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Re: [Dialogue] [Oe List ...] 5/16/19, Progressing Spirit: Brian McLaren: What Am I Now?
by Ellie Stock 17 May '19

17 May '19

Hi Bud, When we were in the pastoral ministry, we used Brian's older book and the accompanying video for adult ed and leadership training. Marcus Borg and Dominic Crossan have a lot of books and video series related to Jesus, Paul and Roman Empire. We journeyed with them in 2003 through Turkey, with many bus lectures on this topic. Ellie elliestock(a)aol.com -----Original Message----- From: H. A. Tillinghast <rev.bud(a)mac.com> To: Ellie Stock <elliestock(a)aol.com> Cc: Colleague Dialogue <dialogue(a)lists.wedgeblade.net>; Order Ecumenical Community <oe(a)lists.wedgeblade.net> Sent: Fri, May 17, 2019 10:30 am Subject: Re: [Oe List ...] 5/16/19, Progressing Spirit: Brian McLaren: What Am I Now? Thanks, Ellie, for forwarding the Progressing Spirit emails. This column by Brian McLaren I found particularly stimulating. He, more than any other thinker for me, brings together the best of what is happening in present theology and religious movements. If anyone has another voice they find of like significance, I would be most happy to hear about that person. I’m currently working on trying to relate the work of the biblical scholars who point out the need to place the first two centuries of the Jesus movement in its context of and conflict with the Roman Empire. Then I’m trying to find what this means for today’s church set in today’s empire. The best book I have found tying these two together, one written ten years ago by Brian McLaren, is not among his books mentioned in this column. It is his “Everything Must Change: Jesus, global crises, and a revolution of hope.” I recommend it highly. Grace and Peace, Bud Tillinghast

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5/16/19, Progressing Spirit: Brian McLaren: What Am I Now?; Spong revisited
by Ellie Stock 17 May '19

17 May '19

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!important;line-height:150% !important;} }@media screen and (max-width:480px){ #yiv4027885298 #yiv4027885298templateBody .yiv4027885298mcnTextContent, #yiv4027885298 #yiv4027885298templateBody .yiv4027885298mcnTextContent p{ font-size:14px !important;line-height:150% !important;} }@media screen and (max-width:480px){ #yiv4027885298 #yiv4027885298templateFooter .yiv4027885298mcnTextContent, #yiv4027885298 #yiv4027885298templateFooter .yiv4027885298mcnTextContent p{ font-size:12px !important;line-height:150% !important;} } Previously I shared a bit about my past, this piece turns to the present. | | | | View this email in your browser | | | | | | | | | | | | | | What Am I Now? | | | | | | | | | | Essay by Brian McLaren May 16, 2019[In my previous piece, I shared a bit about my past. This piece turns to the present.] I’ve just begun work on two books, the second of which is tentatively entitled, Do I Stay Christian? As I sketch out the shape and trajectory of the book, I’m thinking more deeply about why I still identify as Christian and what I think Christian can, and in fact, must come to mean in the decades ahead. Two adjectives are commonly added to Christian when people describe or introduce me and my colleagues. I would like to briefly reflect on those adjectives, emergent and progressive. [Of course, I have to first laugh at myself, because the title and subtitle of one of my better-selling books was a study in using adjectives to modify the problematic noun Christian: A Generous Orthodoxy: Why I am a missional, evangelical, post/protestant, liberal/conservative, mystical/poetic, biblical, charismatic/contemplative, fundamentalist, calvinist, anabaptist/anglican, methodist, catholic, green, incarnational, depressed-yet-hopeful, emergent, unfinished Christian.] The word emergent is probably one of the most common terms associated with my name. The term is derived from two primary sources. In the world of botany, in an emergent wetland, plants rooted in one world (water) emerge into another (air). In the science of emergent properties, a complex system sometimes generates possibilities that go beyond the sum of its parts. For example, if you take a bunch of ants and put them together, you simply have a bunch of ants. But if those ants are organized in a colony, each ant has its role, and the colony has a collective functioning and capacity beyond what any and all individuals could do alone. [Similarly, one-hundred billion brain cells, if linked together by the right neural pathways, can create a sense of self and consciousness that the same cells could never experience apart from the network.] The intelligence of the colony, hive, or brain are emergent properties. Both definitions seemed to describe the experience of growing numbers of Christians in the late 1990’s and early 2000’s. We felt that we were living in two worlds. Our roots were in Evangelical, Mainline Protestant, and Catholic institutions and traditions, all of which were deeply informed by premodern and hierarchical sensibilities augmented by modern and colonial sensibilities. We felt we were growing into some new postmodern and postcolonial space, and we felt that if we could connect and collaborate outside of traditional institutional mechanisms, something powerful, creative, and new could … emerge. We also felt that we were emerging beyond the liberal-conservative polarity that had so typified modern Christianity. We acknowledged our liberal and conservative heritages, but we felt that neither was offering us the resources we needed to move forward. So we were emerging into new space. [Sadly, but predictably, the word emergent was quickly “dumbed down” to mean singing chants and Taize songs, having worship stations, meeting around tables rather than in rows of pews, and so on. (Something similar has happened with the promising word missional.)] People often added another word after emergent, namely, movement. But I didn’t feel, and still don’t feel, that we ever achieved movement status. In movement theory, before a new movement can begin, several things have to happen.1. A group of people have to agree that the status quo isn’t working or is unacceptable. 2. They have to engage in critical conversations to understand what’s not working and what should be done differently, and they need to recruit a critical mass of diverse people to contribute to the critical conversations. 3. The participants in these critical conversations have to agree on what’s wrong and what’s needed, they have to decide to do what’s needed, and they have to identify the proposals, demands, goals, and strategy by which they will do what’s needed. 4. They have to try, fail, try, fail, and keep trying and failing until the elites who have the power to enforce the status quo are sufficiently weakened or divided, so that the movement has a possibility of success. 5. When the moment is right (“in the fullness of time,” to use biblical language), they have to attract needed resources (including money) and launch their strategy. I have felt that emergent Christianity has been working through the second of these stages for the last twenty years. We have been taking critical conversations to deeper and deeper levels, peeling the onion, so to speak, layer by layer, looking at matters of style, method, structure, leadership, substance, and vision. We have made a lot of progress in those twenty years, but I sense that we still haven’t penetrated to the depths of our challenges, nor have we come to wide agreement about what needs to be done. And although we have worked tirelessly to bring a more diverse group of people into the conversation, I don’t believe we have as yet reached either critical mass or diversity. As I see it, for the movement we dream of to be born in North America, we need the emergent wings of several communities to come together: Evangelical, Mainline Protestant, Roman Catholic, Historic Black, Latinex, Indigenous/Native/First Nations, Asian, Eastern Orthodox. These emergent wings are taking shape, but in different communities, and their size, strength, and stability vary greatly, as do their priorities and available energy for collaboration. In many cases, internal dynamics (i.e., tensions in the Black church community, or the Roman Catholic Community or the United Methodist communities) have been so preoccupying that trans-denominational collaboration has been stalled. Because the needed movement has not yet gained critical mass, many young (and some older) people in each wing are simply leaving Christian faith. It may be that we will only be ready to move on from the second stage when we have young leaders, and in light of our history, young leaders of color, who are willing and able to take the lead, supported (but not controlled!) by those of us who are older in years and paler in skin. It also may not be possible or appropriate for such a movement to be born in North America unless it is linked up and working in harmony with parallel movements around the world. In other words, the movement we need may not only be multi-racial and trans-denominational, but also international. And, I can imagine good reasons why it would be less than helpful for Christians to build such a movement alone. I can imagine why what we really need are parallel movements arising and collaborating from within Muslim, Hindu, Jewish, Buddhist, Sikh, Humanist, and other communities. Having traveled to over 40 countries in the last few decades, I see these critical conversations springing up globally, across faiths, races, and denominations. There are encouraging signs of “movement pregnancy.” But births cannot be rushed. Meanwhile, proposals, demands, goals, and strategy continue to come into focus (3). But elites continue to gain ground in terms of financial wealth and control over political, educational, and religious institutions. Their hegemony could topple quickly, but as recent elections have shown, they will not give up without a fight (4). As yet, nowhere near the needed financial resources have been discovered by the proto-movements that are taking shape (5), but, that too, could quickly change with a few generous people. The word progressive well may be eclipsing the word emergent at this point, and it deserves some attention. The word means moving forward, and in that way, differs from a static, institutional liberalism that functioned as a static alternative to a static or regressive conservatism. For participants in the critical conversations described above, institutionalism, whether conservative or liberal, is being identified as one of our key problems. (Not institutions themselves, but institutionalism: a preoccupation with institutional self-protection rather than institutional mission.) Increasingly, I think, progressive implies an acknowledgement that we need to progress beyond static institutional liberalism. [More practically, the term progressive is being defined by many solely in terms of affirming LGBTQ equality, which implies that once one affirms equality, one is in a static new category called progressive and all our problems are solved. In this way, progressive can become a resistant or reactionary stance rather than a revolutionary and dynamic one. If all our energy is used up resisting and reacting to traditionalist, conservative, and regressive actions, we won’t be able to provide a constructive holistic vision of a desirable future, and that vision is absolutely necessary for a movement to occur. So the term progressive, like the term emergent, can quickly be dumbed down and its descriptive power blunted rather than sharpened.] When I think about myself and my work, two other terms are also in play, along with emergent and progressive. First, I believe the term contemplative will be key to the movement we need. The contemplative mind, as currently defined by Richard Rohr and others, is not just about exchanging old thoughts and beliefs for new thoughts and beliefs, but rather it is about an alternative way of thinking and believing. It is about including and transcending the dualistic mind (us/them, right/wrong, saved/damned, accepted/rejected) into something bigger and deeper. We might describe this non-dual or unitive mind as a whole-brained way of seeing that is simultaneously critical and conceptual (left brained), imaginative and mystical (right brained), and embodied (brain stem). This contemplative mind is within everyone’s reach, but many don’t even know it exists, and others may have had brief experiences of it, but haven’t been trained in practices that make it habitually accessible. This contemplative mindset is essential because it helps us see that achieving what we want depends on becoming who we need to be. If we want an ecological civilization, for example, we need to learn to deal with our own consumptive and acquisitive desires. If we want a genuinely peaceful world or nation or neighborhood, we need to learn to deal with our own inner conflicts, fears, hostilities, and rivalries. If we want a just and equitable world, we have to become just and equitable people. In this way, the contemplative mindset leads us to integrate our inner work with our outer work. This inner work is essential, but it is not sufficient; we can’t be satisfied with a more mystical or self-actualized version of organized religion in its current form. That brings me to a final word, activist. Activism demands that organized religion be transformed into organizing religion (as I discussed in my book, The Great Spiritual Migration). I’m supremely uninterested in a reinvigorated form of institutional Christianity that fills churches with happy, fulfilled consumers of religious goods and services, while the poor and vulnerable suffer, the oligarchs make a killing, conflicts rage on, and the planet burns. An emergent, progressive, contemplative, and activist Christian faith is what interests me today and draws me forward, just as it did decades ago, when I didn’t have the words to describe it.~ Brian D. McLaren Read online here About the Author Brian D. McLaren is an author, speaker, activist, and public theologian. A former college English teacher and pastor, he is a passionate advocate for “a new kind of Christianity” – just, generous, and working with people of all faiths for the common good. He is an Auburn Senior Fellow and a leader in the Convergence Network, through which he is developing an innovative training/mentoring program for pastors, church planters, and lay leaders called Convergence Leadership Project. He works closely with the Center for Progressive Renewal/Convergence, the Wild Goose Festival and the Fair Food Program‘s Faith Working Group. His most recent joint project is an illustrated children’s book (for all ages) called Cory and the Seventh Story. Other recent books include: The Great Spiritual Migration, We Make the Road by Walking, and Why Did Jesus, Moses, the Buddha, and Mohammed Cross the Road? (Christian Identity in a Multi-Faith World). Brian has been active in networking and mentoring church planters and pastors since the mid 1980’s, and has assisted in the development of several new churches. He is a popular conference speaker and a frequent guest lecturer for denominational and ecumenical leadership gatherings – across the US and Canada, Latin America, Europe, Africa, and Asia. He has written for or contributed interviews to many periodicals, including Leadership, Sojourners, Tikkun, Worship Leader, and Conversations. A frequent guest on television, radio, and news media programs, he has appeared on All Things Considered, Larry King Live, Nightline, On Being, and Religion and Ethics Newsweekly. His work has also been covered in Time, New York Times, Christianity Today, Christian Century, the Washington Post, Huffington Post, CNN.com, and many other print and online media. Brian is married to Grace, and they have four adult children and five grandchildren. His personal interests include wildlife and ecology, fly fishing and kayaking, music and songwriting, and literature. | | | | | | | | Question & Answer Q: By Ron If our knowledge of God can only be accessed through faith, and if the divinity of Jesus can only be affirmed through faith, why do we act and speak as if faith is the same as empirical knowing? Wouldn’t we be further ahead in our spiritual journey and in our interaction with the world if we would present ourselves honestly by saying something like ‘I don’t ‘know’ God exists or that Jesus was divine in a greater sense than any of us? But I choose to live my life as if those things are true. That, to me, is faith and authenticity. It also protects me from the hubris of thinking that my tribe has the truth over all other truth claims. I’m interested in your perspective on this issue of faith vs knowledge. A: By Rev. Matthew Syrdal Dear Ron, I appreciate your question and observation, especially your ‘choice to live your life as if…’ which seems to be a wonderfully clear and authentic articulation of faith to me. Perhaps faith truly is less a question to be answered, and more a mystery to be lived. Unfortunately, part of the confusion you point out stems from the fact that the modern-scientific age of empiricism has co-opted the word ‘knowledge’, and our understanding of what ‘knowledge’ actually is. Knowledge in the ‘objective’ sense is very important for scientific measurement and forming the mathematical hypotheses that have brought miraculous advances across a diversity of fields in our age of globalizing and quantum technologies. The question is at what cost? Perhaps the cost of these advances has been the loss of the ‘deep subjective’ which is both experiential knowledge (gnosis in the Greek), and relational knowledge (intimate, as the Hebrew word yada insinuates; see Gen 3). The deep subjective is that ‘I-Thou’ relationship spoken of by Martin Buber, not to mention indigenous animistic peoples, religious mystics, and even many deep ecologists.According to folks like Carl Jung and Stephen Galegos and others, there are four functions, or ‘windows’ by which we can know the world. Only one of those windows is the privileged thinking function. The others are sensing, feeling, and intuition, or imagination. Each ‘window’ let’s part of the light into the house, so to speak, but not all of it. They are designed to work together. It could be argued that Albert Einstein, for example, had a more powerful imagination perhaps than even his capacity for critical thinking. My opinion, partially drawn from the study of indigenous peoples, the ancient prophets, mystics and shamans of various cultures, is that real faith goes far beyond ‘thinking’ — the subject-object dualism of the strategic mind must be in a sense overcome for advances in faith and consciousness. To be whole we must incorporate all four ‘windows’ in the fullness of our capacities (I-the Self) in relationship to the dynamic world, other, God (Thou). It makes me think of the way jazz musicians improvise together when they make music in such a deeply intuitive way that they enter a flow state. They might even say that the music is playing them. In this way, it is the deep subjective, not critical thinking, that is the primary referent of faith.~ Rev. Matthew Syrdal Read and share online here About the Author Reverend Matthew Syrdal M.Div., lives in the front range of Colorado with his beautiful family. Matt is an ordained pastor in the Presbyterian church (USA), founder and lead guide of WilderSoul and Church of Lost Walls and co-founder of Seminary of the Wild. Matt speaks at conferences and guides immersive nature-based experiences around the country. In his years of studying ancient Christian Rites of Initiation, world religions, anthropology, rites-of-passage and eco- psychology Matt seeks to re-wild what it means to be human. His work weaves in myth and ceremony in nature as a way for people to enter into conversation with the storied world in which they are a part. Matt’s passion is guiding others in the discovery of “treasure hidden in the field” of their deepest lives cultivating deep wholeness and re-enchantment of the natural world to apprentice fully and dangerously to the kingdom of god. Matt has been coaching, and guiding since becoming a certified Wild Mind nature-based human development guide through the Animas Valley Institute and is currently training to become a soul initiation guide through the SAIP program. | | | | | | | | Please continue to send us your feedback… we are listening. We aim to give voice to many different perspectives that are relevant and inspiring along this spiritually progressing path. We are not here to tell you what to believe or how to act. We are here to support your journey, to share and learn together.Thank you for being a part of this community! | | | | | | Join our FB community today! Spread the word, share with friends. Thanks! | | | | | | | | Bishop John Shelby Spong Revisited Miracles and the Resurrection The Fourth Fundamental, Part I Essay by Bishop John Shelby Spong August 1, 2007 I return this week to our running series on the Five Fundamentals, that supposedly irreducible set of principles that believers were told had to be accepted as literally true if one wanted to be called a Christian. It was from the publication of these five fundamentals between the years 1910-1915, in a series of widely distributed tracts financed by the Union Oil Company (Unocal) of California, that the term “fundamentalist” entered the Christian vocabulary.In the fourth fundamental, two concepts were coupled together both of which had to do with acknowledging that supernatural, miraculous power was present in Jesus of Nazareth as the incarnation of God in human flesh. The literal historicity of the miracle stories of the New Testament was the first. These miracles were designed, it was said, to demonstrate the divinity of Christ who had the ability to do Godlike things. The second was the greatest miracle described in the New Testament that asserts that the divinity of Christ is best seen in the fact that he conquered death by walking physically and bodily out of his tomb on the third day after his death by crucifixion. On this primary supernatural act of the resurrection of Jesus in a physical bodily form that could be handled, touched and on which the wounds of crucifixion were visible, the fundamentalists declared that the whole Christian experience lives or dies.In the next few weeks in this column, I will examine both of these claims, biblically, historically and theologically. I need to note at the very beginning that few, if any, world class biblical and theological scholars would acknowledge the literal accuracy of either claim. Much to the dismay of the fundamentalists, however, these scholars continue to be practicing Christians. The gap between the Christian academy where biblical scholarship is engaged deeply and the pews, in which the typical worshiper sits on Sunday morning, has been growing for at least 250 years. I seek to bridge that gap in this series.Miracles first appear in the gospels in Mark, the first gospel to be written in the early seventies. They are in three general categories: first, the nature miracles, by which I mean stories depicting Jesus as being able to control or manipulate the natural laws of the universe. Examples of this category are the stories of Jesus walking on the water, stilling the storm, cursing a fig tree and causing it to die immediately and the feeding of the multitude in the wilderness with a limited number of loaves and fish. This feeding story is actually told twice in Mark, once on the Jewish side of the lake where five loaves and two fish are expanded to feed 5000 men, plus women and children and after all have eaten their fill twelve baskets of fragments are collected. Then Jesus moves to the Gentile side of the lake and with seven loaves and a few fish feeds 4000 people after which seven baskets of fragments are collected. Second there are the healing miracles. These healing stories in Mark fall basically into four categories: the blind receive their sight, the deaf hear, the lame (those with crippled or withered limbs) are made whole and the tongues of the mute are loosed so that they can speak or sing. Sometimes these categories are mixed since the inability to hear and the status of being mute are in some cases, two parts of the same affliction. Once we referred to this as being “deaf and dumb.” Third are the raising from the dead miracles. Mark records only one such episode, the restoration to life by Jesus of the daughter of Jairus, a synagogue leader. Every miraculous event attributed to Jesus in the first gospel to be written falls into one of these three categories.When we come to the second gospel, written about a decade after Mark (82-85 C. E.) and popularly attributed to Matthew, we note that this gospel is basically an expansion of Mark. Mathew clearly has Mark in front of him as he writes and quite literally incorporates about 90% of Mark’s content into his gospel. He expands that content, however, with his own additions, making his work a twenty-eight chapter book as opposed to Mark’s sixteen chapters. Matthew’s expansions include the genealogy of Jesus with which he opens his gospel, the introduction of the miraculous birth tradition, complete with stars in the east, magi, gold, frankincense and myrrh, the narrative parts of the temptation in the wilderness story, the Sermon on the Mount and some uniquely Matthean parables like the parable of the Last Judgment in which the sheep and the goats are separated. Matthew also expands Mark’s story of the resurrection from Mark’s original eight verses to twenty. For our purposes in discussing the miracles of Jesus, however, it is of note that Matthew includes every miracle story introduced by Mark. Matthew might vary the details in some of the recountings of Mark’s miracles, but nothing is changed so dramatically that the story is not easily recognized. There are no new miracle stories in his gospel.When we turn to Luke, who wrote either near the end of the 9th decade or in the early years of the 10th decade (88-92 C.E.), we discover that Luke also has Mark in front of him as he writes, but he is not nearly so dependent on Mark as Matthew has been. Luke incorporates about 50% of Mark into his gospel and also expands Mark dramatically, but in a different manner from Matthew. While Luke, like Matthew, adds a birth narrative and a genealogy, his major expansion is in the section of the gospel in which Jesus is teaching his disciples on the journey from Galilee to Jerusalem. The journey section in Luke is about three times the length found in Mark. Luke also includes those parables of Jesus that are the most familiar to most of us and that appear nowhere else in the gospel tradition – the Good Samaritan; the Prodigal Son; the Unjust Ruler, and Lazarus and the Rich Man. Luke also changes the resurrection material dramatically, relocating it from Galilee, where it is centered in both Mark and Matthew, to Jerusalem. He also makes Jesus’ resurrection more obviously physical, while stretching his appearances out over 40 days. In addition Luke writes a new climax to the Jesus story by adding narratives of Jesus’ cosmic ascension and the Day of Pentecost, which are told only in Luke’s second volume that we know by the name of the Book of Acts.It is noteworthy to recognize that Luke edits Mark’s miracle stories dramatically, while adding new miracle accounts about which Mark seems not to know. For example, Luke omits Mark’s second feeding of the multitude story, but adds both a healing story (the cleansing of the ten lepers of whom only one, a Samaritan, returns to give thanks) and a new raising of the dead story (the only son of a widow in the village of Nain).When we come to the Fourth Gospel, John calls these supernatural events not miracles but “signs” and he develops them into long elaborate narratives with great theological monologues attached. Most of the Johannine signs can be correlated with earlier miracle stories, but two are unique to John. One is a nature miracle story, the account of Jesus turning water into wine at the wedding feast in Cana of Galilee and the other, a raising of the dead story that we know as the dramatic narrative in which Lazarus is raised from his four days old grave.That is the briefest possible summary of the miracles attributed to Jesus in the New Testament. If we are going to talk about and understand in any way what these supernatural events mean we must begin by becoming aware of their number and their nature. One cannot make sense of the miracle stories of the gospels with only a vague awareness of their content.One further observation will complete this first phase in our study of the miracles attributed to Jesus. No evidence has been found of miracles being attributed to Jesus in any other Christian writing prior to Mark in the 8th decade. Paul who wrote between 50-64 C.E. never refers to or mentions a supernatural act or a miracle that he attributes to Jesus. That omission in no way made Jesus less divine in the writings of Paul. It is clear in all of Paul’s writings that in Jesus God has been met, engaged or, in some way not always clearly articulated, experienced in a dramatically new way. Knowledge of Jesus possessing supernatural, miraculous ability, however, clearly did not seem to be part of Paul’s consciousness.A second source that many scholars date earlier than Mark is called Q, a hypothetical collection of the sayings of Jesus. When all of Mark was deleted from both Matthew and Luke, it was discovered that there were other sayings of Jesus that were identical or near identical in Matthew and Luke that were not Marcan. So the theory was developed that Matthew and Luke both had a second common source on which they drew in the composition of their gospels. Once this source was identified some scholars began to date this Q material even earlier than any of the gospels. I am not convinced by these arguments but those who espouse the Q hypothesis are learned people whose opinions must be taken seriously. However, my point is that if these scholars are accurate in their early dating of Q, it is noteworthy that there are no miracle stories in Q. Nor are there any in the Gospel of Thomas, discovered in the late 1940’s at Nag Hamadi and which some scholars believe was written before Mark.So these are the data we need to explore in this segment of our study of the five fundamentals. Miracle stories attributed to Jesus are no earlier than the 8th decade. They are in three categories: nature miracles, healing miracles and the raising of the dead miracles. Are they literal descriptions of historic happenings? I don’t think so. Is belief in the historicity of the biblical miracles a fundamental truth upon which Christianity hangs? Well only if you want to say Paul would not therefore have been a Christian. I hope this whets your appetite. This study will continue next week.~ John Shelby Spong | | | | | | | | Announcements 2019 Common Dreams Conference, Sacred Earth: Original Blessing, Our Common Home The 2019 Common Dreams Conference, Sacred Earth: Original Blessing, Our Common Home, will be held on 11-14 July at Newington College in Stanmore, Sydney, AU. The distinguished international keynote speaker will be Matthew Fox & the conference program is based on his concept of Creation Spirituality, which is rooted in ancient Judeo-Christian teaching, inclusive of today’s science and world spiritual traditions; welcoming of the arts and artists; wisdom centered, prophetic, and committed to eco-justice, social justice and gender justice. Early Bird Discount ends May 31st - Click here for more information/registration. | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |

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Fwd: Don Cramer ~ My Ladder
by James Wiegel 17 May '19

17 May '19

A poem from Don Cramer > Subject: Don Cramer ~ My Ladder > > https://youtu.be/x36iksOLsNY > > > Jim Wiegel > Sent from my iPad

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Joe Mathews Dissertation on John Wesley
by Wendell Refior 14 May '19

14 May '19

Colleagues - We now have a digital copy of JWM's Dissertation on Wesley. A Study of John Wesley, turned in and rejected by Niebuhr and never rewritten or approved. Wendell Refior for the ICA Global Archives Chapter 1: The Human Constitution https://wedgeblade.net/files/archives_assets/21219.pdf Chapter 2: The Life of Love https://wedgeblade.net/files/archives_assets/21220.pdf Chapter 3: The Knowledge of Faith https://wedgeblade.net/files/archives_assets/21221.pdf Conclusion: Concluding Remarks https://wedgeblade.net/files/archives_assets/21222.pdf -- Thanks until later. "To believe what is true for you in your private heart is true for <everyone> -- that is genius." - Emerson in "Self-Reliance" Wendell

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JWM Dissertation
by Terry Bergdall 14 May '19

14 May '19

Stories surrounding Mathews' unaccepted dissertation have long been the stuff of mythology and his mystic persona that he cherished and propagated. That's certainly true in regards to the stories about the burning of the dissertation. Back in the day I did PLC recruiting in Oklahoma and northern Texas and met many pastors who had been students of his at Perkins. On at least two occasions I heard stories about the "burning." Surrounded by some of his faithful students, the story goes, Joe marched down to the basement of the Seminary and ceremoniously threw a draft of the dissertation into the building's furnace. The point, as related to me by students who were there, was that there's a clear distinction between doing the mission, i.e., "the necessary deed," and being distracted from it by things that didn't really matter, i.e., status and recognition that comes with a PhD. He created a teaching moment through his orchestrated ceremony and it made a lasting impression on those pastors who told me about it ... as well as on me who heard the story secondhand. Mathews was first and foremost a masterful teacher, one who dramatically altered images, and he used his dissertation to do that job. Marshall Jones got it write when he wrote: That's SO like him to say, 'I'm not gonna jump through that hoop again!' and risk another rejection. He WAS stubborn that way. And very proud of his research and writing and masterful teaching. So I would say, 'Good on ya, Joe. Got more important fish to fry!'

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Fw: published on Amazon!
by W. J. 12 May '19

12 May '19

Subject: published on Amazon! Colleagues and friends, I am so pleased to announce that Jim Campbell's new book, Facilitating Authentic Participation, has just been published on Amazon.com! It's 8.5 x 11 inches, 164 pages, and packed with insights and wisdom from a lifetime of teaching and practicing group facilitation skills, including the Technology of Participation©. Before his recent retirement Jim taught college courses on how to engage in 'The Cycle of Facilitation'. This book captures his core insights from his teaching career and his practice of facilitation on four continents. This is Jim's capstone contribution to the field of professional facilitation. It offers the most comprehensive approach to facilitating group decision-making, including details of every step of the process of preparation, delivery, and followup. Jim is offering a not-for-profit preview price of just $5.00 per copy until May 31, after which the list price of $19.95 will take effect. Click on this link to Amazon.com now to take advantage of this special offer! Please order your copy before the discount expires and post your review on Amazon.com. This price is available to Jim's colleagues, students, and friends who appreciate the value of his contribution to the field of facilitation. And if we get more than fifty reviews on Amazon.com, they will pay more attention to Jim's book! It's a must-have for all who aspire to sharpen, broaden, and deepen their facilitation skills and increase the value of their engagement with clients! Plus all who want to be more effective in managing conflicts in groups will want to use Jim's non-confrontational methods of releasing group creativity and creating consensus. A comprehensive and invaluable resource, highly recommended! —Martin Gilbraith It is really about what it means to fully love the whole journey of enabling the creativity that is released in the short time of actually being ‘on stage’. —Jack Gilles A comprehensive context for facilitation, plus great practical tools for every stage of the facilitator’s work, grounded with stories of experience at every stage. Anyone planning to become certified as a facilitator—or just to become a highly competent facilitator—will benefit from Jim’s experience. —Jo Nelson Scroll down to read more about Facilitating Authentic Participation. --Wayne Marshall Jones, editor About Facilitating Authentic Participation All too often, asking any group to work together without effective facilitation is a shortcut to disaster. —James M. Campbell In this revealing step-by-step guide, master group process facilitator James M. Campbell takes you behind the scenes of the usually hidden planning and diagnostic process leading up to the “magic” of guiding a group process that allows the group’s deepest wisdom to be shared in a feasible action plan that everyone is motivated to accomplish. What may look simple, effortless, and easy to accomplish is the culmination of an intensive series of consultative stages of preparation requiring the listening, analytical, and collaborative skills of a master facilitator. This is the text that shares the process that the author taught in university-level courses in Europe after a lifetime of innovative process work with groups on four continents. Jim has written elsewhere: ...people know that participating in creating their destiny is an essential part of their humanity... The process whereby people are enabled to experience this combination of the freeing of their humanity and the ownership which generates commitment and motivation is truly transformative. By the force of their own experience people realise that they can participate in creating their future and the future of their organisation or community. Thus people experience themselves as responsible for their destiny, and so resignation and despair are transformed into hope and belief-in-self. People’s anger and frustration at their disenfranchisement is transformed into energy invested in creating their destiny. This conviction—that authentic participation is transformative—has been the foundation of Jim’s work as a facilitator. Praise for Facilitating Authentic Participation Not just driving the process or holding the space, responsible facilitation requires skillful care and attention to the whole of the facilitation cycle. In this book Jim Campbell, a pioneer of our profession, draws on fifty years of diverse experience in the field to share practical examples and models, tools and tips to empower you, your clients and your groups—not least, as you navigate the too-often-overlooked early phases of the facilitator's role, before the process is designed or the space is opened. A comprehensive and invaluable resource, highly recommended! —Martin Gilbraith, IAF Certified Professional Facilitator; former Chair of the International Association of Facilitators; former President of the Institute of Cultural Affairs International. Just as the students in All Hallows College found Jim Campbell’s facilitation courses to be life- and career-enhancing, so too will the readers of this manual find much food for thought as they prepare to facilitate groups. In this new, so-called ‘post-truth’ age the facilitator who appreciates the need for responsible and ethical facilitation will find this manual extremely useful. —Margarita Synnott MTh, facilitator in adult education (retired), All Hallows College, Dublin. This is a book about being a disciplined facilitator. It is step by step guide to embracing the task of caring; for a client, the task, the process, the group, and oneself. It is really about what it means to fully love the whole journey of enabling the creativity that is released in the short time of actually being ‘on stage’. It is a serious advanced book for those who are learning the art of facilitation. Jim has taken his years of diverse experiences and distilled it into the essence of facilitation Mastery. —Jack Gilles has been doing Strategic Planning and Leadership Development for over 35 years, 22 of which were in India. He has also done work in the USA, Canada, Mexico, Zambia, Nigeria, Egypt, and Indonesia. Most of his work has been with the Private Sector. He resides in Mexico. A comprehensive context for facilitation, plus great practical tools for every stage of the facilitator’s work, grounded with stories of experience at every stage. Anyone planning to become certified as a facilitator—or just to become a highly competent facilitator—will benefit from Jim’s experience. —Jo Nelson, IAF Certified Professional Facilitator; ICA Certified ToP Facilitator; founding member of the International Association of Facilitators (IAF); ICA Associates, Inc., Toronto. Learning the facilitation cycle and its corresponding processes has given me a set of transferable skills that I will carry through my personal and professional life. —Elizabeth McBride MSc, Personal and Leadership Coach and Facilitator, Dublin. >From the Author There are many people and groups who have made it possible for me to do what I have done as a facilitator. I learned the basics of facilitation working with my colleagues in The Ecumenical Institute (EI) and the Institute of Cultural Affairs (ICA). Every group I ever worked with taught me more about being a facilitator, always challenging me and keeping me searching for how I could do better with the next group. The hundreds of people who trusted me in training sessions asked probing questions and pushed me to understand more deeply and more clearly the task of being a facilitator. Strangers on trains and airplanes asked me what I did and then: What does a facilitator do? While checking my passport, a U.S.A. Immigration officer asked me what I did, and when I told him I was a Group Process Consultant asked me what that involved, resulting in a ten-minute conversation. This book is dedicated to all of them, for they all shaped me and enabled me to learn and grow as a facilitator. About the Author - As one of the pioneers who helped define and develop the professional field of process facilitation, James M. Campbell has practiced and taught facilitation skills at the university level since 2004. He has designed and facilitated group process work in North America, Europe, Africa, and Latin America for local community groups, international corporations, United Nations agencies, and in the NGO sector, including groups such as CARE International in the Balkans. He was a planning consultant with the administration of ICTY (the United Nations International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia). - Jim’s undergraduate teaching and his writing of this book based on his university courses is the capstone of a lifetime of work in the developing field of facilitation across four continents around the world. - Jim extended the International Association of Facilitators’ outreach in Europe and Middle East region starting in 1996. He has served on the IAF’s Global Board and was the European Regional Representative during the four years when the IAF’s European membership grew from around seventy-five to almost five hundred. He has contributed to IAF’s publications. - As a staff member of The Ecumenical Institute and the Institute of Cultural Affairs, Jim was instrumental in facilitating EI/ICA’s work with local community leadership in comprehensive socioeconomic reformulation, beginning with the Fifth City Human Development Project on Chicago’s West Side and extending the Fifth City Model to work with rural and urban communities in Kenya and Brazil. - Jim is a key contributor in developing the Technology of Participation (ToP)®, ICA’s proprietary structured facilitation methods for group work that draws upon more than a half century of experience in facilitating group processes, forging community consensus, developing locally based community organizations, and teaching imaginal education and group process methods in fifty nations around the world. - A native of western Pennsylvania, USA, Jim is a graduate of Pennsylvania’s Edinboro University. He joined the staff of The Ecumenical Institute after teaching high school in Iquique, Chile for three years. After his recent retirement as the director of the ICA’s Brussels office, Jim returned to Latin America where he lives with a Columbian family and pursues writing, consulting, training, and teaching. His memoir, A Journey of Beginnings, is forthcoming from Amazon.

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Just watched the movie “First Reformed”
by James Wiegel 11 May '19

11 May '19

Is a good look at the theological crisis of our century. Anyone else seen it? We got it from the library Sent from my iPad > > http://lists.wedgeblade.net/listinfo.cgi/dialogue-wedgeblade.net

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Re: [Dialogue] Just watched the movie “First Reformed”
by Ellie Stock 11 May '19

11 May '19

Yes, saw it when it came out...thought-provoking, disturbing, Ellie -----Original Message----- From: Richard Alton via Dialogue <dialogue(a)lists.wedgeblade.net> To: Colleague Dialogue <dialogue(a)lists.wedgeblade.net> Cc: Richard Alton <richard.alton(a)gmail.com>; Sally Stovall <sallystovall(a)gmail.com> Sent: Sat, May 11, 2019 8:15 am Subject: Re: [Dialogue] Just watched the movie “First Reformed” Yes, saw it for possibly earth fest showing but was considered too heavy...maybe drastic action needed Dick Sent from my iPhone > On May 10, 2019, at 10:48 PM, James Wiegel via Dialogue <dialogue(a)lists.wedgeblade.net> wrote: > > Is a good look at the theological crisis of our century. Anyone else seen it? We got it from the library > > Sent from my iPad > >> >> http://lists.wedgeblade.net/listinfo.cgi/dialogue-wedgeblade.net > > _______________________________________________ > Dialogue mailing list > Dialogue(a)lists.wedgeblade.net > http://lists.wedgeblade.net/listinfo.cgi/dialogue-wedgeblade.net _______________________________________________ Dialogue mailing list Dialogue(a)lists.wedgeblade.net http://lists.wedgeblade.net/listinfo.cgi/dialogue-wedgeblade.net

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Global Buzz for May
by ICA International 08 May '19

08 May '19

Enjoy catching up with what is happening in ICAs across the globe.... Global Buzz Report: May 2019 Click above or copy and paste this URL into your browser's address bar http://globalbuzz.icai-archives.org/7dayreport-19/2019-05-01.php And: read the latest ICAI Winds & Waves Magazine brought to you now on Medium.com See here: https://medium.com/winds-and-waves ICAI Communications

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4/25/19, Progressing Spirit, Toni Reynolds: Shadow Work; Fox: Q &A; Spong revisited
by Ellie Stock 25 Apr '19

25 Apr '19

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!important;line-height:125% !important;} }@media screen and (max-width:480px){ #yiv3907257945 h4{ font-size:16px !important;line-height:150% !important;} }@media screen and (max-width:480px){ #yiv3907257945 .yiv3907257945mcnBoxedTextContentContainer .yiv3907257945mcnTextContent, #yiv3907257945 .yiv3907257945mcnBoxedTextContentContainer .yiv3907257945mcnTextContent p{ font-size:14px !important;line-height:150% !important;} }@media screen and (max-width:480px){ #yiv3907257945 #yiv3907257945templatePreheader{ display:block !important;} }@media screen and (max-width:480px){ #yiv3907257945 #yiv3907257945templatePreheader .yiv3907257945mcnTextContent, #yiv3907257945 #yiv3907257945templatePreheader .yiv3907257945mcnTextContent p{ font-size:12px !important;line-height:150% !important;} }@media screen and (max-width:480px){ #yiv3907257945 #yiv3907257945templateHeader .yiv3907257945mcnTextContent, #yiv3907257945 #yiv3907257945templateHeader .yiv3907257945mcnTextContent p{ font-size:16px !important;line-height:150% !important;} }@media screen and (max-width:480px){ #yiv3907257945 #yiv3907257945templateBody .yiv3907257945mcnTextContent, #yiv3907257945 #yiv3907257945templateBody .yiv3907257945mcnTextContent p{ font-size:14px !important;line-height:150% !important;} }@media screen and (max-width:480px){ #yiv3907257945 #yiv3907257945templateFooter .yiv3907257945mcnTextContent, #yiv3907257945 #yiv3907257945templateFooter .yiv3907257945mcnTextContent p{ font-size:12px !important;line-height:150% !important;} } I am angry about the history of Christianity and it’s legacy. | | | | View this email in your browser | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Shadow Work | | | | | | | | | | Essay by Toni Reynolds April 25, 2019 Over the last few weeks I’ve had several ideas for articles. One of them felt so full of energy that I stayed awake until 3am writing. I’m usually fast asleep by 10pm. Period. So, being pulled from sleep and kept awake to write was significant. I’ve also committed to exercising two different forms of shadow work for the past 10 months: Jungian psychoanalysis, where I engage my dreams as messages from my subconscious, and a form of Buddhist meditation called Tonglen. This form of meditation involves inviting the suffering of others or yourself to take shape right before your eyes, or inside your own body, ask the suffering what it wants, listen to it, and then feed it. There is something happening in the shadow that demands our attention; in the shadow of our families, our nation, our spiritual tradition, and us. What’s happened since the night I was pulled awake is that I have felt completely confused and lost about what to say in a column such as this. It feels inauthentic and troublesome, at best, to write about these concepts as if I believe in them in a way that I think you, the reader, probably do. The truth of the moment is that I haven’t been gleaning much life from Christian spaces for some time now. All the while, I am slowly coming into awareness about the particular ways that Christianity has confused me about the truth of who I am. About how it has been used to swindle my ancestors out of practices, land, drums, and prayers that would have been truly liberating–if they hadn’t been whipped and beaten out of their brown bodies. I am angry about the history of Christianity and its legacy, in this hemisphere and for the last 500 years, as well as earlier and in the eastern hemisphere. The evidence of this legacy continues to result in present day acts of racism and bigotry that damage minds and spirits. It is not enough to say that “those people” who did and do “those” things of the past are not like us, here, even as we cultivate spaces like Progressing Spirit. We are always in contention with the brutal legacy of this country and of the groups to which we belong. I have previously had conversations with several folks about how un-christian I feel. I’ve been encouraged by others, hearing them say that they too don’t really identify as Christian; at least not in the way that the majority of the country understands that word. Initially, I felt some relief about this. It was nice to know that I was in good company as I moved into the next chapter of what felt like a faith identity crisis. Over time, however, I have started to feel more bothered. More worried. More confused about what it is that I’m really doing, writing for a Christian column when it feels like something major is still being avoided, danced around, and only talked about and worked on when certain bodies point out the lack. The article I was writing until 3am was a piece about Jesus and the Syrophoenician (and/or Canaanite) woman. The one where he publicly humiliates her, calling her a dog and reminding her that he didn’t not come to help her people. I wanted to write about the way that even Jesus had to confront bigotry. How even the enlightened mind had to make a choice about what stream of consciousness he was going to participate in–the one of the culture of his time, or the one of the Creator. Even Jesus had to overcome bigotry. I wanted to encourage people to give up racism for Lent. To give up male privilege for Lent. To spend 40 days in the shadow of suffering, calling out the names of every woman you know who has experienced sexual violence. I wanted to ask readers to use Jesus’ example of overcoming prejudice and supremacy by pausing. Waiting. Listening. And then pausing some more before accepting the truth and choosing to do better. In the text this scene passes quickly. In my spiritual imagination I just cannot imagine Jesus rapidly moving to “Woman, great is your faith!…” Wouldn’t he have gasped? Wouldn’t he have stopped while walking with his annoyed disciples and wondered how it was that he could have even thought about calling this woman, this mother, this human being something outside of her God given name? Wouldn’t he have paused? I know Lent is over. But I think that if we each spent the last few days thinking every day about how we individually practice racism, misogyny, USA supremacy, academic elitism, spiritual elitism, whatever it is–if we committed to exploring that every day for the next few days I am sure that shift in consciousness would take place. Maybe not for the whole world, but at least for your world. Wouldn’t that be worth it to start? The shadow that falls behind each of us has some shared pain. Perhaps I’ve been looking at it too long, trying my best to face my own shadow and noticing where it pulls in things that belong to more story lines than just my own. Regardless, I feel full of desire to heal it to the best of my ability. My form of Tonglen meditation guides me to feed the embodied suffering nectar from my heart. Over and over again you feed the shadow nectar until it turns into an ally, a teacher, a reformed enemy who has wisdom from a depth previously unknown. I really don’t know if I am Christian. I really do know that I’m pretty sure I’m not. But maybe if some of the shadow can be turned into an ally I could reconsider. Maybe. I have a sneaking suspicion that something similar is up with the droves of people who presently want nothing to do with Christianity in any form. There’s just too much denial and too much looking forward without looking back and admitting the ugly truth that lies behind us. This shadow is all of ours to heal. It belongs to everyone who benefits from the conveniences of this country’s modernization. We were built on a form of Christian principles. No matter how true those principles are to our current understandings of the Christian faith. We live in the wake of people who murdered in the name of Jesus. Lied and stole in the name of Jesus. Captured humans and burned books in the name of Jesus. Still drop bombs and plunder the earth in the name of Jesus. We will need all of our eyes to see the whole of this suffering. And we will need each of our hearts to generate enough nectar to fully feed and transform our collective shadow into a trusted ally. If you feel at all compelled to commit your spiritual practice, morning commute, or late-night reading to gathering tools to equip you and us to slowly healing this up here are a few small places to start. When it comes to Tonglen meditation, please seek out the guidance of a trained meditation teacher who belongs to a lineage that understands the fundamentals of meditation. It is deep work and it is important that you place yourself in good hands to utilize that particular meditation practice. These resources are things that have moved me in thinking, feeling, and praying through/about shadow work; the only one missing from the list is therapy. Please feel free to share in the comments if you know of other resources that offer empowerment to face an uncomfortable truth, and then accept it. ~ Toni Anne Reynolds Read article online here. Recommendations Books: Stand Your Ground by Kelly Brown Douglas Engaging the Powers by Walter Wink It Didn’t Start with You by Mark Wolynn Bringing Your Shadow Out of the Dark by Robert Augustus Masters Movies: Moana Us Articles: How To Feed Your Demons How to Practice Tonglen About the Author Minister Toni Anne Reynolds is committed to singing flesh onto the bones of the Christian tradition by incorporating recently found texts of the ancient world into liturgy, sermons, and poetry. Toni’s Christianity forms a holy trinity with the psychological medicine of Tibetan Buddhism and the eternal Life found in Yoruba traditions. Balanced in an eclectic faith and focused in theology, Toni’s ministry offers a unique perspective on life, theology, and spirituality. | | | | | | | | Question & Answer Q: By Philip I come from a traditional evangelical upbringing and have embraced catholicismCatholicism. However, I am also exploring the more modern Christian concepts as related by Bishop Spong and Rev. Matthew Fox. I am very attracted to those concepts and want to incorporate them into my spirituality, along with Buddhist and native American wisdom. But I still find meaning and comfort in traditional catholic practices. Living in the rust belt, I am hard pressed to find any congregation sympathetic to the newer interpretations and viewpoints of progressing spirit. I feel very alone in the congregation, but do not have much opportunity to find a place to fit in. Do you have any words of wisdom or encouragement for a seeker who doesn’t happen to live in a progressive community where such a congregation can be found? A: By Rev. Dr. Matthew Fox Dear Philip, Thank you for your question, I am moved to hear that you are continuing your search for a deeper and broader Christian experience and viewpoint than you were brought up on. Indeed, there is much in what you call “traditional catholic practices” that is rich and deserving of our attention, as well as improving on and bringing up to date. Since I was a practicing Roman Catholic for 54 years and a Dominican for 34 of those years, I know something of what I speak. One example is bringing the Mass into the 21st century with what we call the Cosmic Mass. We have celebrated over 100 of these in North America, including one at the World Parliament of Religion in Toronto last November. Bringing in the body through dance and post-modern art forms like dj, vj, rap, etc. definitely brings the Mass alive and invites us to pray with all our chakras. As far as finding communities in your neck of the woods, there is the Benedictine community of Sister Joan Chittister near Erie, PA. They know creation spirituality well and are living it. There is also the international group based in the US called Creation Spirituality Communities (CSC)—look up their web page and newsletter/blog. There may well be folks in your area who have created a community. If not, you could always start one! You can go online with the group and learn more about it. Also there is the new Order of the Sacred Earth (OSE) which has now I believe about 40 “pods” or communities around the country. They meet on line every month and come from a variety of spiritual backgrounds—you are welcome to tune in to that exchange. The book that launched the Order, written by myself and the two young co-directors, is called: Order of the Sacred Earth: An Intergenerational Vision of Love and Action. Check them out and see if there is a group in your area. In addition to adapting the Mass, I recommend adapting other traditional practices like mantras (the rosary is a mantra). Take bumper-sticker sayings from the Scriptures or the mystics and turn them in to mantras. My most recent book on Naming the Unnameable: 89 Wonderful & Useful Names for God…including the Unnameable God invites turning such names into mantras, a powerful prayer. You are wise to explore the wisdom of the indigenous peoples and of Buddhism—I treat both side by side with our own Meister Eckhart in my recent book, Meister Eckhart: A Mystic-Warrior for Our Times. There Black Elk, Thich Naht Hanh, Rabbi Heschel, Coomeraswami, Rumi and others interact with Eckhart. The wisdom of mystics across religious divides is so powerful and necessary a path to pursue today. Other great Catholic mystics worth your consideration surely include Thomas Merton, Dorothy Day, Thomas Berry, Thomas Aquinas--rarely considered as a mystic but he shines forth as one in his own words in my book Sheer Joy: Conversations on Creation Spirituality with Thomas Aquinas. Practicing contemplation such as reading the Scriptures or mystics and stopping when something strikes you deeply, and being with that moment, letting it take you into silence; or reading nature itself - going into nature and allowing it to speak to you; or centering prayer, for example as taught by Father Richard Rohr - these are also worthwhile ways to go deeper. Also don’t neglect Pope Francis’ excellent encyclical on the Environment, Laudato Si (it was actually written by a former student of mine plus my friend Leonardo Boff). ~ Matthew Fox Read and share online here About the Author Rev. Dr. Matthew Fox holds a doctorate in spirituality from the Institut Catholique de Paris and has authored 35 books on spirituality and contemporary culture that have been translated into 71 languages. Fox has devoted 45 years to developing and teaching the tradition of Creation Spirituality and in doing so has reinvented forms of education and worship. His work is inclusive of today’s science and world spiritual traditions and has awakened millions to the much neglected earth-based mystical tradition of the West. He has helped to rediscover Hildegard of Bingen, Meister Eckhart, Thomas Aquinas. Recent books include The Lotus & The Rose: Conversations on Tibetan Buddhism and Mystical Christianity with Lama Tsomo; Naming the Unnameable: 89 Wonderful and Useful Names for God…Including the God Without a Name; new paperback version of Stations of the Cosmic Christ with Bishop Marc Andrus. A Special Eckhart@Erfurt workshop in June, 2019. | | | | | | | | Please continue to send us your feedback… we are listening. We aim to give voice to many different perspectives that are relevant and inspiring along this spiritually progressing path. We are not here to tell you what to believe or how to act. We are here to support your journey, to share and learn together.Thank you for being a part of this community! | | | | | | Join our FB community today! Spread the word, share with friends. Thanks! | | | | To read learn more and read articles by our Progressing Spirit authors such as this one please visit our website and sign up for the subscription newsletter: click here for discounted rate of $3/month or $30/year. | | | | | | | | Bishop John Shelby Spong Revisited The Third Fundamental: The Substitution by Death of Jesus on the Cross Brings Salvation, Part II Essay by Bishop John Shelby Spong, June 6, 2007 Last week we began our analysis of the third fundamental that traditional Christians stated, in the Tractarian Movement in the early years of the 20th century, was basic to a proper understanding of Christianity. It focused on what Christians came to call “the doctrine of the Atonement.” In many ways it proclaims a barbaric understanding of God, yet through the centuries it has been strangely popular and is regarded by many as the center of the gospel and thus is still powerfully defended in both Catholic and Protestant circles. From the doctrine of the Atonement has flowed the familiar language of sacrifice and the liturgical fetish that concentrates on the cleansing power of the blood of Jesus. Protestants like to be washed in it to be cleansed externally. Catholics like to drink it to be cleansed internally. All of the traditional church references to Jesus as “The Lamb of God,” come out of this doctrine. As I sought to explain last week it reflects an ancient biblical definition of human life as that which was created to be perfect, to live at one with God inside the Garden of Eden, but which has now become fallen, banished from God’s presence and in need of divine rescue. Most Christian theology has traditionally been organized around these definitions, which over the centuries have been thoroughly literalized in Christian circles. Library shelves in theological centers the world over are lined with books about the saving act of atonement that took place on the cross. That theology, however, makes no sense in a post-Darwinian world that sees human origins in a dramatically different way, and so this understanding of the death of Jesus has become all but irrelevant in our day. That is why traditional Christianity seems so foreign to so many and why worship in our churches today appears not only meaningless, but sometimes even grotesque. If one begins, as the Bible seems to do, with an understanding of human life as incapable of doing anything about its fallen and evil condition, then the task of salvation must be seen in terms of God’s intervening act to rescue the fallen and to save the lost. Human beings are thus reduced to being helpless, dependent supplicants who beg for salvation. It is clear, however, that this constitutes the frame of reference that underlies most of the Bible. The Bible tells the story of God’s eternal search for a way to bring the whole created order, now corrupted by sin, back to what God intended it to be. That is why, the Bible suggests, that God gave the Torah to the people at Mount Sinai. If the people could only obey the Torah then perhaps their alienation from God could be overcome. The demands of the law, however, proved to be more than any life could achieve and so, as a means of bringing salvation, it failed. God next was said to have raised up prophets to recall the wayward to their original purpose. The people, however, did not or could not heed the prophets’ message and so drove them out of their land or killed them. Thus the prophets also failed to achieve a rescue of the fallen. Next, the Jews sought to remove the power of their alienation by acting it out liturgically and so a day was born in the liturgical life of the synagogue known as the Day of Atonement. It was also called Yom Kippur. The way this day was to be observed was described in the Book of Leviticus. In it the Jews were taught not only to identify themselves as sinful people, separated from God, but also to remember that they were created in God’s image and must yearn for restoration. Most Christians today continue to use the language of Yom Kippur, but with no understanding whatsoever of either the source or the meaning of their words. Click here to read full essay. ~ John Shelby Spong | | | | | | | | Announcements We are pleased to announce that GRATEFUL by Diana Butler Bass has won a Nautilus Book Award -- a Silver Medal in the Social Change/Social Justice category. Although most of us know that gratitude is good — and good for us — there is a gap between our desire to be grateful and our ability to behave gratefully. The implications of the gap are bigger than we realize, affecting both our personal and public lives. In Grateful, Bass weaves together social science research, spiritual wisdom, and contemporary issues as she calls for a richer understanding and practice of gratitude. What emerges are surprising insights about the power of thankful living to change how we treat one another, and how we might transform our world. | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |

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