mystictrek

Excellent observation -- especially the idea that to really eliminate evil from a situation requires a deep understanding of it that goes far beyond "common sense." It makes me think of the Taoist idea of understanding one's enemy well enough to make him essentially defeat himself -- which I take to be one of the many meanings of the Cross. Also, and this ties into my original thoughts on the parable, a deep understanding of one's enemy always involves a deep understanding of oneself -- many times they are one and the same. I think our attempt at eliminating terror has been so miserable precisely because, as a society, we utterly lack this kind of deep, spiritual self-understanding. I'm not saying that terrorists are simply victims of socio-economic injustice and everything is our own fault, or something stupid and reductionistic like that. But on a deeper level, the repression and denial of evil in ourselves does create an inner split that manifests itself as polarization in the global community, and differentiation and self-identification of people into roles of good/us and bad/them. Surface "common sense" ideas about guilt and blame are utterly hopeless to diagnose such realities.... <{POST_SNAPBACK}> I just pasted this exchange at a Conservative-Liberal Debate List at Yahoo. I wonder what kind of response I will get. I called you Wise Person #1 and Wise Person #2. And you are both very wise!

I think your statement of faith has a lot of support in the pragmatism of William James who wrote that classic, THE VARIETIES OF RELIGIOUS EXPERIENCE. Here's a link to a comprehensive website on that book > http://www.psywww.com/psyrelig/james/toc.htm I also think of the New Thought movement of practical Christianity best known now in Christian Science (unfortunately) and Unity (fortunately). Here's a New Thought website > http://www.psywww.com/psyrelig/james/toc.htm.

Great post, MOW. I hadn't heard of Neo-Christianity although I did hear of those ideas. I think Pat Boone said that a good Christian becomes a millionaire or something like that.

I think ever one has to write their own "Here I Stand" and maybe keep revising it. Community statements always lack a little of that individual passion which excites us and motivates us deep down to the bones. Here's one I wrote in the 80s which I shared with my congregation, of course. They never got as excited about it as I did! But that's my point. I wrote these 7 Good News Ambassador guidelines mainly for myself. I think there is a lot of consistency with the 8 Points in them. Would love some feedback. Yes, I would change some of the language, too, but it worked for me in the 80s and for the most part still does. READ > http://www.abundancetrek.com/gnaguidelines.html

Dave, you really didn't have to wait long at all for some good responses. I see that this string began just 6 days ago and you are getting a pretty good response, don't you think? Progressive Christians need to be patient. I know it's hard. I'm preaching to myself as well as to you. The network is growing. We are making a difference. Just trust the process. I know you believe that. Just a reminder! A little encouragement I hope.

When I read the Eight Points I see answers to questions I've had all my life. But that's not to say that we don't continue to love the questions.

A fascinating Process Theology book I've read is QUANTUM THEOLOGY by Diarmuid O'Murchu, formerly an RC priest I believe (in the spirit of Teilhard de Chardin I suppose). I believe his ideas are quite similar toi the ones Dave is advocating here. I really appreciate these ideas. Keep 'em coming! To limit God to the Now is not to limit God at all according to an Eastern and possibly Process approach. Because there is only the Now. Mysticism, the perennial philosophy, asserts this belief and I'm persuaded by it.

JamesAMDG wrote: No, there really wasn't. As I stated earlier, the so-called Palestinian people were citizens of surrounding countries until those countries lost that land in successive, unprovoked wars against Isreal. As a side note, God created Israel when he drove the Canaanites out and gave it to the Jews and to their descendants forever. This covenant was never revoked. +++ The history of the Palestine region in the mid-twentieth century is not easy to discern since both sides are so busy revising it. But clearly the UN voted to create an Arab Palestinian state with land somewhat greater than the current Gaza & West Bank. It is true that the Arabs did not buy this UN proposal believing that the Arab population was getting a raw deal, something like 90 per cent of the population getting 50 per cent of the land. But the Arabs were divided and had little power and they lost both at the UN and on the battlefield. The UN should have persisted in pressing its agenda. But it didn't and the rest is the unfortunate history since then so unfair to the Palestinians. Most of the world can see this because most of the world gets a more accurate picture of both the history and current events. The US media has let us down badly. To suggest that the wars in that region were unprovoked by Israel is a biased pro-Israeli view so typical of people who don't want to look at the truth in this region. Here's a website where you can get educated about the real situation > http://peace-with-justice.org/ The idea that the Bible should be used to determine the boundaries of a modern state is simply absurd IMO but I realize that this nonsense is taught as a God-given truth in Christian Right circles these days. I suggest that people in these circles get their heads out of their collective sand and begin to see what's really happening in the Middle East (and around the globe). Maybe if they would just stop reading the "Left Behind" fiction books .... and reading and watching the corporate-owned major media outlets. Get depth reporting daily at http://www.democracynow.org/ I believe that the prophet Isaiah made it clear (Isaiah 49:1-6 and other places)that the Diaspora of Jews and Christians (and presumably Muslims, too) is God's will. The New Israel of Christian scripture is not a geographical territory but the movement of a servant nation around the globe. Hugh Schonfield, a Jew, writes marvellously about this in THE POLITICS OF GOD.

+ FaithfulAmerica ( http://www.faithfulamerica.org/ ), a progressive faith political action organization, is campaigning to prevent Congress from reducing benefits for the poor. Here is an excerpt from the home page: America's Poor are Under Siege - Help Stop an Immoral Budget A $50 BILLION hole is about to be blown in our national safety net for the poor, including: • $9.5 billion in Medicaid – CUT. It's a direct hit to those needing health care – including children • $5 Billion in Child Support Enforcement – GONE. Without it, deadbeat parents are off the hook again, plunging hundreds of thousands of children back into poverty. • $844 Million in food stamps – ELIMINATED. Do we even need to explain the implications here? The list goes on. It is about to happen at the U.S. Capitol, where Congress has proposed perhaps the cruelest, most immoral budget ever to reach the floor. Its rationale: to help pay for Katrina recovery. Yes, Katrina recovery will be expensive, but do we really believe punishing the poorest among us is the best answer? If this budget is passed, Katrina victims will the the FIRST to feel its sting. It makes no sense. Adding insult to injury, the proposed budget also contain massive tax BREAKS for big corporations and the ultra-wealthy few. This budget must not stand. On Thursday morning, FaithfulAmerica joined a gathering of national religious leaders at the U.S. Capitol to call on Congress to reject the proposed budget cuts in the federal budget. The reason: the proposed cuts literally take from the POOR and give to the RICH. Cruel and immoral as it sounds, this is exactly what is going down in Washington. You can help stop it.

Here's a megachurch which might meet your criteria. The IRS thinks so! I lifted this from a progressive UCC forum at Y! groups > http://groups.yahoo.com/group/IUCCAdvocates/ Antiwar Sermon Brings IRS Warning · All Saints Episcopal Church in Pasadena risks losing its tax-exempt status because of a former rector's remarks in 2004. http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-al...2419,full.story By Patricia Ward Biederman and Jason Felch, Times Staff Writers The Internal Revenue Service has warned one of Southern California's largest and most liberal churches that it is at risk of losing its tax-exempt status because of an antiwar sermon two days before the 2004 presidential election. Rector J. Edwin Bacon of All Saints Episcopal Church in Pasadena told many congregants during morning services Sunday that a guest sermon by the church's former rector, the Rev. George F. Regas, on Oct. 31, 2004, had prompted a letter from the IRS. In his sermon, Regas, who from the pulpit opposed both the Vietnam War and 1991's Gulf War, imagined Jesus participating in a political debate with then-candidates George W. Bush and John Kerry. Regas said that "good people of profound faith" could vote for either man, and did not tell parishioners whom to support. But he criticized the war in Iraq, saying that Jesus would have told Bush, "Mr. President, your doctrine of preemptive war is a failed doctrine. Forcibly changing the regime of an enemy that posed no imminent threat has led to disaster." On June 9, the church received a letter from the IRS stating that "a reasonable belief exists that you may not be tax-exempt as a church … " The federal tax code prohibits tax-exempt organizations, including churches, from intervening in political campaigns and elections. The letter went on to say that "our concerns are based on a Nov. 1, 2004, newspaper article in the Los Angeles Times and a sermon presented at the All Saints Church discussed in the article." The IRS cited The Times story's description of the sermon as a "searing indictment of the Bush administration's policies in Iraq" and noted that the sermon described "tax cuts as inimical to the values of Jesus." As Bacon spoke, 1984 Nobel Peace Prize winner Archbishop Desmond Tutu, a co-celebrant of Sunday's Requiem Eucharist, looked on. "We are so careful at our church never to endorse a candidate," Bacon said in a later interview. "One of the strongest sermons I've ever given was against President Clinton's fraying of the social safety net." Telephone calls to IRS officials in Washington, D.C., and Los Angeles were not returned. On a day when churches throughout California took stands on both sides of Proposition 73, which would bar abortions for minors unless parents are notified, some at All Saints feared the politically active church had been singled out. "I think obviously we were a bit shocked and dismayed," said Bob Long, senior warden for the church's oversight board. "We felt somewhat targeted." Bacon said the church had retained the services of a Washington law firm with expertise in tax-exempt organizations. And he told the congregation: "It's important for everyone to understand that the IRS concerns are not supported by the facts." After the initial inquiry, the church provided the IRS with a copy of all literature given out before the election and copies of its policies, Bacon said. But the IRS recently informed the church that it was not satisfied by those materials, and would proceed with a formal examination. Soon after that, church officials decided to inform the congregation about the dispute. In an October letter to the IRS, Marcus Owens, the church's tax attorney and a former head of the IRS tax-exempt section, said, "It seems ludicrous to suggest that a pastor cannot preach about the value of promoting peace simply because the nation happens to be at war during an election season." Owens said that an IRS audit team had recently offered the church a settlement during a face-to-face meeting. "They said if there was a confession of wrongdoing, they would not proceed to the exam stage. They would be willing not to revoke tax-exempt status if the church admitted intervening in an election." The church declined the offer. Long said Bacon "is fond of saying it's a sin not to vote, but has never told anyone how to vote. We don't do that. We preach to people how to vote their values, the biblical principles." Regas, who was rector of All Saints from 1967 to 1995, said in an interview that he was surprised by the IRS action "and then I became suspicious, suspicious that they were going after a progressive church person." Regas helped the current church leadership collect information for the IRS on his sermon and the church's policies on involvement in political campaigns. Some congregants were upset that a sermon citing Jesus Christ's championing of peace and the poor was the occasion for an IRS probe. "I'm appalled," said 70-year-old Anne Thompson of Altadena, a professional singer who also makes vestments for the church. "In a government that leans so heavily on religious values, that they would pull a stunt like this, it makes me heartsick." Joe Mirando, an engineer from Burbank, questioned whether the 3,500-member church would be under scrutiny if it were not known for its activism and its liberal stands on social issues. "The question is, is it politically motivated?" he said. "That's the underlying feeling of everyone here. I don't have enough information to make a decision, but there's a suspicion." Bacon revealed the IRS investigation at both morning services. Until his announcement, the mood of the congregation had been solemn because the services remembered, by name, those associated with the church who had died since last All Saints Day. Regas' 2004 sermon imagined how Jesus would admonish Bush and Kerry if he debated them. Regas never urged parishioners to vote for one candidate over the other, but he did say that he believes Jesus would oppose the war in Iraq, and that Jesus would be saddened by Bush's positions on the use and testing of nuclear weapons. In the sermon, Regas said, "President Bush has led us into war with Iraq as a response to terrorism. Yet I believe Jesus would say to Bush and Kerry: 'War is itself the most extreme form of terrorism. President Bush, you have not made dramatically clear what have been the human consequences of the war in Iraq.' " Later, he had Jesus confront both Kerry and Bush: "I will tell you what I think of your war: The sin at the heart of this war against Iraq is your belief that an American life is of more value than an Iraqi life. That an American child is more precious than an Iraqi baby. God loathes war." If Jesus debated Bush and Kerry, Regas said, he would say to them, "Why is so little mentioned about the poor?'' In his own voice, Regas said: ''The religious right has drowned out everyone else. Now the faith of Jesus has come to be known as pro-rich, pro-war and pro-American…. I'm not pro-abortion, but pro-choice. There is something vicious and violent about coercing a woman to carry to term an unwanted child." When you go into the voting booth, Regas told the congregation, "take with you all that you know about Jesus, the peacemaker. Take all that Jesus means to you. Then vote your deepest values." Owens, the tax attorney, said he was surprised that the IRS is pursuing the case despite explicit statements by Regas that he was not trying to influence the congregation's vote. "I doubt it's politically motivated," Owens said. ""I think it is more a case of senior management at IRS not paying attention to what the rules are." According to Owens, six years ago the IRS used to send about 20 such letters to churches a year. That number has increased sharply because of the agency's recent delegation of audit authority to agents on the front lines, he said. He knew of two other churches, both critical of government policies, that had received similar letters, Owens said. It's unclear how often the IRS raises questions about the tax-exempt status of churches. While such action is rare, the IRS has at least once revoked the charitable designation of a church. Shortly before the 1992 presidential election, a church in Binghamton, N.Y., ran advertisements against Bill Clinton's candidacy, and the tax agency ruled that the congregation could not retain its tax-exempt status because it had intervened in an election. Bacon said he thought the IRS would eventually drop its case against All Saints. "It is a social action church, but not a politically partisan church," he said.

I am responding here to the Israeli-Palestinian issue. Those opposed to Palestine as a nation often point out that there was no Palestine before the creation of Israel in 1948. There was just as much a Palestine as there was an Israel. The problem really was caused by the colonial regimes of Europe, particularly England & France. They broke up the Ottoman Empire after World War 1 and carved out nations artificially. As if they had that right. Of course that's not the only place in the world where England & France and other European colonial regimes carved out nations artificially. I support either a 2-nation solution with a Palestine which really is the whole West Bank and Gaza and not just what Israel carves out of the West Bank OR one secular nation where the rights of both Palestinians and Israelis will be protected by international agreement and enforcement. It's amazing to me how james amdg can assert that Israel had to protect itself from "Muslim aggression" and not also assert that Arabs had to protect themselves from Israeli aggression. Both sides have been and continue to be extremely aggressive. There are lots of thugs and terrorists on the Israeli side as well as the Palestinian side. I think that it's very unfortunate that james amdg calls it "Muslim aggression." I would call it Arab aggression. I don't call Israeli aggression Jewish aggression. I don't call English & French & American aggression Christian aggression. There are hawks and doves in the Muslim community and in the Jewish community and in the Christian community.

Welcome to this great forum, Demas. Maybe you should answer the question you have raised. There has been a lot of discussion on these 8 points over the years. What do you think is missing?

http://www.thecentering.org/centering_method.html < CENTERING PRAYER & LECTIO DIVINA I have trouble being disciplined and don't do this regularly but it leads to so much awakening and awareness and awe. Maybe I am resisting that power. Maybe I just don't like those nails which are hammered into bodies which follow God no matter what. Keating's method is very similar to TM. He would probably deny that but I tend to find so much commonality in all of the great wisdom traditions.

I love Baseball. The Sunday night game was simply marvellous with a dramatic grand slam allowing the Sox to get ahead. Then the Astros tying it up in the 9th. And then that walk off homer by somebody who rarely hits a homer. WOW! This is such a great World Series no matter who wins. It would be Houston's first ever and Chicago's first in 88 years. That's good for Baseball. And neither team got there because of steroids!

They call me the "yin/yang kid" out here in the wild wild west! (Which is easier than the "thesis/antithesis/synthesis kid".) <{POST_SNAPBACK}> Thanks for the LOL opportunity. I love it.

As I read these posts (well skim these posts) I think of Hegel's philosophy of history: thesis and antithesis leading to a new synthesis. We are progressing toward what I like to call "the new church for the new age." I believe that there is a lot of spiritual energy in both the Conservative Church and in the New Age Movement. As far as I know, they can't stand each other! Thesis - antithesis! God is involved and will find a way to bring it all together. I sure don't know how.

I sure hope the White Sox win the WS. I was a White Sox fan in the late 50s when the Go-Go Sox were the only AL team which even came close to challenging the Yankees. I really liked Luis Aparicio. I lived in Hyde Park for a couple of years in the 80s and got to go to the old Comiskey Park. The organist was great. Nobody wanted to please the fans more than Bill Veeck. It was a lot of fun. I got to the South Side too late to go to the Disco Sucks rally! I'm a Red Sox fan having lived in Massachusetts for about a decade total. New England waited 86 years for a WS win. Chicagoland shoudn't have to wait any longer. 88 years is a long time to wait!

Yes, it counts. We need to share our journeys here, our stories, and blogs are a really helpful new tool for doing that. As you can see below, I promote my blog a lot!

Thank you so much. This is a big part of my vocation these days and I am glad when it is working for somebody.

My grandfather was named Samuel Waldemar Samuelsen. He came to NYC in 1901 and changed his name to Samuel Waldemar so we have a similar story!

I saw a wonderful rendition of GODSPELL by a local group in Rome NY recently. They had a lot of fun and were very creative and talented. It seemed to me that the script was pure scripture and great scripture at that. I think there was plenty of song and dance at that feast when the prodigal son returned. The Last Temptation of Christ is a tremendous book and movie both. Kazantzakis is one of the best writers ever. REPORT TO GRECO which is somewhat autobiographical is my favorite but THE ROCK GARDEN and ZORBA and ST. FRANCIS aren't far behind.

"The national government will maintain and defend the foundations on which the power of our nation rests. It will offer strong protection to Christianity as the very basis of our collective morality. Today Christians stand at the head of our country. We want to fill our culture again with the Christian spirit. We want to burn out all the recent immoral developments in literature, in the theatre, and in the press -- in short, we want to burn out the poison of immorality which has entered into our whole life and culture as a result of liberal excess during recent years." Adolf Hitler. (in his first radio address to the German people after coming to power July 22, 1933; from My New Order, The Speeches of Adolf Hitler, 1922-1939, Vol. 1, pp. 871-872, Oxford University Press, London, 1942.) Scary, isn't it?

MOW wrote: "In regard to the Nazi issue I believe it was D Bonhoeffer ,a Christian, who was frustrated with the leadership of the Christian church in Germany. As the Nazi's rose to power they looked the other way. Bonhoeffer had visited Dr King's church in Harlem and thought he could bring that kind of activism to Germany. He was finally executed by the Nazi's." This needs correction. Dr Martin Luther King Jr was a teenager when Bonhoeffer died. Did he ever serve a church in Harlem? I don't think so. You must have him mixed up with someone else.

Today's post at www.dailyzen.com is again pertinent IMO. One who has attained the Tao is master of herself, and the universe is dissolved for her. Throw her in the company of the noisy and the dirty, and she will be like a lotus flower growing from muddy water, touched by it, yet unstained. - T'u Lung Again, I see a common approach in the Tao and Jesus. Resistance, even defiance, is appropriate to the forces of the universe which are not authentic. Resistance or defiance toward God (or the authentic forces of the universe) is not a good idea. If my memory serves me right, the Tao is aimed at Chinese leaders who have armies and will use those armies with the blessing of the Tao Masters! The issue is timing and making sure that those armies are not used in self-defeating ways (US in Viet Nam, Iraq etc.). So, the Tao teachers are certainly not opposed to resistance and defiance. They teach that timing is everything. Sounds like Jesus to me.

I think today's offering at dailyzen -- http://www.dailyzen.com -- offers us a way to integrate these two seemingly opposite positions: Calm in quietude is not real calm; when you can be calm in the midst of activity, this is the true state of nature. Happiness in comfort is not real happiness; when you can be happy in the midst of hardship, then you see the true potential of the mind. - Huanchu Daoren Zen Buddhism integrates Buddhism with the Tao. I believe Jesus achieved this state of mind and teaches us to seek that state of mind. I don't believe that Jesus tried to end up on that cross. The authorities saw him as a threat. He was simply being authentic in the same way that Tao and Zen and Progressive Christian and other Wise Masters are authentic.