the other hand, a law making marriage a criterion for adoption is not intended to broaden the group of eligible participants but to narrow it to those most likely to be good parents. If the state concludes that children are most likely to benefit by having both a mother and a father and that heterosexual unions are more likely to be enduring, thus promising long-term stability, the definition of marriage might be narrower for adoption purposes than for health benefits purposes. In both cases, the civil definition of union or marriage would be answered by the particular aims of the legislature, not by the abstract question: "What is marriage?" None of this should be taken as an argument that the law should recognize same-sex civil unions. There may be important functional (as opposed to moral) reasons why such recognition would be unwise. Nor should a separation of civil and religious marriage lessen our concern over the recent conduct of activist judges and mayors who have tried to impose their own political vision by judicial or executive fiat, contrary to the clear rules established by state legislatures. But neither should we escalate the culture war by making this debate into a battle for the heart and soul of marriage. If we do that, we concede that the state owns marriage and that the church's function in blessing unions is subservient to the government's. Far better to lose the battle over the legal definition of marriage than to win it and find that the government now owns one of our most sacred institutions.

The Delusional is no longer Marginal... There Is No Tomorrow By Bill Moyers The Star Tribune Sunday 30 January 2005 One of the biggest changes in politics in my lifetime is that the delusional is no longer marginal. It has come in from the fringe, to sit in the seat of power in the Oval Office and in Congress. For the first time in our history, ideology and theology hold a monopoly of power in Washington. Theology asserts propositions that cannot be proven true; ideologues hold stoutly to a worldview despite being contradicted by what is generally accepted as reality. When ideology and theology couple, their offspring are not always bad but they are always blind. And there is the danger: voters and politicians alike, oblivious to the facts. Remember James Watt, President Ronald Reagan's first secretary of the interior? My favorite online environmental journal, the ever-engaging Grist, reminded us recently of how James Watt told the U.S. Congress that protecting natural resources was unimportant in light of the imminent return of Jesus Christ. In public testimony he said, "after the last tree is felled, Christ will come back." Beltway elites snickered. The press corps didn't know what he was talking about. But James Watt was serious. So were his compatriots out across the country. They are the people who believe the Bible is literally true - one-third of the American electorate, if a recent Gallup poll is accurate. In this past election several million good and decent citizens went to the polls believing in the rapture index. That's right - the rapture index. Google it and you will find that the best-selling books in America today are the 12 volumes of the "Left Behind" series written by the Christian fundamentalist and religious-right warrior Timothy LaHaye. These true believers subscribe to a fantastical theology concocted in the 19th century by a couple of immigrant preachers who took disparate passages from the Bible and wove them into a narrative that has captivated the imagination of millions of Americans. Its outline is rather simple, if bizarre (the British writer George Monbiot recently did a brilliant dissection of it and I am indebted to him for adding to my own understanding): Once Israel has occupied the rest of its "biblical lands," legions of the antichrist will attack it, triggering a final showdown in the valley of Armageddon. As the Jews who have not been converted are burned, the messiah will return for the rapture. True believers will be lifted out of their clothes and transported to Heaven, where, seated next to the right hand of God, they will watch their political and religious opponents suffer plagues of boils, sores, locusts and frogs during the several years of tribulation that follow. I'm not making this up. Like Monbiot, I've read the literature. I've reported on these people, following some of them from Texas to the West Bank. They are sincere, serious and polite as they tell you they feel called to help bring the rapture on as fulfillment of biblical prophecy. That's why they have declared solidarity with Israel and the Jewish settlements and backed up their support with money and volunteers. It's why the invasion of Iraq for them was a warm-up act, predicted in the Book of Revelations where four angels "which are bound in the great river Euphrates will be released to slay the third part of man." A war with Islam in the Middle East is not something to be feared but welcomed - an essential conflagration on the road to redemption. The last time I Googled it, the rapture index stood at 144 - just one point below the critical threshold when the whole thing will blow, the son of God will return, the righteous will enter Heaven and sinners will be condemned to eternal hellfire. So what does this mean for public policy and the environment? Go to Grist to read a remarkable work of reporting by the journalist Glenn Scherer - "The Road to Environmental Apocalypse." Read it and you will see how millions of Christian fundamentalists may believe that environmental destruction is not only to be disregarded but actually welcomed - even hastened - as a sign of the coming apocalypse. As Grist makes clear, we're not talking about a handful of fringe lawmakers who hold or are beholden to these beliefs. Nearly half the U.S. Congress before the recent election - 231 legislators in total and more since the election - are backed by the religious right. Forty-five senators and 186 members of the 108th Congress earned 80 to 100 percent approval ratings from the three most influential Christian right advocacy groups. They include Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, Assistant Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, Conference Chair Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania, Policy Chair Jon Kyl of Arizona, House Speaker Dennis Hastert and Majority Whip Roy Blunt. The only Democrat to score 100 percent with the Christian coalition was Sen. Zell Miller of Georgia, who recently quoted from the biblical book of Amos on the Senate floor: "The days will come, sayeth the Lord God, that I will send a famine in the land." He seemed to be relishing the thought. And why not? There's a constituency for it. A 2002 Time-CNN poll found that 59 percent of Americans believe that the prophecies found in the book of Revelations are going to come true. Nearly one-quarter think the Bible predicted the 9/11 attacks. Drive across the country with your radio tuned to the more than 1,600 Christian radio stations, or in the motel turn on some of the 250 Christian TV stations, and you can hear some of this end-time gospel. And you will come to understand why people under the spell of such potent prophecies cannot be expected, as Grist puts it, "to worry about the environment. Why care about the earth, when the droughts, floods, famine and pestilence brought by ecological collapse are signs of the apocalypse foretold in the Bible? Why care about global climate change when you and yours will be rescued in the rapture? And why care about converting from oil to solar when the same God who performed the miracle of the loaves and fishes can whip up a few billion barrels of light crude with a word?" Because these people believe that until Christ does return, the Lord will provide. One of their texts is a high school history book, "America's Providential History." You'll find there these words: "The secular or socialist has a limited-resource mentality and views the world as a pie ... that needs to be cut up so everyone can get a piece." However, "[t]he Christian knows that the potential in God is unlimited and that there is no shortage of resources in God's earth ... while many secularists view the world as overpopulated, Christians know that God has made the earth sufficiently large with plenty of resources to accommodate all of the people." No wonder Karl Rove goes around the White House whistling that militant hymn, "Onward Christian Soldiers." He turned out millions of the foot soldiers on Nov. 2, including many who have made the apocalypse a powerful driving force in modern American politics. It is hard for the journalist to report a story like this with any credibility. So let me put it on a personal level. I myself don't know how to be in this world without expecting a confident future and getting up every morning to do what I can to bring it about. So I have always been an optimist. Now, however, I think of my friend on Wall Street whom I once asked: "What do you think of the market?"I'm optimistic," he answered. "Then why do you look so worried?" And he answered: "Because I am not sure my optimism is justified." I'm not, either. Once upon a time I agreed with Eric Chivian and the Center for Health and the Global Environment that people will protect the natural environment when they realize its importance to their health and to the health and lives of their children. Now I am not so sure. It's not that I don't want to believe that - it's just that I read the news and connect the dots. I read that the administrator of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has declared the election a mandate for President Bush on the environment. This for an administration: That wants to rewrite the Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act and the Endangered Species Act protecting rare plant and animal species and their habitats, as well as the National Environmental Policy Act, which requires the government to judge beforehand whether actions might damage natural resources. That wants to relax pollution limits for ozone; eliminate vehicle tailpipe inspections, and ease pollution standards for cars, sport-utility vehicles and diesel-powered big trucks and heavy equipment. That wants a new international audit law to allow corporations to keep certain information about environmental problems secret from the public. That wants to drop all its new-source review suits against polluting, coal-fired power plants and weaken consent decrees reached earlier with coal companies. That wants to open the Arctic [National] Wildlife Refuge to drilling and increase drilling in Padre Island National Seashore, the longest stretch of undeveloped barrier island in the world and the last great coastal wild land in America. I read the news just this week and learned how the Environmental Protection Agency had planned to spend $9 million - $2 million of it from the administration's friends at the American Chemistry Council - to pay poor families to continue to use pesticides in their homes. These pesticides have been linked to neurological damage in children, but instead of ordering an end to their use, the government and the industry were going to offer the families $970 each, as well as a camcorder and children's clothing, to serve as guinea pigs for the study. I read all this in the news. I read the news just last night and learned that the administration's friends at the International Policy Network, which is supported by Exxon Mobil and others of like mind, have issued a new report that climate change is "a myth, sea levels are not rising" [and] scientists who believe catastrophe is possible are "an embarrassment." I not only read the news but the fine print of the recent appropriations bill passed by Congress, with the obscure (and obscene) riders attached to it: a clause removing all endangered species protections from pesticides; language prohibiting judicial review for a forest in Oregon; a waiver of environmental review for grazing permits on public lands; a rider pressed by developers to weaken protection for crucial habitats in California. I read all this and look up at the pictures on my desk, next to the computer - pictures of my grandchildren. I see the future looking back at me from those photographs and I say, "Father, forgive us, for we know not what we do." And then I am stopped short by the thought: "That's not right. We do know what we are doing. We are stealing their future. Betraying their trust. Despoiling their world." And I ask myself: Why? Is it because we don't care? Because we are greedy? Because we have lost our capacity for outrage, our ability to sustain indignation at injustice? What has happened to our moral imagination? On the heath Lear asks Gloucester: "How do you see the world?" And Gloucester, who is blind, answers: "I see it feelingly.'" I see it feelingly. The news is not good these days. I can tell you, though, that as a journalist I know the news is never the end of the story. The news can be the truth that sets us free - not only to feel but to fight for the future we want. And the will to fight is the antidote to despair, the cure for cynicism, and the answer to those faces looking back at me from those photographs on my desk. What we need is what the ancient Israelites called hochma - the science of the heart ... the capacity to see, to feel and then to act as if the future depended on you. Believe me, it does. ------- Bill Moyers was host until recently of the weekly public affairs series "NOW with Bill Moyers" on PBS. This article is adapted from AlterNet, where it first appeared. The text is taken from Moyers' remarks upon receiving the Global Environmental Citizen Award from the Center for Health and the Global Environment at Harvard Medical School. -------http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/013105F.shtml

from an email newsletter (the E-Pistle) by ESA: ------- Dear ePistle, Much of what Rick Nowlin articulated in last week’s "What Do We Do Now?" coincides with my beliefs and thinking. One point of difference is in regard to the final paragraph. He didn't have expectation that there could soon, if ever, be electoral or cultural victory. The impact of Jonah, that reluctant and racist prophet, and having "the world turned upside down" (or right side up) by 1st-century Christians gives me reason to believe otherwise. If God is ready for change and Christians are unified and seriously faithful to living and promoting the words, commands and wisdom of God through the Lord Jesus, cultural and electoral positions can be significantly impacted for change toward Christ-conformed Shalom (i.e. holistic well-being) in this nation and world. An 8-Point Petition has been developed, as a means of unifying Christians in a prophetic and evangelistic thrust for challenging those of us who call Jesus "Lord", to remember and apply his commands and wisdom, in order to curtail or prevent physical and verbal violence in families, communities of faith, geographic communities, as well as between and within ethnic groups intra-and-internationally. In addition the 8-Point Petition could serve as a means of generating interest in learning more about other wisdom and Good News from God's Kingdom, while influencing government policy, political parties, and politicians. If there are others who believe that God is able and willing to "turn things right side up" again, and who would like to at least look at the 8-Points for the Golden Rule, Unity, and Christ-conformed Shalom, I can be contacted at elainebryant@ameritech.net. - B. Elaine Bryant, pastor in a small inner-city Chicago Mennonite congregation, who recently completed a six-month, Boston University-sponsored study sabbatical on the topic of Christ-conformed Shalom

An upcoming (semi-progressive) Evangelical Event: ------- ESA CONFERENCE: THE SCANDAL OF THE EVANGELICAL CONSCIENCE March 6-7, 2005 in Philadelphia, PA "Whether the issue is divorce, materialism, sexual promiscuity, racism or physical abuse in marriage, the polling data point to widespread, blatant disobedience. The statistics are devastating. This scandalous behavior mocks Christ, undermines evangelism, and destroys Christian credibility." - from THE SCANDAL OF THE EVANGELICAL CONSCIENCE (Baker, 2005) by Ronald J. Sider As well as the title of Ron Sider’s forthcoming book, THE SCANDAL OF THE EVANGELICAL CONSCIENCE is a conference sponsored by Evangelicals for Social Action, The Sider Center on Ministry and Public Policy, Baker Books, and The Barney II Foundation. Keynote speakers include: “Assessing the Scandal” - Mark Noll, Professor of History, Wheaton College, Wheaton IL “What Went Wrong” - Randall Balmer, Professor of Religion, Barnard College, Columbia University “What Can Be Done” - David Neff, Editor, CHRISTIANITY TODAY Panelists include Andy Crouch, Chris Hall, Ellen Charry, Jo Anne Lyon, Wallace Smith, Bill Borror, and Dean Trulear Register with ESA online or phone toll-free 800-650-6600. The cost of the conference is $75, students $30. Each registration includes a complementary copy of the SCANDAL book. Additional copies will be available for sale at the conference (or by order from ESA and retailers as of February ’05). Help us spread news of the conference by downloading, printing, and passing out or displaying this promotional poster. Register here: http://www.esastore.com/page6.html Promotional poster: http://www.esastore.com/page6.html

Soma, I disagree. Socialism did NOT exist in the ancient world. Rather, the early followers of Jesus (esp. as described in the Book of Acts) practiced Communitarianism. The differences are as follows; 1) The early followers of Jesus were citizens of two realms, i.e. of the Kingdom of God (and the Church); and of whatever nation they resided in and the Roman Empire. So, they paid taxes to the powers that be AND they paid money into their local church and to the Mother Church in Jerusalem. 2) Socialism - as commonly understood - is an economic system whereby all citizens of a nation are FORCED to pay into a certain economic system. Communitarianism, on the other hand, is a spiritual system voluntary association whereby people freely choose to pay into a common fund in order to help meet the essential needs of the community (church - voluntary association). Moreover, with Socialism, one pays according to whatever scheme the powers that be tell you to based upon your income, whereas with Christian Communitarianism, one pays into the fund based upon their awareness of God's blessings in their life. I agree that socialism is "more Biblical" than capitalism, but I don't agree that it is described in the Bible or in the teachings of the early Church. The Amish practice communitarianism as do the Bruederhof's etc. I think you'd agree that what they do is NOT socialism.

More on Wallis' "evangelicalism": ---------- As evangelical as an oak tree by Jim Wallis I debated Jerry Falwell yesterday on Tavis Smiley's National Public Radio show. The subject was the current talk about "values" in the presidential election campaign. Tavis first asked Falwell to name a "short list" of the values issues that were important to him. It turned out to be a very short list indeed. All the Religious Right leader could talk about was the gay marriage amendment. That was it. I pointed out that overcoming poverty was a values issue, as was protecting the environment, as was fighting unnecessary wars on false pretenses, as was the abuse of Iraqi prisoners. As he often does when he fears he might lose a debate, Falwell eventually began to interrupt what I was saying and moved into personal-attack mode, saying that I was "as much an evangelical as an oak tree." The television preacher from Lynchburg has such a way with words. But then he really got vicious. He challenged me: "You voted for Al Gore, didn't you, Reverend? Admit it! Admit it!" he demanded. "You didn't vote for George Bush, or George Bush Sr., or even Ronald Reagan!" He had me. I was finally exposed on National Public Radio - a Christian who hadn't consistently voted for Republican candidates. How could I ever again claim to be a follower of Jesus Christ, who, as we all know, was pro-rich, pro-war, and pro-American? It was an absolutely partisan and theocratic moment. There is only one way that Christians can possibly vote: That's exactly what Falwell was saying. And that's exactly what the Religious Right is saying. And they say the only values issues are things like gay marriage and abortion. Forget everything the Bible says about the priority of the poor, about Christian peacemaking, about respecting God's creation, or about the image of God in every human being - including our enemies. I happen to think that both abortion and gay marriage are important issues, but they are not the only issues. Many Christians are getting tired of the tirades of the Jerry Falwells who repeatedly claim that all values issues have to do with sex and that every Christian must vote for their Republican friends. Family values are important to many Christians, but so are social values. And many Christians are pro-family without being anti-gay the way Falwell is. And many of us believe that a deep commitment to the sacredness of human life requires a consistent ethic of life, which also regards the destruction of war, the death penalty, and the scandal of global poverty as deeply moral concerns, not just abortion. The future of American politics should be a real discussion of values; that would be a very welcome development. And we may be reaching a "tipping point" when many other Christians and the media who cover faith and politics will decide that the Religious Right should no longer dominate the discussion. Let them have their say, but let other Christian voices be heard. The control of right-wing fundamentalists over the "values" conversation may be coming to an end. And the uncritical alliance between the Religious Right and the Republican Party should be named a theocratic mistake and idolatrous allegiance (as is any religious left's uncritical alliance with the Democrats). Later in the day, my friend Tony Campolo called and I told him what Falwell had said. Tony is a Baptist preacher and as evangelical as you can get, but he will not likely be voting for George W. Bush. Imagine that. We agreed the next time either of us is in a debate with Falwell, we will name him for what he really is - a fundamentalist who has stolen the word evangelical. ====== The Tavis Smiley Show, July 13, 2004 · NPR's Tavis Smiley discusses values and politics with Rev. Jerry Falwell, founder of the conservative Moral Majority, and Jim Wallis, founder of Sojourners: Christians for Justice and Peace and author The Soul of Politics. http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.p...storyId=3354001

re: QUOTE 2. Virgin birth I don;t think that bothers most progressives Well, actually, I don't think that there would be any progressive scholar out there who would take the virgin birth literally. --------------- I guess I'd agree with the statement above - both of them; i.e. IMO, most progressive Christians don't take the virgin birth literally, but they not make a big deal about it either way - they see it largely as a moot point that is not a "make or break" essential of the faith. ---------------------------------- Re: "post-evangelicalism" To add even further nuance to all of this, there is also a growing movement called "Post-liberalism / post-liberal theology" Examples of proponents of this: Stanley Hauerwas; Will Willimon; James Gustafson; George Lindbeck, etc. I used to embrace Process theology, but now, more and more, find myself drawn to the Post-liberal approach to the faith. I still operate in a process theology perspective in my understanding of "how prayer works."

A.R., Yes, I've read most all of Wallis' books. They are all very good but my favorite is still his classic, "The Call to Conversion." In it he reminds us what true and full conversion means; i.e. it's not just personal, its social, and its not just about belief, it's about living out our beliefs.

Peace & Justice oriented Liturgies for Ash Wednesday http://www.oslcdenver.org/ashwednesday.htm

The following is my review of a similar book called Ten Things I Learned Wrong in a Conservative Church by John Killinger. In it I mention my thoughts about Stealing Jesus and Rescuing the Bible from Fundamentalism: ---------- Here is the review of that book that I posted at amazon.com: Authored by a former prominent Southern Baptist pastor and professor who was once deemed a "rising star" in that denomination, this book provides the wisdom, insights and learnings of a veteran pastor who is now able to reflect back upon the experiences of his truly dynamic career. This work offers the general public insights into our nation's largest Protestant denomination that only a well positioned insider could possibly have discerned. I read Killinger's book over the course of only two days. It is very well written and truly compelling - you can't wait to read what he has to say next! The work is somewhat similar to that of Bruce Bawer's "Stealing Jesus: How Fundamentalism Betrays Christianity" as well as to the popular "Rescuing the Bible From Fundamentalism" by John Shelby Spong, but is more balanced, less dense, and much less strident in tone than the others. I am tempted to assert that Killinger, in a few places, may have "overstated" or "overly generalized" in his remarks about the ways and practices of the Southern Baptist Convention, but it could well be that he isn't. If not, then this work shines a truly needed exposing light upon the denomination that is most represented in our current U.S. Congress - and that currently has "the keys to the kingdom" of current U.S. foreign and domestic policy. In this United Methodist pastor's opinion, this work ought to be required reading in all mainline seminaries and I highly recommend it for adult Sunday School or church book club discussions. Other books of a similar nature include: "Theological Crossfire: An Evangelical/Liberal Dialogue" by Clark Pinnock and Delwin Brown; "Liberals & Other Born-Again Christians: Many Minds, One Heart," by Sally Geis; "The Good Book: Reading the Bible with Heart and Mind," by Peter Gomes. For those who are currently reconsidering their theological commitments, I recommend exploring: "Good Goats: Healing Our Image of God," Dennis Linn; "The God We Never Knew: Beyond Dogmatic Religion to a More Contemporary Faith," Marcus Borg; "God of the Possible: A Biblical Introduction to the Open View of God," Gregory Boyd; "Most Moved Mover: A Theology of God's Opneness," Clark Pinnock; "The Powers That Be: Theology for a New Millennium," Walter Wink; and "Grace & Responsibility: A Wesleyan Theology for Today," John Cobb, Jr. ----------------------- Here are the 10 chapter titles (the ten "wrong teachings"): 1. The Bible is the Literal, Inerrant Word of God 2. God is a Great Moral Judge, and Therefor Jesus Had to Die for our Sins 3. Jesus is the Only Way to God 4. There is No Salvation Outside the (Conservative) Church 5. Worship is Proclamation before it is Anything Else 6. Spiritual People Don't Drink, Dance, or Come out of the Closet 7. Religion is a Man's Business 8. Faith is Always Truer than Science 9. When Bad Things Happen to Good People, There is Always a Reason 10. Conservatives Want Everybody to be Free