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Re: [Dialogue] Fwd: Witness- Birthday
by Del Morrill 15 Dec '18

15 Dec '18

So great to get this sharing. Hope the lip and ribs are now okay. Enjoy the season. Del From: Dialogue <dialogue-bounces(a)lists.wedgeblade.net> On Behalf Of Jeanette Stanfield via Dialogue Sent: Friday, December 14, 2018 5:37 AM To: Colleague Dialogue <dialogue(a)lists.wedgeblade.net> Cc: Jeanette Stanfield <jstanfieldica(a)gmail.com> Subject: Re: [Dialogue] Fwd: Witness- Birthday Thank you Dick. Wow! Sent from my iPhone On Dec 13, 2018, at 10:29 PM, Richard Alton via Dialogue <dialogue(a)lists.wedgeblade.net <mailto:dialogue@lists.wedgeblade.net> > wrote: Oh My God, Life …the things that happen in life are astonishing..being driven to and fro by the mystery.. a few recent examples I attended part of the ICA USA Board meeting last month. We broke up into small groups and I was in a group with John Cock II. He and I were in Kenya together. I think it was John’s 9th grade trip. I was impressed to hear him rattle off the villages he worked in: Kwangware, Kamweleni and Mugumwoini...just like he had been there yesterday. John was a great addition. Probably, the first Board member literally born into the organization- now an urban engineer with a focus on bike trails. Had his middle school daughter with him. I wonder when she is going abroad. The afternoon I was there, the Board brainstormed ICA core values- things like community development, ToP methods, being a learning organization, even poverty, chastity and obedience. I struggled with this question of core values. I think the core of the core is the ability to give a witness.. to stand present to one’s life and the amazing things revealed or that happen to one…the mystery at work in one’s life. Like on Halloween night I was coming home late at night on my bike and ran right onto a big pile of leaves- it knocked me off my bike, split my lip and banged up my ribs. I made it home but the next day was having trouble breathing so went to the hospital. They performed a CT scan. There were no broken ribs, but the scan showed that I had spots on my lungs...so this all happened to catch my attention about my lungs... and on Halloween (the Day of the Dead). The second part of my Halloween leaf event: it seems the leaves grabbed my phone- so the day after the fall, I could not find my phone- that really hurt. I went back to all the places I had been including the leaf place but no phone. Finally, after I had given up Sally asked me, “doesn’t Apple have an app that will help you find a lost phone?” so on my computer I found the lost apple link and sure enough on the screen map there was a flashing signal. It was about a 100 yards from where I fell. So I follow the map and there is my cell on the curb like it had been waiting for me… think those leaves put it there. Is this not The Other World in the midst of this world…a Visit to the Land of Mystery? These Visits seem to come in 3s. I work on the One Earth Film Fest through which we show environmental movies all over greater Chicago and engage people in conversation and action in response to the films. So I received an email from a Dexter Watson at St Malachi/Precious Blood Parish about showing a movie. I set up a meeting with Dexter on the Westside of Chicago. It turns out Dexter is not only the parish coordinator but also the former Alderman of the area. And yes, Fifth City is in his former Aldermanic area. In fact, one of Dexter’s favorite people and a mentor was the late Verdell Trice, the head of the Fifth City Auto Center and board member of the Preschool. Dexter even tried to have a street named after Verdell at one time. This is the second time I have been driven back to 5th City. You know we are going to have a great film fest event there. Dick Alton, introduced to the mystery in December,1968 and working with the mystery on the future of planet Earth ever since. Oak Park, Illinois -- Richard H. T. Alton One Earth Film Fest ( OEFF) Green Community Connections Interfaith Green Network T: 773.344.7172 richard.alton(a)gmail.com <mailto:richard.alton@gmail.com> *Save the Date! One Earth Film Festival 2019, March 1-10 http:www.oneearthfilmfestival.org <http://www.oneearthfilmfestival.org> Make Plain the Vision, Habakkuh 2:2 -- Richard H. T. Alton One Earth Film Fest ( OEFF) Green Community Connections Interfaith Green Network T: 773.344.7172 richard.alton(a)gmail.com <mailto:richard.alton@gmail.com> *Save the Date! One Earth Film Festival 2019, March 1-10 http:www.oneearthfilmfestival.org <http://www.oneearthfilmfestival.org> Make Plain the Vision, Habakkuh 2:2 _______________________________________________ Dialogue mailing list Dialogue(a)lists.wedgeblade.net <mailto:Dialogue@lists.wedgeblade.net> http://lists.wedgeblade.net/listinfo.cgi/dialogue-wedgeblade.net

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Man on fire is on PBS here in Arizona next week
by James Wiegel 15 Dec '18

15 Dec '18

https://www.pbs.org/video/man-fire-trailer-uvtw81/ Jim Wiegel 401 North Beverly Way, Tolleson, Arizona 85353 Tel. 011-623-936-8671 or 011-623-363-3277 jfwiegel(a)yahoo.com www.partnersinparticipation.com When a great ship is in harbor and moored, it is safe, there can be no doubt. "But that is not what great ships are built for." Clarissa Pinkola Estes

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Re: [Dialogue] [Oe List ...] Interesting article -- especially for Social Process collection -- common religion triangle and Inner life/other world and all
by Randy Williams 15 Dec '18

15 Dec '18

Every person and culture has a story of reality that informs our active living in the world, whether or not it’s been “canonized” and/or “institutionalized.” For me the Christian story is neutered when it becomes a story of how to save oneself from an evil world rather than why and how to serve a suffering world. Maybe that perversion has contributed greatly to the demise of what Douthat calls the “Protestant establishment.” I like the thought that I first encountered in Harvey Cox’s book The Future of Faith, that faith is less about what you believe or how you worship and more about how and on behalf of what you live your life. If this is what Douthat means by “a social gospel denuded of theological content” then I am guilty as charged. Randy > On Dec 13, 2018, at 5:49 PM, James Wiegel via OE <oe(a)lists.wedgeblade.net> wrote: > > The Return of Paganism: Maybe there actually is a genuinely post-Christian future for America. > By Ross Douthat Opinion Columnist Dec. 12, 2018 > > Here are some generally agreed-upon facts about religious trends in the United States. Institutional Christianity has weakened drastically since the 1960s. Lots of people who once would have been lukewarm Christmas-and-Easter churchgoers now identify as having “no religion” or being “spiritual but not religious.” The mainline-Protestant establishment is an establishment no more. Religious belief and practice now polarizes our politics in a way they didn’t a few generations back. > > What kind of general religious reality should be discerned from all these facts, though, is much more uncertain, and there are various plausible stories about what early-21st century Americans increasingly believe. The simplest of these is the secularization story — in which modern societies inevitably put away religious ideas as they advance in wealth and science and reason, and the decline of institutional religion is just a predictable feature of a general late-modern turn away from supernatural belief. > > But the secularization narrative is insufficient, because even with America’s churches in decline, the religious impulse has hardly disappeared. In the early 2000s, over 40 percent of Americans answered with an emphatic “yes” when Gallup asked them if “a profound religious experience or awakening” had redirected their lives; that number had doubled since the 1960s, when institutional religion was more vigorous. A recent Pew survey on secularization likewise found increases in the share of Americans who have regular feelings of “spiritual peace and well-being.” And the resilience of religious impulses and rhetoric in contemporary political movements, even (or especially) on the officially secular left, is an obvious feature of our politics. > > So perhaps instead of secularization it makes sense to talk about the fragmentation and personalization of Christianity — to describe America as a nation of Christian heretics, if you will, in which traditional churches have been supplanted by self-help gurus and spiritual-political entrepreneurs. These figures cobble together pieces of the old orthodoxies, take out the inconvenient bits and pitch them to mass audiences that want part of the old-time religion but nothing too unsettling or challenging or ascetic. The result is a nation where Protestant awakenings have given way to post-Protestant wokeness, where Reinhold Niebuhr and Fulton Sheen have ceded pulpits to Joel Osteen and Oprah Winfrey, where the prosperity gospel and Christian nationalism rule the right and a social gospel denuded of theological content rules the left. > > I wrote a whole book on this theme, but in the years since it came out I’ve wondered if it, too, was incomplete. There has to come a point at which a heresy becomes simply post-Christian, a moment when you should just believe people who claim they have left the biblical world-picture behind, a context where the new spiritualities add up to a new religion. > > Which is why lately I’ve become interested in books and arguments that suggest that there actually is, or might be, a genuinely post-Christian future for America — and that the term “paganism” might be reasonably revived to describe the new American religion, currently struggling to be born. > > A fascinating version of this argument is put forward by Steven D. Smith, a law professor at the University of San Diego, in his new book, “Pagans and Christians in the City: Culture Wars From the Tiber to the Potomac.” Smith argues that much of what we understand as the march of secularism is something of an illusion, and that behind the scenes what’s actually happening in the modern culture war is the return of a pagan religious conception, which was half-buried (though never fully so) by the rise of Christianity. > > What is that conception? Simply this: that divinity is fundamentally inside the world rather than outside it, that God or the gods or Being are ultimately part of nature rather than an external creator, and that meaning and morality and metaphysical experience are to be sought in a fuller communion with the immanent world rather than a leap toward the transcendent. > > This paganism is not materialist or atheistic; it allows for belief in spiritual and supernatural realities. It even accepts the possibility of an afterlife. But it is deliberately agnostic about final things, what awaits beyond the shores of this world, and it is skeptical of the idea that there exists some ascetic, world-denying moral standard to which we should aspire. Instead, it sees the purpose of religion and spirituality as more therapeutic, a means of seeking harmony with nature and happiness in the everyday — while unlike atheism, it insists that this everyday is divinely endowed and shaped, meaningful and not random, a place where we can truly hope to be at home. > > In popular religious practice there isn’t always a clean line between this “immanent” religion and the transcendent alternative offered by Christianity and Judaism. But clearly religious cultures can tend toward one option or the other, and you can build a plausible case for a “pagan” (by Smith’s definition) tradition in Western and American religion, which in his account takes two major forms. > > First, there is a tradition of intellectual and aesthetic pantheism that includes figures like Spinoza, Nietzsche, Emerson and Whitman, and that’s manifest in certain highbrow spiritual-but-not-religious writers today. Smith recruits Sam Harris, Barbara Ehrenreich and even Ronald Dworkin to this club; he notes that we even have an explicit framing of this tradition as paganism, in the former Yale Law School dean Anthony Kronman’s rich 2016 work “Confessions of a Born-Again Pagan.” > > Second, there is a civic religion that like the civic paganism of old makes religious and political duties identical, and treats the city of man as the city of God (or the gods), the place where we make heaven ourselves instead of waiting for the next life or the apocalypse. This immanent civic religion, Smith argues, is gradually replacing the more biblical form of civil religion that stamped American history down to the Protestant-Catholic-Jew 1950s. Whether in the social-justice theology of contemporary progressive politics or the trans-humanist projects of Silicon Valley, we are watching attempts to revive a religion of this-world, a new-model paganism, to “reclaim the city that Christianity wrested away from it centuries ago.” > > These descriptions are debatable, but suppose Smith is right. Is the combination of intellectual pantheism and a this-world-focused civil religion enough to declare the rebirth of paganism as a faith unto itself, rather than just a cultural tendency within a still-Christian order? > > It seems to me that the answer is not quite, because this new religion would lack a clear cultic aspect, a set of popular devotions, a practice of ritual and prayer of the kind that the paganism of antiquity offered in abundance. And that absence points to the essential weakness of a purely intellectualized pantheism: It invites its adherents to commune with a universe that offers suffering and misery in abundance, which means that it has a strong appeal to the privileged but a much weaker appeal to people who need not only sense of wonder from their spiritual lives but also, well, help. > > However, there are forms of modern paganism that do promise this help, that do offer ritual and observance, augury and prayer, that do promise that in some form gods or spirits really might exist and might offer succor or help if appropriately invoked. I have in mind the countless New Age practices that promise health and well-being and good fortune, the psychics and mediums who promise communication with the spirit world, and also the world of explicit neo-paganism, Wiccan and otherwise. Its adherents may not all be equally convinced of the realities that they’re trying to appeal to and manipulate (I don’t know how many of the witches who publicly hexed Brett Kavanaugh really expected it to work), but their numbers are growing rapidly; there may soon be more witches in the United States than members of the United Church of Christ. > > What ancient paganism did successfully was to unite this kind of popular supernaturalism with its own forms of highbrow pantheism and civil-religiosity. Thus the elites of ancient Rome might reject the myths about their pantheon of deities as just crude stories, but they would join enthusiastically in public rituals that assumed that gods or spirits could be appealed to, propitiated, honored, worshiped. > > To get a fully revived paganism in contemporary America, that’s what would have to happen again — the philosophers of pantheism and civil religion would need to build a religious bridge to the New Agers and neo-pagans, and together they would need to create a more fully realized cult of the immanent divine, an actual way to worship, not just to appreciate, the pantheistic order they discern. > > It seems like we’re some distance from that happening — from the intellectuals whom Smith describes as pagan actually donning druidic robes, or from Jeff Bezos playing pontifex maximus for a post-Christian civic cult. The 1970s, when a D.C. establishment figure like Sally Quinn was hexing her enemies, were a high-water mark for those kinds of experiments among elites. Now, occasional experiments in woke witchcraft and astrology notwithstanding, there’s a more elite embarrassment about the popular side of post-Christian spirituality. > > That embarrassment may not last forever; perhaps a prophet of a new harmonized paganism is waiting in the wings. Until then, those of us who still believe in a divine that made the universe rather than just pervading it — and who have a certain fear of what more immanent spirits have to offer us — should be able to recognize the outlines of a possible successor to our world-picture, while taking comfort that it is not yet fully formed. > > Ross Douthat has been an Opinion columnist for The Times since 2009. He is the author of several books, most recently, “To Change the Church: Pope Francis and the Future of Catholicism.” > > > > > > > COMMENT OF THE MOMENT > jim kunstler commented December 12: Saratoga Springs, NY > > Andrew Sullivan got it right in NY Magazine this week when he noted that Wokesterism is the replacement du jour for Christianity. It has its sacred characters (identity groups) and a notion of original sin (white privilege), and requires sinners to apologize abjectly... but is absolutely unforgiving. That’s how crazy we have become. > > Comments 1280 > > LES commented December 12 As Epictetus, the grand old man of Greco-Roman philosophy pointed out two thousand years ago it is one thing to talk about philosophy/region and it is another thing to live the teaching and seek truth. > > Middleman Eagle WI USADec. 12 One of the principle drivers of a post-Christian future is people's need to experience their sexuality without the horrible schism imposed on it by the Christian religion. I once visited an exhibit of sexuality in art in Hamburg, Germany and what struck me the most about it was the sad evidence of how Christianity had literally driven a line through the center of the body, and above the navel was 'for God,' and below, the devil. People who chose their sexuality over church-sanctioned piety literally danced with the devil. Such demonization continues today, in subtler, but still life-destroying forms. This and Christianity's own hypocrisies about sexual behavior within their institutions have left many of us to walk away from the faith of our upbringing to find compassion and spirituality in other ways and other communities and fellowships. > > North Carolina commented December 12 The country is moving away from organized Christianity because people are disillusioned, defeated, and dismayed by the total corruption of our religious leaders whether from the Catholic Church or the Protestant churches, see the Fort Worth Star Telegram's investigation into sexual misconduct at nearly 1,000 churches and organizations affiliated with the independent fundamental Baptist movement across 40 states and Canada, in which 168 church leaders have been “accused or convicted of committing sexual crimes against children.” You simply can't be a part of organized religion without encountering human corruption on a massive scale. And it is this corruption, this hypocrisy that ultimately drives people from churches and organized religion. That is not going to change. Instead, people are going to find other places to connect to the universe, their planet, their family and friends, and themselves to the greater and find God or Goddess out there away from men who are completely corrupt. > > Kjensen commented December 12Burley Idaho Another pathetic attempt by Mr. Douthat to lament the decline of organized religion. For me it can't come fast enough. As for the resurgence of so-called paganism, with its new ageism, self-help gurus, revival of ancient religions, it's really the same old thing that is embodied in the popes, prophets, and the priests that Mr. Douthat wishes were still absolutely preeminent in our society. Yes, in my opinion, these new age religious movements are the same old charlatans just cut from a different bolt of cloth. > > Ron commented December 12 FloridaDec. 12 Douthat uses the term “paganism” to describe various New Age and Wicca movements, but he says almost nothing about the paganism of the Religious Right. Was Nazism, with its symbolism, mass gatherings, and return to a “greater” Teutonic past, pagan? Undoubtedly. And why was it essentially pagan and anti-Christian? Because it exalted the nation state and its leader above all moral considerations. Does that sound familiar? Do we see that today? Donald Trump and his millions of faux Christian, evangelical followers are the real pagans of our time. (Note that Trump even refused—or was unable—to recite the Apostles' Creed at G. H. W. Bush’s funeral.) > > doughboy commented December 12 Wilkes-Barre, PA Douthat’s continued use of pagan hides the origin of that term. When Christianity received the official backing of the Roman emperors, it turned on all other religions. Their attacks on Roman, Greek, Egyptian, etc religion introduced the term pagan to undercut these practices. Catherine Nixey’s The Darkening Age and Charles Freeman’s The Closing of the Western Mind details the harm that this zealotry did. The murder and dismemberment of Hypatia in Alexandria in 415 and the closing of Athens’ Academy in 532 are but two illustrations. The Italian physicist Carlo Rovelli wrote, “The anti-intellectual violence of the Christianized Roman Empire managed to suffocate almost every development of rational thought for many centuries.” This trend did not end in the early centuries. The execution of Giordano Bruno in 1600 and the Inquisition continued the suppression. Blaise Pascal wrote, “Men never do evil so completely and cheerfully as when they do it from religious conviction.” This animus remains today whenever atheists protest religious symbols on public land. How many members of Congress are declared atheists? “Pagans” are neither ignorant nor stupid. Symmachus, in the face of the Christian onslaught, challenged the new faith when he said, “We see the same stars, the sky is shared by all, the same world surrounds us. What does it matter what wisdom a person uses to seek for the truth?” > > Kaye commented December 12 Connecticut I grew up second-gen in a Neopagan religion. Like most second-gen individuals in new religious movements, I tend to be more conservative (religiously, not politically) than people who are converts because I was raised in an environment where there were correct and incorrect ways of doing worship. This article assumes that "paganism" is a mercurial thing that is just "not Christianity." The term paganism is still sometimes used as a religious slur in opinion pieces describing a person's lack of morality, and the term is adapted to fit ideas ranging from atheistic pan(en)theism to the New Age movement. I rarely ever use the term — I call myself a polytheist. While like a Roman elite I don't believe in the literal truth of myths, I believe in gods. Almost all of my worship is conducted in the home. Another correction: "explicit neo-paganism" offers help and sense-making practices. Wicca has a moral code based on non-harming. Polytheist revivalist religions like Hellenism, Asatru, Religio Romana, and Kemetism draw from the wealth of philosophical and moral writings in antiquity to offer grounding and solutions to devotees regardless of the issues they are confronting in their lives. We have a resurgence of people in both Pagan Studies (ex: Chas Clifton) and philosophy (ex: Edward P. Butler, who does polytheologies and engages in dialogue with ancient writers like Proclus and Iamblichus). Neopagan movements are not bereft of 201- and 301-level sense-making practices at all. > > dogma vat commented December 12 Washington, DCDec. 12 Interesting commentary, but a bit over my head. However, I'll say this- modern life is making us weak, lonely people. Too many choices, too much freedom and opportunity, along with the eradication of our Judeo-Christian identity has decimated families and enabled our culture to be filled by grunting, flatulent creatures like our current president on the right and woke religious zealots on the left. These folks are turning the established order of decency upside down and turning this country into the idiocracy many have feared. We need religion because the alternative seems to be Donald Trump or wokeness or something else that is totally incoherent. > > Walter L. Maroney commented December 12 Manchester NH A couple of fundamental misunderstandings here, Ross. First, we are not supposed to be a Christian Nation. Our founders conceived of our polity as determinedly secular. It was not until the Great Awakenings of the early to mid 1800s that Christianity assumed the character of a shibboleth in our public discourse. And the "Under God" and "In God We Trust" memes are Twentieth Century inventions, which have only been part of our national fabric for about 70 of our nearly 250 year history. Second, for all your talk of heresy, you miss the obvious fact that American Evangelical Protestantism, with its Prosperity Gospel doctrine and its perverse twisting of the doctrine of election into an us vs. them political/social context (we are the elect on Earth, all others are hellbound) is itself the foremost Christian heresy of our time. > > Jocelyn commented December 12 Vista, CA There are many troubling aspects to this essay, but perhaps the most troubling is the author’s assertion that what paganism (and this term, as applied to the wide range of practices and beliefs referred to here, is not unproblematic) may appeal to the wealthy and well-off, but what those who are impoverised and suffering need is help. I was nodding along until it became clear that what he meant by “help” is belief in divine intervention and/or an afterlife. This completely misses the point that an understanding of the world as infused with divinity calls - in fact, obligates - us to take better care of it and one another. Christianity has not historically done a good job of this, and has, unfortunately, used promises of heaven and threats of hell to keep people from seeking a more harmonious relationship with one another and the planet as a whole in this lifetime. To judge what he calls paganism through the lens of Christianity both misses the point, and attempts to colonize the term and practices associated with it, turning them into just another Christian sect. > > Emma commented December 12 Indiana There is this interesting notion at the end of the article -- that there is comfort that the "old way" dictated by the Bible and its interpretation have not been eclipsed by paganism. I find the opposite comforting. The old way, which served a specific societal master and has been used in every era as a cudgel against racial, religious (ironically), and sexual minorities, was not wholly positive. It should be comforting that the essence of spirituality in the global north is being reworked in a more equitable fashion. You will probably find that today's spiritual adherents are unwittingly closer to the teachings of Jesus than the religious zealots that claim to be so godly in their actions. > > LJ commented December 12 MA Overlooked in your essay is the individualizing of spiritual practices—so Christians, Jews, Buddhists, Hindus may attend a meditation or “satsang” group together, for example. Or non-Jews adopt Kabbalah traditions, etc. People are cobbling together practices from various religions and activities to express and develop their spiritual sides (even Non-believers can appreciate a walk on the beach....) The commonality all the “great” religions share is that the foundation is Love, and that all we are here to “get,” whether Christian, Atheist, Agnostic, Muslim, Humanist, Capitalist, Marxist, etc., is to love one another. That is the sum total of the Game of Life. > > jim kunstler commented December 12 Saratoga Springs, NY Andrew Sullivan got it right in NY Magazine this week when he noted that Wokesterism is the replacement du jour for Christianity. It has its sacred characters (identity groups) and a notion of original sin (white privilege), and requires sinners to apologize abjectly... but is absolutely unforgiving. That’s how crazy we have become. > > Androculus commented December 12 Far Left Don't worry, Ross, Catholicism and paganism can exist side by side, as they have for centuries in New Orleans. Good Catholics here, without conflict or contradiction, can also practice Voodoo, because the two religions compliment each other. In fact, they are so interrelated that the saints of one (Virgin Mary, St. Patrick ) are seen as the gods and goddesses of the other (Maitress Erzuli, Dambala Wedo). Just let people be, Ross; they can figure out what makes them happy or gives them comfort. > > Joseph Huben commented December 12 Upstate NY Pagan? Witches? Neither existed as concepts before Christianity and the “demonization” of all beliefs or ways of life that was not “Christian” as defined by “Christians”. Is Douthat condemning or demonizing or belittling all non-Christians? Are all Hindus or Buddhists or Taoists pagans? They all pre-dated Christianity and were designated pagan by early “Church Fathers”. “modern societies inevitably put away religious ideas as they advance in wealth and science and reason, and the decline of institutional religion is just a predictable feature of a general late-modern turn away from supernatural belief.” Supernatural belief is protected by the First Amendment. So is “putting away religious ideas” in favor of science and reason. Could the clinging to “religious ideas” be the real problem? In the world today we all recognize that religious fervor is the source of global terror. And where denial of science and reason are incited to prevent remedies to global warming, poverty, hunger and disease they have the “unintended” consequences we live with? Marx said religion is the opiate of the people. He was wrong. Religion is the enemy of reason and science and the exploited wedge that justifies savage cruelty. > > Dave commented December 12 Boston As a scholar of Religious Studies, I’m sorry to report that it’s my opinion that Mr. Douthat’s propositions are rather uninformed. He is captivated by a picture of religions as a set of discrete beliefs about the nature of the divine or supernatural. This way of thinking about religion is a product of 19th century taxonomies, a mode that still has a lot of popular pull today but that is generally discredited in scholarship. More troublingly, he seems to think that it makes sense to speak about what “we Americans” believe, relying upon an uncritical assessment of vaguely worded polls. The United States is and always has been composed of an incredible diversity of beliefs, making such generalizations about allegedly epochal shifts extremely difficult to make with any accuracy. More often than not, these kind of generalizations reflect the preoccupations of the one making them, rather than anything about the actual state of affairs. > > David Patin commented December 12 Bloomington, IN To the list of religious trends in the United States in Douthat’s first paragraph I would have added a political party that teams up with a religious denomination to force the tenets of that faith on everyone else. Yet it isn’t just forcing the tenets of their faith on everyone else, it’s also declaring that anyone who doesn’t agree with their dogma is somehow less American than they are. And from some of the more extreme members of this Republican/Religious Party, those who don’t believe just like them are bringing about the decline of the United States. That this forcing of faith on others might possibly be contributing to the secularization of the United States somehow Ross Douthat can’t imagine. > > esp commented December 12 ILL Confusing. Does one have to choose between "religion" or paganism? Can't one just "be". Be spiritual, yet not have a tag, like "religious" or pagan? Can't people exist spiritually without reading "self-help" books, or reading a religious text like the Bible or worshiping nature. Or perhaps people could find some things helpful in "self-help" books, a religious text, and/or a walk in nature. Wisdom can be found in all of these without having to be "religious" or "pagan"? Do we need to worship something? > > Ellen commented December 12 Williamburg One of the benefits of paganism is that most forms of it are nature and earth centered in belief. In a time of climate change provoked by neglect and abuse of our shared environment, we could use more religion that offers respect for Mother Earth and the natural processes that have allowed living forms to largely thrive until our time. > > candideinnc commented December 12 spring hope, n.c. I chuckled at the characterization of the burgeoning secularists in America as being the gullible victims of "self-help gurus and spiritual-political entrepreneurs." Oh my goodness, no, Mr. Douthat! We do not need shamans and priests to encourage us to be skeptics. We are actually capable of rational thought, all under our own power. We are not little children who are indoctrinated with the superstition that if we are good little boys and girls, we will go up in the sky back in the arms of Mommy and Daddy, all under the benevolent supervision of the great, long bearded patriarch sky daddy. We are fully capable of distinguishing between fables and reality under our own power. > > PJ commented December 12 Salt Lake City Thank you Mr. Douthat for another challenging and interesting read. I too think about the decline of Christianity in the United States, but have not come across a lot of anecdotal evidence suggesting the rise of paganism. No doubt you are better versed in theological studies than I am, but I would bet I interact with far more individuals than you do as I work as an ER clinical social worker. I rarely meet individuals who claim to be Pagan, though I have met 1 or 2 Wiccans over the course of many years. I meet many individuals who express spirituality and also disdain for organized religion of any sort. The fact that they search for God in nature, the universe, and not inside a church, does not mean they are Pagan - which would be traditionally defined as believing in many Gods. I rarely meet individuals who believe in many Gods... The more likely hypothesis, I believe, is that people are being pushed out of Protestant, Mormon, Catholic, and other Christian churches because those religions continue to line up more with the political right, their values and prejudices, than the values and teachings of Jesus Christ. I long for the fellowship of religion, the ceremonies and rituals, but I will not pay tithes to any church that excludes people because of their identity, and is loyal to the political right. A kind man once told me: "if there were a true church of Christ in our midst, there wouldn't be people dying in our streets from the cold". There are... > > reaylward commented December 12 st simons island, ga Douthat misidentifies what's happening to religious, in particular Christian, institutions: it isn't a rise in secularization but sectarianism, the sectarianism practiced by the growing movement of independent evangelical churches. One is either a member and believer, or one isn't really a Christian. These churches are usually led by a highly charismatic minister, a cultish figure who determines the beliefs and practices to be followed and who has unquestioned authority, both as the result of his or her charisma and the absence of any hierarchy above him or her to which to answer. The only authority above the minister is God, and the minister is the mediator between the minister and his followers. These are by far the fastest growing Christian churches, and their increasing numbers come at the expense of mainline protestant churches (Methodist, Presbyterian, etc.). It's not a big leap from such cultish churches to a political cult, which helps explain Trump's overwhelming popularity and support among the members. > > Didier commented December 12 Charleston, WV Perform this experiment. Over the next few months, visit several mainline Protestant churches where you live. Don't worry; they will welcome you. But, what you will generally see are older congregations, empty pews, and large structures in need of repair. The membership of mainline Protestant churches and particularly regular church attendance is cratering. I read an article recently that said, demographically, there are only about 23 Easters left for mainline Protestant churches. But, as I've sat in many of those churches for the last few years and looked around, and heard the few left decrying their decline, something has occurred to me. What if this isn't what God wants? What if hierarchical organizations and large buildings were a mistake? Something that satisfied human aspirations, but not spiritual ones. There will always be those, like me, whose lives are, in part, a search for the divine, but it is time to look and listen and reevaluate what it means to be a searcher. I will still go to church because it is there I find something -- even if it is one I have never attended before -- that I cannot personally find elsewhere. But, I do not begrudge those who choose a different path. I celebrate the journey, the search for the divine. > > Norwester commented December 12 Seattle Douthat suggests that Judeo-Christian religions offer "help" where paganism does not, in a "universe that offers suffering and misery in abundance." Christianity may offer opium to sufferers, but it does nothing to allay suffering and misery in any permanent way. No religion does. As Harris says, only when we recognize that there is no supernatural solution and we humans are accountable for solving our own problems will we actually band together and solve them. In the mean time, we'll throw bones at the poor, fight over magic books, fail in stewardship of our planet and waste time, money and resources on superstition, incense and prayer, none of which have any real benefit whatsoever. > > Paul commented December 12 Richmond VA Call me a pagan, but the idea of a divine that pervades the universe strikes me as much more meaningful and profound than the notion that this is all the result of the snap some celestial magician’s fingers. If we don’t seek the divine within us and all things, we’ll never find the divine without. Relying on an external divinity, though, leads inevitably to the widespread practice of what Niebuhr called “bad religion” — religion that reserves the ultimate sanction for itself. That road starts with the Crusades and leads remorselessly to 9/11. > > > > Jim Wiegel > “That which consumes me is not man, nor the earth, nor the heavens, but the flame which consumes man, earth, and sky." Nikos Kazantzakis > > 401 North Beverly Way,Tolleson, Arizona 85353 > 623-363-3277 > jfwiegel(a)yahoo.com > www.partnersinparticipation.com > _______________________________________________ > OE mailing list > OE(a)lists.wedgeblade.net > http://lists.wedgeblade.net/listinfo.cgi/oe-wedgeblade.net

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Re: [Dialogue] Fwd: Witness- Birthday
by Richard Alton 14 Dec '18

14 Dec '18

Wow, gravesweeping is something I will look into Thanks, Dick Sent from my iPhone > On Dec 14, 2018, at 8:06 AM, mary hampton via Dialogue <dialogue(a)lists.wedgeblade.net> wrote: > > Thank you Dick and Jack. A great way to start my day. Yesterday Stuart and I spent the day driving to and from Abilene and Albany with my mom for what the Chinese call gravesweeping. To put new remembrances on family graves. > > Care as deep value speaks to me. > > mary > > Sent from Mail for Windows 10 > > From: Jack Gilles via Dialogue > Sent: Thursday, December 13, 2018 11:13 PM > To: Dialogue Listserve > Cc: Jack Gilles > Subject: Re: [Dialogue] Fwd: Witness- Birthday > > Dick, superb witness! > > A little reflection on your context on the struggle with an organizations core values. An organization is not a conscious entity. It is a creative collection of people about something. Its value system is about how it goes about doing that task. So its value system is clearly contextual. It may value speed, or innovation, or quality, or design, or flexibility, simplicity, etc. It is what enables them to do what they do exceptionally well. Organizations should have a limited number so that those values enable the collective capacity and all can easily speak about the corporate culture. I refer to these values by having a small ‘v’. > > Individuals also have small ‘v’ values. They usually govern our behavior and tend to be related to our priorities in life. Most people put high value on their family, health, career, job, and how they are seen as human beings. But they may or not be Universal Values. Let me illustrate with my own life. For many years I saw myself as having a value of care. I tried to be such a person in situations that confronted me. Life became a budgeting task as there were many things I cared about. I felt my budget was pretty well balanced, but there were occasions where I had to make adjustments, mainly regarding family. > > I thought I had care, but then Life hit me hard, and I discovered that I didn’t have care, Care has me. Care (C) is Universal Value, it is just the way Life is. And when Care has you, it will take you where you do not want to go. I believe there are five Universal Values; Care (we often call that Love), Mercy, Justice, Compassion and Truth. The trouble comes when we try and define what these mean. They are just words, and words are the vehicle of the left brain rational knowing. But Universal Values are the domain of the right brain, and that brain is mute. It “knows” and communicates in a different way. It is the domain of our relationship to the Mystery, TWLI, or G-O-D. Therefore we can never be sure our response will be “right”, for we are not GOD, we are the instrument of the Mystery. And it is our requirement therefore to act, take responsibility and then render the deed to history. > > We grow in our understanding of these things, that is what the Journey is all about. We grow in our ability to understand what it means to be a child of the Mystery and a servant of the Mystery. And sometimes it takes a fall on a bike to remind us the Truth of that fact. > > Peace brother! > > Jack > > > > > > > On Dec 13, 2018, at 21:29, Richard Alton via Dialogue <dialogue(a)lists.wedgeblade.net> wrote: > > > Oh My God, Life > …the things that happen in life are astonishing..being driven to and fro by the mystery.. a few recent examples > > I attended part of the ICA USA Board meeting last month. We broke up into small groups and I was in a group with John Cock II. He and I were in Kenya together. I think it was John’s 9th grade trip. I was impressed to hear him rattle off the villages he worked in: Kwangware, Kamweleni and Mugumwoini...just like he had been there yesterday. John was a great addition. Probably, the first Board member literally born into the organization- now an urban engineer with a focus on bike trails. Had his middle school daughter with him. I wonder when she is going abroad. > > The afternoon I was there, the Board brainstormed ICA core values- things like community development, ToP methods, being a learning organization, even poverty, chastity and obedience. I struggled with this question of core values. I think the core of the core is the ability to give a witness.. to stand present to one’s life and the amazing things revealed or that happen to one…the mystery at work in one’s life. > > Like on Halloween night I was coming home late at night on my bike and ran right onto a big pile of leaves- it knocked me off my bike, split my lip and banged up my ribs. I made it home but the next day was having trouble breathing so went to the hospital. They performed a CT scan. There were no broken ribs, but the scan showed that I had spots on my lungs...so this all happened to catch my attention about my lungs... and on Halloween (the Day of the Dead). > > The second part of my Halloween leaf event: it seems the leaves grabbed my phone- so the day after the fall, I could not find my phone- that really hurt. I went back to all the places I had been including the leaf place but no phone. Finally, after I had given up Sally asked me, “doesn’t Apple have an app that will help you find a lost phone?” so on my computer I found the lost apple link and sure enough on the screen map there was a flashing signal. It was about a 100 yards from where I fell. So I follow the map and there is my cell on the curb like it had been waiting for me… think those leaves put it there. Is this not The Other World in the midst of this world…a Visit to the Land of Mystery? > > These Visits seem to come in 3s. I work on the One Earth Film Fest through which we show environmental movies all over greater Chicago and engage people in conversation and action in response to the films. So I received an email from a Dexter Watson at St Malachi/Precious Blood Parish about showing a movie. I set up a meeting with Dexter on the Westside of Chicago. It turns out Dexter is not only the parish coordinator but also the former Alderman of the area. And yes, Fifth City is in his former Aldermanic area. In fact, one of Dexter’s favorite people and a mentor was the late Verdell Trice, the head of the Fifth City Auto Center and board member of the Preschool. Dexter even tried to have a street named after Verdell at one time. This is the second time I have been driven back to 5th City. You know we are going to have a great film fest event there. > > Dick Alton, introduced to the mystery in December,1968 and working with the mystery on the future of planet Earth ever since. Oak Park, Illinois > > > _______________________________________________ > Dialogue mailing list > Dialogue(a)lists.wedgeblade.net > http://lists.wedgeblade.net/listinfo.cgi/dialogue-wedgeblade.net

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Re: [Dialogue] Fwd: Witness- Birthday
by Marianna Bailey 14 Dec '18

14 Dec '18

Thank you, Dick. A beautiful witness to life. By the way, Happy Birthday! Marianna Bailey Sent from my iPad > On Dec 14, 2018, at 9:06 AM, mary hampton via Dialogue <dialogue(a)lists.wedgeblade.net> wrote: > > Thank you Dick and Jack. A great way to start my day. Yesterday Stuart and I spent the day driving to and from Abilene and Albany with my mom for what the Chinese call gravesweeping. To put new remembrances on family graves. > > Care as deep value speaks to me. > > mary > > Sent from Mail for Windows 10 > > From: Jack Gilles via Dialogue > Sent: Thursday, December 13, 2018 11:13 PM > To: Dialogue Listserve > Cc: Jack Gilles > Subject: Re: [Dialogue] Fwd: Witness- Birthday > > Dick, superb witness! > > A little reflection on your context on the struggle with an organizations core values. An organization is not a conscious entity. It is a creative collection of people about something. Its value system is about how it goes about doing that task. So its value system is clearly contextual. It may value speed, or innovation, or quality, or design, or flexibility, simplicity, etc. It is what enables them to do what they do exceptionally well. Organizations should have a limited number so that those values enable the collective capacity and all can easily speak about the corporate culture. I refer to these values by having a small ‘v’. > > Individuals also have small ‘v’ values. They usually govern our behavior and tend to be related to our priorities in life. Most people put high value on their family, health, career, job, and how they are seen as human beings. But they may or not be Universal Values. Let me illustrate with my own life. For many years I saw myself as having a value of care. I tried to be such a person in situations that confronted me. Life became a budgeting task as there were many things I cared about. I felt my budget was pretty well balanced, but there were occasions where I had to make adjustments, mainly regarding family. > > I thought I had care, but then Life hit me hard, and I discovered that I didn’t have care, Care has me. Care (C) is Universal Value, it is just the way Life is. And when Care has you, it will take you where you do not want to go. I believe there are five Universal Values; Care (we often call that Love), Mercy, Justice, Compassion and Truth. The trouble comes when we try and define what these mean. They are just words, and words are the vehicle of the left brain rational knowing. But Universal Values are the domain of the right brain, and that brain is mute. It “knows” and communicates in a different way. It is the domain of our relationship to the Mystery, TWLI, or G-O-D. Therefore we can never be sure our response will be “right”, for we are not GOD, we are the instrument of the Mystery. And it is our requirement therefore to act, take responsibility and then render the deed to history. > > We grow in our understanding of these things, that is what the Journey is all about. We grow in our ability to understand what it means to be a child of the Mystery and a servant of the Mystery. And sometimes it takes a fall on a bike to remind us the Truth of that fact. > > Peace brother! > > Jack > > > > > > > On Dec 13, 2018, at 21:29, Richard Alton via Dialogue <dialogue(a)lists.wedgeblade.net> wrote: > > > Oh My God, Life > …the things that happen in life are astonishing..being driven to and fro by the mystery.. a few recent examples > > I attended part of the ICA USA Board meeting last month. We broke up into small groups and I was in a group with John Cock II. He and I were in Kenya together. I think it was John’s 9th grade trip. I was impressed to hear him rattle off the villages he worked in: Kwangware, Kamweleni and Mugumwoini...just like he had been there yesterday. John was a great addition. Probably, the first Board member literally born into the organization- now an urban engineer with a focus on bike trails. Had his middle school daughter with him. I wonder when she is going abroad. > > The afternoon I was there, the Board brainstormed ICA core values- things like community development, ToP methods, being a learning organization, even poverty, chastity and obedience. I struggled with this question of core values. I think the core of the core is the ability to give a witness.. to stand present to one’s life and the amazing things revealed or that happen to one…the mystery at work in one’s life. > > Like on Halloween night I was coming home late at night on my bike and ran right onto a big pile of leaves- it knocked me off my bike, split my lip and banged up my ribs. I made it home but the next day was having trouble breathing so went to the hospital. They performed a CT scan. There were no broken ribs, but the scan showed that I had spots on my lungs...so this all happened to catch my attention about my lungs... and on Halloween (the Day of the Dead). > > The second part of my Halloween leaf event: it seems the leaves grabbed my phone- so the day after the fall, I could not find my phone- that really hurt. I went back to all the places I had been including the leaf place but no phone. Finally, after I had given up Sally asked me, “doesn’t Apple have an app that will help you find a lost phone?” so on my computer I found the lost apple link and sure enough on the screen map there was a flashing signal. It was about a 100 yards from where I fell. So I follow the map and there is my cell on the curb like it had been waiting for me… think those leaves put it there. Is this not The Other World in the midst of this world…a Visit to the Land of Mystery? > > These Visits seem to come in 3s. I work on the One Earth Film Fest through which we show environmental movies all over greater Chicago and engage people in conversation and action in response to the films. So I received an email from a Dexter Watson at St Malachi/Precious Blood Parish about showing a movie. I set up a meeting with Dexter on the Westside of Chicago. It turns out Dexter is not only the parish coordinator but also the former Alderman of the area. And yes, Fifth City is in his former Aldermanic area. In fact, one of Dexter’s favorite people and a mentor was the late Verdell Trice, the head of the Fifth City Auto Center and board member of the Preschool. Dexter even tried to have a street named after Verdell at one time. This is the second time I have been driven back to 5th City. You know we are going to have a great film fest event there. > > Dick Alton, introduced to the mystery in December,1968 and working with the mystery on the future of planet Earth ever since. Oak Park, Illinois > > > _______________________________________________ > Dialogue mailing list > Dialogue(a)lists.wedgeblade.net > http://lists.wedgeblade.net/listinfo.cgi/dialogue-wedgeblade.net

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half price books at ICA store
by Lynda C 13 Dec '18

13 Dec '18

In case you missed the ICA-e News today, with its amazing story of the 5th year of CSLN ( Chicago Sustainability Leaders Network), go back and look again. Of other interest is this special sale of ICA books in stock...maybe for a Christmas gift. Lynda C. With more than fifty years of leading human-centered community development and social change movements worldwide, there is a lot to know about ICA. Thankfully, much of that history and unearthed insights have been documented, organized, and published by ICA colleagues. Now through the end of January, 2019, use the code IMPACT when purchasing through the ICA online store to get 50% off classic texts such as Pilgrimage<http://r20.rs6.net/tn.jsp?f=0016xSlxnmrGAR1jN7TPqsJPBgwDjDawT2xdVKZNlWkbr-i…>, The Circle of Life<http://r20.rs6.net/tn.jsp?f=0016xSlxnmrGAR1jN7TPqsJPBgwDjDawT2xdVKZNlWkbr-i…>, and A Chronological History of the EI &ICA<http://r20.rs6.net/tn.jsp?f=0016xSlxnmrGAR1jN7TPqsJPBgwDjDawT2xdVKZNlWkbr-i…>. Please note that only books in the ICA Classics category are eligible for this discount. Visit our store<http://r20.rs6.net/tn.jsp?f=0016xSlxnmrGAR1jN7TPqsJPBgwDjDawT2xdVKZNlWkbr-i…>

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Re: [Dialogue] Man on fire is on PBS here in Arizona next week
by Ellie Stock 13 Dec '18

13 Dec '18

The DVD can also be purchased. Ellieelliestock(a)aol.com -----Original Message----- From: James Wiegel via Dialogue <dialogue(a)lists.wedgeblade.net> To: Colleague Dialogue <dialogue(a)lists.wedgeblade.net>; Order Ecumenical Community <oe(a)lists.wedgeblade.net> Cc: James Wiegel <jfwiegel(a)yahoo.com> Sent: Thu, Dec 13, 2018 11:58 am Subject: [Dialogue] Man on fire is on PBS here in Arizona next week https://www.pbs.org/video/man-fire-trailer-uvtw81/ Jim Wiegel401 North Beverly Way, Tolleson, Arizona 85353Tel. 011-623-936-8671 or 011-623-363-3277jfwiegel(a)yahoo.comwww.partnersinparticipation.com When a great ship is in harbor and moored, it is safe, there can be no doubt. "But that is not what great ships are built for." Clarissa Pinkola Estes_______________________________________________ Dialogue mailing list Dialogue(a)lists.wedgeblade.net http://lists.wedgeblade.net/listinfo.cgi/dialogue-wedgeblade.net

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Progressing Spirit: 12/13/18, Lauren Van Ham: The Medicine of Intimacy: an Advent Challenge; Spong revisited
by Ellie Stock 13 Dec '18

13 Dec '18

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!important;line-height:150% !important;} }@media screen and (max-width:480px){ #yiv4553886032 #yiv4553886032templateBody .yiv4553886032mcnTextContent, #yiv4553886032 #yiv4553886032templateBody .yiv4553886032mcnTextContent p{ font-size:14px !important;line-height:150% !important;} }@media screen and (max-width:480px){ #yiv4553886032 #yiv4553886032templateFooter .yiv4553886032mcnTextContent, #yiv4553886032 #yiv4553886032templateFooter .yiv4553886032mcnTextContent p{ font-size:12px !important;line-height:150% !important;} } In what ways will I choose to become more intimate this holiday season and in the New Year? | | | | View this email in your browser | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | The Medicine of Intimacy: an Advent Challenge Column by Lauren Van Ham December 13, 2018At the beginning of November, I dizzied myself in a dervish with 7500 participants at the Parliament of World Religions. In a series of keynote presentations spanning Peace & Reconciliation, Climate, Women, Indigenous Voices, and the Next Generation, one unifying message was consistently offered, “Humans have caused this.” Whatever the challenge before us, it is our species who has created the conditions for our current reality.Not an easy pill to swallow. And we might well agree that this is part of the problem: we’re not swallowing. Many of us are able to read the headlines or hear the news while simultaneously numbing out to, “business as usual:”“Conservationists have issued a demand for urgent international action after a major report uncovered an unprecedented crisis in nature that threatens to devastate the world economy and imperil humanity itself.”i“Last Friday, just hours after the last funeral of a victim of the Pittsburgh shooting, a man with a history of misogyny online walked into a yoga studio and killed two women in Tallahassee. Just a few months earlier, one of the women killed at the yoga studio, and her father were among the many families that swarmed Florida’s state capitol after the Parkland high school massacre in February that left 17 students and teachers dead. Reports have said that several of the Thousand Oaks survivors had escaped the mass shooting that left 58 people dead at a Las Vegas country western festival last year.”ii“The world’s leading climate scientists have warned there is only 12 years for global warming to be kept to a maximum of 1.5C, beyond which even half a degree will significantly worsen the risks of drought, floods, extreme heat and poverty for hundreds of millions of people.”iiiThis is NOT business as usual. We are being asked, right now, to embed in all of our day-to-day activities, behaviors and actions that care for one another, for all species, and for the generations to come. We created this complexity – in all its genius, and in all its messiness – and now we are the ones to bring ourselves into a safer, sustainable reality. There is no guarantee that we can, or will. Understandably, the level of release and reinvention before us can feel so daunting – so frightening – that disconnecting or compartmentalizing becomes a natural default.We know we can be a fear-prone species, and we have been sold a story that thrives on “independence,” but is that who we are really? The antidote is intimacy. Intimacy with ourselves, and with one another. Somewhere along the way, intimacy became VERY unpopular. It’s not nearly as convenient as anonymity, and it requires an investment of time when many of us anxiously confess that we have none.In the days of Advent, and in the darkening days of the Winter Solstice, we enter the womb (a very intimate space) so that we can better perceive and embrace Emmanuel, “God with Us.”In that fecund darkness, we’re encouraged to welcome our fears, vulnerability and disbelief. I’m thinking of Mary, a virgin, who was told by an angel that she would be impregnated by the Divine; or Joseph, being shown in a dream, that he was to name his immaculately-conceived son, “Jesus;” and those shepherds shaking (!!!) as they were directed by celestial visitors to go to Bethlehem. In each of these, the individual faces the unexpected, an uncomfortable disruption in business as usual.During one of the sessions I attended at the Parliament, a presenter told the room, packed with enthusiastic listeners, that she no longer uses Amazon…and that she’s inviting her congregation to do likewise. The room fell s-i-l-e-n-t. And reading this right now, some of us might feel a similar welling-up from within, “Not my Amazon!!”But isn’t this a rigorous example of our loss of intimacy? Being seduced by an apparent convenience over a possibly transformative connection? What are our alternatives?Maybe like you, my morning coffee is more than a caffeinated beverage, it’s a ritual that I call, “ordinary/extraordinary.” It’s so mundane, it’s sacred. Knowing this and not wanting to be unappreciative, I traveled to Guatemala in 2011…to make it intimate.This is Raniero, and his niece, Flor. Raniero coordinates a Fair Trade coffee cooperative in Guatemala that supplies parts of Europe and a large grocery chain in the US with fair trade coffee beans. Upon landing in Guatemala City, Raniero and Flor drove me out to the shores of Lake Atitlan to meet Maria Luis.To find her, we scrambled up a steep, jungle-covered mountainside. Maria Luis, very much at-work, was expecting us and smiled as she shared the story of her organic, fair trade coffee cherries (beans), start-to-finish. She gestured up the slope, explaining the land was hers and that she oversees a women-owned collective.In the months between the planting and harvest, she and the women cook and sell their meals for folks in town. That year, the profits from their coffee crop were to be pooled to create a covered structure to better support their catering business.Caressing the coffee cherries in her basket, Maria Luis gently laughed, “My husband left a long time ago… he said he couldn’t understand me.” I wept as I listened. I was so touched by her vision, by the pride she held for her work, by the joy she exhibited in sharing her life with strangers. A cherry slipped from her basket and I scrambled to pick it up.These coffee cherries were suddenly worth a fortune. They were funding Maria Luis’s sons’ dreams of attending college! Never again could a bean fall to my floor and find its eternal fate beneath my refrigerator. Intimacy is defined as “being familiar or belonging together.” Since returning home from Guatemala, I cringe a little watching our country’s many abandoned, unfinished cups of coffee. Warm, strong memories of Maria Luis remain. New Testament scriptures this season declare,“And the Word became flesh and lived among us…” – John 1:14Fair Trade is one way – in a growing collection of others – to practice the medicine of intimacy, to feel the Divine living here among us. The movement exists to ensure farmers and artisans receive a just wage, that their villages and towns retain some of the profits, and that the land supporting these endeavors is tended in a life-sustaining way both for today, and decades to come. Fair Trade is built on personal relationships between the workers, distributors and buyers. It’s not only wonderfully intimate, it’s also a powerful vote for an economic model that values equality, working together and restoring Earth’s resources. And like all movements, Fair Trade works best when lots of us play.Humans have caused this. And God is with us. Intimacy lives here among us, patiently and enthusiastically waiting to be employed. Here is my Advent Challenge for all of us:In what ways will I choose to become more intimate this holiday season and in the New Year?Be creative! Lean in to relationships – especially the ones that raise fear or threaten inconvenience. Ask for help from the Divinity present all around you. We can’t do this alone and we’re not supposed to. It’s Intimate.~ Lauren Van Ham Click here to read online and to share your thoughtsAbout the Author Lauren Van Ham was born and raised beneath the big sky of the Midwest, Lauren holds degrees from Carnegie Mellon University, Naropa University and The Chaplaincy Institute. Following her ordination in 1999, Lauren served as an interfaith chaplain in both healthcare (adolescent psychiatry and palliative care), and corporate settings (organizational development and employee wellness). Her passion and training in the fine arts, spirituality and Earth’s teachings has supported her specialization in eco-ministry, grief & loss, and sacred activism. Lauren’s work with Green Sangha (a Bay Area-based non-profit) is featured in Renewal, a documentary celebrating the efforts of environmental activism taking place in religious America. Her essay, “Way of the Eco-Chaplain,” appears in the collection, Ways of the Spirit: Voices of Women. Lauren tends a private spiritual direction practice and serves as Dean for The Chaplaincy Institute in Berkeley, CA.************************************* i https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/10/30/global-wildlife-populations-fal… ii https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-partisan/wp/2018/11/08/the-thousa… iii https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/oct/08/global-warming-must-not… | | | | | | | | Question & Answer Q: By Jack What gets me miffed is using the word Christ without ‘the’ before it. The lack of this preposition before Christ denotes exclusivity, something, I’m definitely sure God also gets miffed at. This is a Greek word added to Jesus’ name in the early years of Christianity and had the preposition ‘the’ used. Who are we to be so arrogant that we can limit an infinite God to only Jesus, when we know in our hearts that the God-man has been on the earth more times in different guises than we can count. So, we need to get honest and not be hypocritical, since that action is the one action that God finds the most difficult to forgive. A: By Rev. Roger Wolsey Dear Jack,That’s a truly interesting question and take on things you’re presenting. I hear you. As many have put it, “The Cosmic Christ” transcends Christianity and is something that is, has always been, and always will be. Christianity doesn’t have a monopoly on this. So, dropping “the” as part of the Christ can lead people to think that it’s a uniquely Christian concept and personage.That said, a case can be made that the concept of the Christ is in fact a Judeo-Christian one. The word “Christ” comes from Χριστός, Christós, a Greek word meaning “[the] anointed [one].” It is the equivalent of the Hebrew word masiach, or Messiah. With this in mind, to be the Christ, or Messiah, is to be “the anointed one of God” – literally, to have oil poured on one because God has chosen the person for a special task. This Hebrew concept came to refer specifically to a title for the savior and redeemer who would bring salvation to the whole House of Israel. Christians, of course, have expanded this understanding of salvation to include Gentiles, not just Jews.Let’s consider the following insights of a more conservative Christian writer:“Priests and kings were anointed, and occasionally prophets. Kings were anointed during their coronation rather than receiving a crown. Even though prophets and priests were anointed, the phrase “anointed one” or “the Lord’s anointed” was most often used to refer to a king. For instance, David used it many times to refer to King Saul, even when Saul was trying to murder David and David was on the verge of killing Saul to defend himself: Far be it from me because of the LORD that I should do this thing to my lord, the LORD’S anointed (mashiach), to stretch out my hand against him, since he is the LORD’S anointed (mashiach)” - 1 Samuel 24:6. The overriding biblical imagery of the word “Messiah” or “Christ” is that of a king chosen by God. Often in the Old Testament, God would tell a prophet to go anoint someone and proclaim him king. The act of anointing with sacred oil emphasized that it was God himself who had ordained a person and given him authority to act as his representative. I remember being quite surprised when I first learned this. If you would have asked me to describe Jesus’ identity, “Son of God” or “Suffering Savior” would have been my two best guesses. “King” didn’t even make the list. While Jesus also has a priestly and a prophetic role, the prominent idea within the title “Christ” is actually that of a king.”So the Christ is not merely a term that is synonymous for all other demi-gods that have been part of global culture, but a very specific “god-man” (who is often thought of as being a mere human who God has chosen for a liberating role to play). But again, we do well to recall the various persons who were considered by the Jewish people as being anointed messiahs and saviors.Moreover, some would contend that placing “the” in front of Christ also limits how this aspect of God shows up in the world, because “the” refers to a singular – as opposed to “them/they.”But back to your point that we’d do well to have a more humble and generous understanding of The Christ, let me close by sharing these words:“from a progressive Christian perspective, Jesus is “the way, the truth, and the life,” and all who follow Jesus’ way, teachings, and example — the way of unconditional love, of radical hospitality, of loving-kindness, of compassion, of mercy, of prophetic speaking truth to power, the way of forgiveness, of reconciliation, and the pursuit of restorative justice – by whatever name, and even if they’ve never even heard of Jesus, are fellow brothers & sisters in Christ and his Way. To the extent that other world religions are about instilling, fostering, and nurturing those universal values – we see [the] Christ in them.”In The Christ,~ Rev. Roger Wolsey Click here to read and share onlineAbout the Author Rev. Roger Wolsey is an ordained United Methodist pastor who directs the Wesley Foundation at the University of Colorado at Boulder, and is author of Kissing Fish: christianity for people who don’t like christianity; The Kissing Fish Facebook page; Roger’s Blog on Patheos “The Holy Kiss” | | | | | | | | This Rabbi On That Rabbi A modern Portland, Oregon rabbi explains Jesus’s messages in a 6-Part Video Series. View this exclusive video content below. Part 3 Heaven (on their minds) Heaven. It’s quite a large concept. Whether you believe in Heaven or not, it behooves you to think, “What did this idea mean to this group of people who so long ago seemed so obsessed with it as a concept?” The people of the ancient Near East had Heaven on their minds. What did they understand by this concept and what can we use the idea of Heaven to mean to us in our lives? The birth of the idea of Heaven in the ancient Near East In the beginning books of the Bible, there was Earth, and there was water below, and there was water above. No early book of the Bible makes any reference to a place called Heaven where the good get rewarded or another place where the wicked are punished. How did the firmaments above become a destination for the blessed? Is this land of judgment even what Jesus and his contemporaries were thinking and talking about? Let’s look at this for a moment. The Gospels in the New Testament are not very detailed with accounts of Heaven as the location where God’s justice would be meted out. This is understandable because the early Hebrew books in the Bible also have different notions of God than do the later books. Early descriptions of God did not include God being either everywhere or all good. As you know, the God depicted in the very earliest books of the Bible represent a more jealous totalitarian ruler who has to ask the first humans to reveal to him their locations. (While I’m a big fan of reading these lines metaphorically today, their original readers tended not see these words as such.) But God’s character changes. God becomes more of a constitutional monarch (in Abraham’s time) and then a body-less, name-less deity of history (in Moses’ time). It is only much, much later – the Babylonian exile of 586 BCE – that the character of God becomes accepted and understood to be omnipresent and omnipotent – everywhere existing and in control of everything. There is an interesting effect that this notion of God brings with it – theodicy: the question of how bad things happen to good people and good things happen to bad people. The solution to this problem probably has its origins around the time of the Maccabees – 132 BCE – when so many “good Jewish men” who were fighting the Greek culture were being killed. It seemed awful to the average person that they should not be given some place of eternal and reverential rest. God will make it alright in the world to come, was the solution to this dilemma. Martyrdom could now make sense to the average person. It could serve a redemptive and holy purpose. The idea of a life after death was not a new idea. After all, we know that the Egyptians buried their loved ones with possessions to take to the next land. But while this more ‘modern view’ was contemporaneous to Jesus’s time, it was not what Jesus was talking about. when he spoke of heaven. What Jesus meant by Heaven When Jesus referred to Heaven, he was not talking about a location in the beyond. The Kingdom of Heaven (used by Matthew as synonymous with The Kingdom of God) that Jesus was talking about was a reality to be experienced here on earth, in the here and now. Heaven is not above and beyond in a different land. It’s here. We see much evidence of this. We can see this clearly as Jesus is recorded having told his disciples how to enter the Kingdom of Heaven. The gospels of Luke says the Kingdom of Heaven is not without, but it is within a person. Luke 17:20-21 When asked by the Pharisees when the kingdom of God would come, Jesus replied, “The kingdom of God will not come with observable signs. Nor will people say, ‘Look, here it is,’ or ‘There it is.’ For you see, the kingdom of God is in your midst.” Thomas 3b The kingdom is inside of you, and it is outside of you. When you come to know yourselves, then you will become known, and you will realize that it is you who are the sons of the living father. But if you will not know yourselves, you dwell in poverty and it is you who are and who experience that poverty. Let me paraphrase Jesus to try to help us get our minds around the notion of a location. Jesus’s words could have been something like this: “If you have a mystical experience, if you see that the kingdom is within, if you are born in spirit, if you are born from above, then you will be in the Kingdom of Heaven – you will be in the Kingdom of God.” Hebrew and Heaven There is a Hebrew phrase that might help: irat ha’shamiyim. These two words often get translated to the phrase: “the fear of Heaven.” And, indeed, that is a good translation of those two words. The word “SHaMayim” meant the firmaments above, and Heaven is a good enough translation of that. “Ira” is a biblical notion for ‘fear.’ Except the phrase, “fear of Heaven,” wasn’t ever a phrase that was supposed to mean we should be scared of not getting into an eternal place of salvation. That notion of Heaven as a resting place for good souls to have eternal life had yet to be developed. “Fear of Heaven,” as a phrase, meant (and is still used to mean) someone who believes that God is in control of their life. Ask any rabbi you can find. You will get the same explanation: irat ha’shamiyim or ira shmaiyma is a designation of a person who believes, in the sense of a surrendering of one’s will to that of God. Words are limited. The word Heaven – no matter what our contemporary culture uses it to mean – was used as a synonym for living a religious experience of this world. When the phrase is used in the Lord’s Prayer it means . . . The Lord’s Prayer, famous throughout all of Christendom, has an interesting couplet that shows this notion of Heaven being a place on earth, an experience. The specific words in question are “thy kingdom come, thy will be done.” It is best to look at those lines as a question and answer. “Thy kingdom come?” – When is the kingdom coming? “Thy will be done.” – The kingdom is coming and will be here when “God’s will is being done.” This is a Jewish notion, a very Jewish notion: that Heaven on Earth is not something that we are waiting for – it is not a waiting for a savior to make this world a better place for us ,but that it is something incumbent upon us to bring to pass. In conclusion When will it be Heaven on Earth? When we see that it is Heaven on Earth and when we will it to be so. When we feed the hungry, clothe the naked, and take care of those who are in need That’s when we will experience Heaven on Earth. That’s what Jesus was talking about. That is the meaning of the Bible in Jesus’s time. It is a picture of peacefulness, of feeling a sense of salvation - a word which comes from the word ‘salve’- a wonderful feeling of healing and wellbeing. It is not surprising that we describe in with the word ‘Heaven’ an uplifting and transcendent experience. It is not that we’re going to get a room upgrade in the world to come, but that our experience in this life will be evermore blessed. With Love, Rabbi Brian Rabbi Brian is the C.E.O. of Religion-Outside-The-Box, an internet-based, non-denominational congregation nourishing spiritual hunger. Find out more about newsletter, podcasts, videos, and other good ROTB.org is doing for thousands every week. This Rabbi on That Rabbi is a co-production of Religion-Outside-The-Box and Progressing Spirit. This is a 6-part video series also available for purchase here, it is made available to our subscribers to purchase as a gift or for a study group - the course contains six videos and audios along with their written companion PDFs. | | | | | | | | Bishop John Shelby Spong Revisited Miracles in the Bible, Part II Essay by Bishop John Shelby Spong on September 6, 2006 There is a great desire among religious people for quick answers to complex issues. “What is the meaning of prayer? What do you believe about life after death? Do you believe in Miracles?” These are questions that I am often asked when giving lectures, where I am limited to only a few minutes for each response. The fact is that none of these questions can be competently addressed until I have unloaded the dated and inoperative assumptions out of which they so frequently have arisen. It is, for example, difficult to address questions about prayer, God or miracles until some time is spent clearing out the intellectual debris about what prayer is not (adult letters addressed to a Santa Claus-type God), or what God is not (a supernatural parental Mr. Fixit in the sky), or what miracles are not (divine intervention to rescue us from peril). When I hear someone talk about the miracles that they believe have happened in their lives, I wonder if they have ever stopped to think about the hundreds of thousands of people who lived in similar circumstances where there were no miracles.This long and roundabout introduction is designed to warn my readers that, if this series of columns on the miracle stories found in the Bible is to be worthwhile, I will have to prepare the ground to give us the context in which the real issues can be addressed. Only then can appropriate understandings be formed. I intend to go slowly into this process for the theological implications that are involved are serious. I will be happy if I can lead my readers to at least one new insight in each column as I pursue this topic periodically through the coming fall.I begin by challenging some common but uninformed ideas. Most people assume that the Bible is filled with stories of supernatural happenings and miraculous interventions. Yet in the whole of the Bible, miracle stories are found in only a very small number of places. Indeed there are only three cycles of stories in the entire biblical drama that contain widespread accounts of supernatural miracles. First, miracles are encountered in the Moses-Joshua narratives in the Torah (Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy) followed by the Book of Joshua in which Moses’ successor is said to be able to act with the power of Moses. It is too early in this study to draw any conclusions about connections between the miracles attributed to Moses and those attributed to Jesus, but we might note that Moses is mentioned in the gospels 37 times, in the book of Acts 19 times, in the Pauline epistles 8 times, in non-Pauline epistles, especially the Epistle to the Hebrews, 13 times and once in the book of Revelation. That at the very least gives us some sense that the two narratives were not completely separate from each other.The miracles attached to Moses are almost all nature miracles and some of them are quite bizarre. Moses, for example is said to be equipped with the ability to turn his staff into a snake, to stick his hand into his tunic and to pull it out filled with leprosy and then to return it to his tunic in order to pull it out clean. These were signs supposedly given him by God so that he could successfully negotiate the release of God’s people from slavery in Egypt. When these miracles proved to be inadequate for that task, Moses’ power over nature was heightened into the stories of the plagues that were inflicted on Egypt, beginning with turning the Nile River, the lifeline of the Egyptian economy, into blood and ending with the killing of the firstborn male in every Egyptian household on the night of thePassover. Nature miracles continued to mark the life of Moses after the Exodus from Egypt with the splitting of the Red Sea being the best known. There were also the stories of the miraculous raining down from heaven of bread called manna upon the starving Israelites in the wilderness and the miraculous flight of quail to provide “flesh to eat” that would balance their diet.It is interesting to note that in each of these miracle stories, Moses was the instrument of God’s supernatural power. That power did not reside in him. It is also worth noting that some of those Moses stories reveal a use of supernatural power that would, by our standards today, be declared to be acts of immorality. The enemies that God seems to hate are the same ones that the people of the Jewish tribe hate.The plagues inflicted by an angry God, are designed to destroy the lives of those who are the enemies of the tribe for which this God is the tribal deity. That is simply not worthy divine behavior. The biblical portrayal of God as passing through the land of Egypt indiscriminately murdering the firstborn male in every Egyptian household on the night of the Passover, needs to be named for the immoral act that it is. So my study leads me to challenge the assumption that if something is described as a miracle it is necessarily either good or moral.Joshua, Moses’ chosen successor, was also said to have been endowed with Moses’ same God-given power, so nature miracles also appear to mark his life. Two of these miracles are quite well known. First Joshua, like Moses, splits a body of water so that the people of Israel could pass through it on dry land. This occurred in Joshua’s invasion of the land of Canaan. Following that “miraculous” crossing through the flooded Jordan River, Joshua then proceeded to rout in battle the Canaanites, whose ancestors had lived on that land for literally hundreds of years.The Bible provides Joshua with the moral pretext that God had promised Abraham that this land would be the possession of his descendants. If such a promise were given, it would have been about 1850 B.C.E. Joshua is dated about 1200 B.C.E. So for some 650 years no one had told the Canaanites that they were squatters on Jewish land! That is obviously not a God the Canaanites would have had any interest in worshiping.However, Joshua was not through with nature miracles for just a few chapters later in the book that bears his name, Israel is at war with the Amorites. Israel is winning the battle, but the sun begins to sink in the west and that will provide the Amorites with sufficient cover of darkness to escape death at the hands of the Israelites. So Joshua prayed to God and God stops the sun in the sky, the first recorded instance of daylight-saving time, for the sole purpose of allowing Israel to slaughter more of their enemies. Is that an appropriate divine intervention? Could the Amorites ever worship so vindictive a deity? If we defend the literal occurrences of the supernatural, then we have to face the question as to whether God-sanctioned actions might sometimes be evil. That is a conclusion few people entertain when they think of the miraculous.The second series of miraculous biblical accounts is found in the Elijah-Elisha cycle of stories recorded between I Kings 17 and II Kings 13. Once again, we note that these are primarily nature miracle stories. Elijah is portrayed as having the ability to call down fire from heaven to ignite his sacrifice in a duel with the priests of Baal on Mount Carmel after which Elijah calmly beheads them all. Later, Elijah uses this heavenly firepower to burn up his enemies. Both Elijah and Elisha are said to be able to manipulate the forces of nature sufficiently to produce a drought. Both Elijah and Elisha have stories told about them in which they too are able to split the waters of the Jordan River to walk across on dry land.Healing miracles, however, do make their appearance in the Bible in this Elijah-Elisha cycle. These two prophets are also said to be the first people in the Bible who have the power to raise the dead back to life. Elijah, like Moses, exercised enormous influence on the development of the sacred story of the Jews and this influence is seen in the fact that Elijah’s name receives mention 27 times in the gospels, once in a Pauline epistle and once in the epistle of James.So long before the time of Jesus, we discover that miracles are not something unknown in the Jewish faith story, but that they are limited to the two major heroes of Judaism, Moses, the father of the law and Elijah, the father of the prophetic movement as well as their immediate successors. When we do turn to examine the miracle stories attributed to Jesus, we find that they fall into three categories: nature miracles, healing miracles and raising the dead miracles, and that each category has been previously introduced into the biblical story in these two earlier cycles of miracle stories. Some intermingling of these three traditions would not be surprising.A second popular assumption that needs to be questioned, arises when we realize that it was not until some 40 to 70 years after the earthly life of Jesus came to an end, that the gospels were written. They are not eyewitness reports. Can we find any evidence of miracles being associated with Jesus before the gospels were written? The fact is that we cannot. There are no miracle stories in Paul who wrote between 50 and 64. Had Paul never heard of this tradition? Had he heard about it and dismissed it as not authentic? Was the miracle tradition added to the memory of Jesus well after the fact? Giving at least some credibility to this latter possibility, we note that there are no miracle stories in either the Q document or the Gospel of Thomas, which are the only other two sources that at least some scholars think might be earlier than the gospels.For now I ask you simply to absorb these facts and to entertain these questions. It is too early for conclusions.Nothing has yet been proved. An argument from silence is not a strong argument. However, if Paul had no need to buttress his claims for the presence of God as the operative force in the life of Jesus, at least I think we might suggest that the power of Christ was not originally attached to his ability to do miraculous acts. That raises the possibility that miracle stories were added to the memory of Jesus for some purpose other than that they were recordings of things that happened. We will revisit this possibility again before this series is complete.That is as far as I can go this week. I hope the discussion is beginning to intrigue my readers.~ John Shelby Spong | | | | | | | | | |

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Global Buzz December
by ICA International 07 Dec '18

07 Dec '18

Enjoy catching up with what is happening in ICAs across the globe.... Global Buzz Report: December 2018 Click above or copy and paste this URL into your browser's address bar http://globalbuzz.icai-archives.org/7dayreport-18/2018-12-01.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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11/29/18, Progressing Spirit: Gretta VosperOur Deepest Roots; Spong revisited
by Ellie Stock 29 Nov '18

29 Nov '18

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!important;line-height:150% !important;} }@media screen and (max-width:480px){ #yiv2538069147 #yiv2538069147templateBody .yiv2538069147mcnTextContent, #yiv2538069147 #yiv2538069147templateBody .yiv2538069147mcnTextContent p{ font-size:14px !important;line-height:150% !important;} }@media screen and (max-width:480px){ #yiv2538069147 #yiv2538069147templateFooter .yiv2538069147mcnTextContent, #yiv2538069147 #yiv2538069147templateFooter .yiv2538069147mcnTextContent p{ font-size:12px !important;line-height:150% !important;} } At this time of year, we turn toward traditions that go deep into the backstories of our lives. | | | | View this email in your browser | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Our Deepest Roots Column by Rev. Gretta Vosper Novembery 29, 2018 At this time of year, we turn toward traditions that go deep into the backstories of our lives. The Christmas narrative serves as a foundation for our own narratives, those of our families of origin and those of the families we have created for ourselves. They are good. They are bad. They are beautiful. They are ugly. And we feel compelled to participate whether the stories are healthy or horrible. It’s what we do, right?ABOUT THAT STORY WE ALL KNOW AND LOVE …The real Christmas story, itself, is all but washed up in many progressive Christian congregations. For decades we’ve been uncomfortable with the clash between the birth narratives and “what we now know”, the latter whispered discreetly to those we think can bear to hear the truth. “The Version Birth” by Dot Saunders-Perez and Janet Allyn, a true-to-the-text clash of the birth narratives found in Matthew and Luke, has offered a humorous way to introduce congregants to the truths that have been in front of them their whole lives. Without, of course, requiring they believe even that tidbit of historical quandary. It is a clash of stories so unremembered that I even mixed them up in my first book, With or Without God, attributing the magi to Luke and the shepherds to Matthew. (In my defense, eight theologically literate people proofread that manuscript! Which proves my point, I think…)Liberal and progressive Christians have long wrestled with the birth narratives, their fantastic tales, the unlikely heroes. In a statement of faith accepted by The United Church of Canada in 1940, reference to the virgin birth was removed entirely. Yet it is the most sacred Christian story of all despite the fact that it is undoubtedly fantasy. It remains indisputable by the so so so so so so so many Christians who still believe there were angels singing, three wise men (sic) on camels bringing precious and fragrant gifts, and shepherds quaking on the hillsides. Oh, and the star. There had to have been a star. Over the baby.“Myth” is an easier word to get heads around than “fantasy”, of course. There is a dignity in ”myth” that provides a sense of intellectual earnestness or enlightenment. We use it to relate to scholars exploring the great religious traditions of the world, Mircea Eliade and his work on religion and myth, or Frazer and his Golden Bough. It helps us rise above those who take the stories literally. And definitely above those who haven’t yet learned that the one seamless story they listen to every year doesn’t exist; they remain quite happy to see angels tossing hay at the wisemen in the Christmas pageant. Who are we to undermine their Christmas joy?Of course, “fabrication” is too harsh a word for most churchgoers. They find it confrontational and confrontation is not terribly welcome in church, particularly around feature articles like this one about the birth of Jesus. Yes, the stories were fabricated, woven together of the threads of oral tradition that wound themselves into truths in the decades after Jesus’ death. But they are also beautiful, earnest, easily cast, and delightful in their innocent presentation by new children year after year after year.WELL, WHAT DOES THE MINISTER BELIEVE?One of the essential problems that arises from the annual Christmas play, the uplifting Lessons and Carols service, or the peaceful, reflective beauty of the Midnight Mass is their reinforcement to all who attend of the belief that clergy think the virgin birth and all its accoutrements are factual. Fantastic, yes, but fantastic because of the super powers of the god called God. Those who dare to ask the question may receive from their minister an answer that more closely resembles her or his actual beliefs: it is a story we tell over and over to remind us of the impregnation of our hearts by God’s love and our need to live that out in the contemporary world, according to the needs of that world. That sounds good, doesn’t it? Of course it does! And we all watched the Christmas play happily ever after.But the problem remains. Why do we want clergy to act and speak and lead in ways that allow those not asking questions to assume an ongoing belief in fantastic tales? What is the merit in that? Especially when we are seeing younger generations eschew the mythology of “the virgin” for the seemingly more accessible mythology of “the good life” and its myriad representations over the Christmas season? Is maintaining a semblance of belief worth losing whole generations who find fantastic tales just that: too fantastic to believe, too irrelevant to today?I think not. But I must admit that mine is not a popular perspective in the wider church. Clergy know that if they tamper with the traditions of Christmas, they will lose people. Big time. I know from experience. The fact that those families they lose are very likely those who only show up for Christmas and (maybe) Easter, makes no difference. It is loss. And when year end financial targets are built to include the once-a-year donations of those Christmas patrons, it is calculable.GETTING DOWN UNDER THE STORYLet me share with you a tradition that has grown up at West Hill over the past several years. We frame it as a “celebration of the deepest roots of our tradition”. The scholarship undergirding that statement tells us that the Christmas narratives grew out of the desire of the early church to wrap its stories around traditions that already existed, that were known and celebrated by the people the church hoped would embrace its story. But I imagine that the truth goes even deeper: religious traditions, including our earliest, unrecorded affirmations and acknowledgements, were, themselves, wrapped around our deepest needs. In the midst of winter[i], that need was for a return of the light, of the warmth of the sun, of the promise that they would, once again, revel in warmth and bounty.The first time we celebrated The Longest Night, we also celebrated Christmas Eve. But the former was so popular and beautiful, that it became our sole seasonal celebration the following and every year since. The service draws participants into the fears that lie within our darkest nights. We tell those stories, as true today as they have been throughout history, stories of fear, of accountabilities unpaid. The earth spins outside our control, swirling through a cosmos upon which we have no hold. We gaze at constellations, wonder at the beauty of the heavens, leave footprints in sand and watch them wash away. But we have made our mark upon its face in ways not so easily erased where our power, our lust for life, leaves too deep a stain. We have burned and scraped Earth clear, making room for the planting of our own desires, overpowering whatever future it may have unfolded for itself. Pressing back against what might emerge, we draw lines, prepare plans, plant modifications nature would never have dreamed. And we threaten the future, the seventh generation, one that may not even see the light of day because we serve our own ravenous hungers like addictions we recognize but lack the fortitude to overcome. We consume not only what we have – the here and now – but what might serve tomorrow. We plunder Earth’s future hope. And tonight, we sit within the darkness of the truths we whisper here.[ii] And then we work the magic, calling ourselves and one another to the possibilities that lie within our reach, within our own hearts. We create a sculpture of candlelight as we do so, each member of the gathered community lighting candles as symbols of their commitment to creating peace, hope, joy, and love in the world, to the work of bringing about the beauty in the hope-filled stories we cast before us. Whether we believe we are compelled to love by some outside force or some inner strength, we are responsible for creating that love – the culmination of our highest ideals – through our acts, our voices, our lives. We challenge ourselves to hold those ideals boldly because it is too easy to weave ourselves into a web of our own desires and the cultural expectations that surround us. May that which we once projected onto gods and divine beings – pure, unsullied by our baser needs and wants – may it stir once again in our own hearts – beyond all gods – that we might remember who we are and who we seek to be. Finally, when the sculpture is complete, the candlelight shimmering like lit water in the centre of our space, we take up our responsibilities. The community comes forward, each person accepting both a lit candle and a candlewick bracelet and hearing the words, “You are the light of the world” as the bracelet is slipped over their hand and onto their wrist. Some wear these bracelets throughout the year, replacing the greyed cord with a fresh, bright one only when the next Longest Night circles round.A SHARED FOUNDATIONThe best part of the service is that it lives underneath all the stories we have ever told of this dark night and the events we conspired to merge it with. It supports every telling of that tale. Those who are traditional believers hear the story of a cold and frightened family and the birth of a child who will shine with his own extraordinary light. They slip their bracelet on as a symbol of that light and their commitment to it. Those who have no belief in the Christian story, slip their bracelets on as a symbol of the infinite possibility into which they were born and the reminder that their choices alone weave together the story of their life. The bracelet is a reminder to recommit morning after morning after morning.“Make light!” we say to one another when the final song is sung. “Make light!”After all, isn’t that the best we could ever hope to do with our “one wild and precious life”?[iii] ~ Rev. Gretta Vosper Click here to read online and to share your thoughts About the Author The Rev. Gretta Vosper is a United Church of Canada minister who is an atheist. Her best-selling books include With or Without God: Why The Way We Live is More Important Than What We Believe, and Amen: What Prayer Can Mean in a World Beyond Belief. She has also published three books of poetry and prayers. ************************[i] Apologies to our Southern Hemisphere colleagues who spend their Christmases on the beach![ii] Longest Night elements © 2017 gretta vosper, used with permission.[iii] Mary Oliver, A Summer Day | | | | | | | | | | Join our FB community today! Spread the word, share with friends. Thanks! | | | | | | | | Question & Answer Q: Recently, Arizona’s state school board narrowly defeated the effort of creationist Christians to alter science standards and open the door for a literal interpretation of the Bible being taught alongside evolution. Some of the advisers advocating for creationism were referred to as “Young Earthers” in the news. What exactly does that mean? A: By Rev. David M. Felten Dear Readers,Believe it or not, “Young Earthers” are folks who are convinced that the earth (and all of creation) is only 6,022 years old (as of 2018). How did they arrive at this remarkably specific date?It seems that back in the 17th century, a Renaissance Bishop (James Ussher, 1581-1656) figured that he could use the Bible to calculate the date of creation. Taking note of genealogies, events, and the number of candles on Methuselah’s birthday cake (all of which he took as literally as possible), he counted backwards to arrive at the exact day of creation: October 23rd 4004 BCE. He wasn’t clear on the exact time (or the time zone), but suggested that it was in the morning. Today, a big chunk of American Christians attend churches that claim the Bible is inerrant (without error) and infallible (a safe and reliable source in all matters). I want to believe that most of them don’t actually believe this – considering that they live in the 21st century – but enough of them do believe it to make it a problem for the rest of us.And you’ve got to feel a little sorry for them. Literalists are taught to expect that the Bible does not waiver from objective truth in the matter of history and science – and despite advances in biology, cosmology, archaeology, geology – and evidence in the Bible itself – they continue to double-down on inerrancy. As an outside observer of this phenomenon, it appears that they believe that “real” Christians are somehow spiritually superior for their ability to, despite evidence to the contrary, deny reality. Obviously, this has clear parallels in our current political reality.Here’s the problem: despite the very real and urgent societal issues challenging humanity, many literalists continue to fixate not on solving the world’s problems, but on “proving” the Bible is literally true. They are enabled by theological carnival barkers like Ken Ham, who wastes people’s time and resources on building a full-size ark in Kentucky (complete with dinosaurs to account for and then misrepresent the fossil record) – all to shore up their doubts and insecurities.From Darwin to the Scopes Monkey Trial to today’s efforts to influence school curriculum, literalists have seen themselves as pious warriors engaged in a pitched winner-take-all, us-vs-them battle with science. Many perceive science as an enemy to be defeated at all costs (unless they get sick and want 21st century medical science at their disposal).To overthrow the enemy, they try to impose their narrow-minded worldview on their neighbors – through challenges to science-based curriculum, sowing doubt about the reality of climate change, and generally promoting an anti-science agenda. If their cockamamie ideas only affected them, then no problem. But trying to sneak fundamentalist ideas into my children’s science curriculum? Them’s fightin’ words! To top it off, their efforts stand to do lasting damage to the United States’ intellectual reputation, our standing in a global economy, and a decreased likelihood that the world will take us seriously as participants in a future grounded in science.So, put Young Earthers in the same category with Flat Earthers, Vaxers, and those who believe the moon landing was faked: all of them people who, for their own reasons, have decided to live in a world disconnected from evidence-based reality. It would be funny if it weren’t for their attempts to try and impose their antiquated worldview on everyone else.~ Rev. David M. FeltenPS: I encourage you to visit the website of the Creation Museum and the Ark Encounter to see just how far these people will go to try and prove their point and get out of the hard work of following Jesus. My advice? Don’t give in! But be kind. Evidently, they don’t seem to know any better and don’t have anyone who loves them enough (or whom they trust enough) to get them caught up on the last two hundred years of science and theology. Click here to read and share onlineAbout the Author Rev. David M. Felten is a full-time pastor at The Fountains, a United Methodist Church in Fountain Hills, Arizona. David and fellow United Methodist Pastor, Jeff Procter-Murphy, are the creators of the DVD-based discussion series for Progressive Christians, “Living the Questions”.A co-founder of the Arizona Foundation for Contemporary Theology and also a founding member of No Longer Silent: Clergy for Justice, David is an outspoken voice for LGBTQ rights both in the church and in the community at large. David is active in the Desert Southwest Conference of the United Methodist Church and tries to stay connected to his roots as a musician. You’ll find him playing saxophones in a variety of settings, including appearances with the Fountain Hills Saxophone Quartet. David and his wife Laura have three children. | | | | | | | | Bishop John Shelby Spong Revisited Understanding Religious Anger Essay by Bishop John Shelby Spong on August 22, 2006 One of the things that always surprises me is the level of anger, often expressed in acts of overt rudeness, which seems to mark religious people. It appears so often that I have almost come to expect it, or at the very least not to be surprised by it. A recent episode simply made the connection between religion and anger newly indelible in my consciousness.It occurred last spring when I attended, at their invitation, the graduation ceremonies of a well-known university. Indeed, I was to receive an honorary degree. There was much conviviality connected with this event. We were entertained royally by the president of the university and his wife. We saw former classmates. Families gathered to share this transitional moment with a graduating son or daughter. It seemed to be a very pleasant occasion.When the procession formed to begin the ceremonial walk into the arena, there was a panoply of color marking the assembly. The black caps and gowns of academia were bedecked with bright and varied hoods, representing the doctorates earned by the members of the faculty and reflecting the school colors of the awarding universities. Harvard’s crimson was immediately identifiable, as well as the unique form of the doctoral hoods from the storied universities of Cambridge and Oxford. My place in this lineup was in the company of some of the university’s deans. While we waited for the signal to begin the procession, I introduced myself to my nearest companions. They were all cordial until I introduced myself to the Dean of the Medical School. It was not a time for small talk for this man. He could not have possibly known that he and I would be together in the procession, so what followed was clearly spontaneous and unplanned. He obviously had strong feelings about me and could not miss this exquisite opportunity to give expression to them. I had never met this man before this moment, but my expectation was that one whose career in medicine had been so successful that he had become the dean of a major medical school would have a broad perspective on life. I was wrong. He was bitter and small-minded, caught more in his narrow religious agenda than in his academic excellence. We had barely unlocked hands in our introductory handshake when he said,“I wish I did not feel this way but I think what you have done to the Church is both reprehensible and destructive. I regret that this university has decided to honor you today.” I was taken aback not by the content of his remarks, since I have dealt with threatened religious people many times before, but by the inappropriateness of his comments. This was neither the time nor the place for this tirade. I was after all an invited guest in his world. Yet, he simply could not contain his feelings. I tried to parry his comments by saying something like: “I’m sorry we don’t have time to discuss this here, but you must realize that the world has undergone a vast intellectual revolution in the last 500-600 years and if the Church is to stay in dialogue with that world then the Church must also change. However, this Dean was in no mood to let go; he had the bit between his teeth. “You totally ignore the truth of those first 1,300 years of Christian history,” he retorted, his anger still rising. “Would you want to practice medicine in today’s world equipped only with the medical knowledge available in the first 1300 years of Christian history?” I enquired. At that moment the conversation ended because the music started, the stately procession began its journey into the stadium where literally thousands were gathered.As we walked in silence I could not help but wonder at the rudeness of this Dean, who had so great a need to express his anger that he violated the good manners of his university. I learned later that this doctor was part of a conservative Christian congregation. Somehow, religious convictions seem to give people permission to be rude.A similar incident occurred in the summer of 2005, when I was the guest lecturer at the Highlands Institute for American and Philosophical Thought in Western North Carolina. I had been there for the past three summers, and had always met with a warm and positive reception. However, on this particular night, a local fundamentalist decided to achieve his fifteen minutes of fame. About midway in the lecture, this man stood up and drew sufficient attention to himself that I stopped speaking and enquired if there was something wrong. “I’m feeling sick,” this gentleman replied. So I responded, “There is nothing I’m saying tonight that is more important than your health, so let me pause until you get whatever help you need.” “You don’t understand,” he retorted, “I’m sick of you.” Somehow this man felt that his religious convictions justified his interruption of a lecture attended by more than 250 people. It never occurred to him that this behavior was rude to me, rude to the audience and that it reflected little more than his own anger. I learned later that he was a member of the Community Bible Church and that he had been encouraged to take this action by fellow members of his fundamentalist church. Once again if one is acting ‘in the name of God,’ both anger and rudeness are apparently justified.Those two experiences set me to thinking about the relationship between religion and anger. It is far closer than most people seem to realize. Sometimes the sweet piety of religion serves to hide anger even from the awareness of the angry one, though it is obvious to everyone else. Is it anything but anger when religious people describe what is in store for those who do not believe their way? Is the threat of hell, which is spoken so freely in religious circles, not a projection onto God of the anger inside the one consigning another to a place of eternal torment? Is there much difference between a person saying in hostility: “Go to hell!” and a preacher threatening a congregation with that same destiny? When one looks at the history of religious persecution, which has included such things as excommunication, torture, and the burning of heretics at the stake, there is ample evidence of hostility associated with Christianity. When one adds to that the Crusades designed ‘to kill the infidels,’ a history of anti-Semitism, and the wars between Catholics and Protestants, the picture of religion as a source of anger in human society, victimizing people in every generation, becomes clear.In moments of social upheaval, religious anger becomes very apparent. Most of the anger that was displayed during the movement to emancipate women came from the Christian Church. Most of the anger displayed in the current struggle over justice for gay and lesbian people emanates from the Christian Church.It is very hard to deny that underneath the sounds of religious conviction, there is a boiling cauldron of anger that seems to be an unrecognized part of the religious experience. Step one, therefore, is to recognize it. Step two is to understand it. Religious anger seems to manifest itself first and most stridently in those religious traditions that claim to possess absolute certainty. It is only when one believes that one possesses the whole truth of God that one finds the need to persecute those who do not accept your version of truth. What that behavior reveals is that the frightened human psyche needs the certainty of religion, no matter how narrowly defined, in order to feel secure. Christianity has developed many security-giving idols inside its traditional formulations, infallible popes and inerrant scriptures being two of them. How rational, for example, is it for anyone to say: “Since my God is the true God and your God is, therefore, a false God, I have the right to hate you, to persecute you or even to kill you?” Yet all of these expressions of anger are found inside the Christian Church.The second thing that religious anger reveals to me is that organized religion feeds the expression of self-hatred in its people. There is certainly much self-negativity in traditional Christianity with its doctrines of ‘the Fall,’ its emphasis on the depravity of human life, the need to be rescued, and the guilt-producing idea that “Jesus died for my sins.” The liturgies of Christian churches are constantly calling their worshipers such things as ‘a wretch,’ ‘a worm,’ ‘one unworthy to gather up the crumbs under the divine table,’ all interspersed with the plea to God to ‘have mercy, have mercy, have mercy.’ Are these not expressions of self-directed religious anger?If one absorbs negativity from any source long enough, one cannot help but become negative. When one is denigrated in worship over a sustained period of time, one inevitably projects this denigration onto others as anger. It is necessary for survival.Does this not help us to understand why prejudice is greater among religious people than among non-religious people; why slavery, segregation and other overt forms of racism have been the pattern of that region of our country that we call ‘the Bible Belt;’ and why the ‘Religious Right’ even today is more supportive of war as an instrument of national policy than any other segment of our national population? Each of these attitudes reflects religiously justified violence.Has religion in general and Christianity in particular degenerated to the level that it has become little more than a veil under which anger can be legitimatized? What happened to that biblical proclamation that the disciples of Jesus are to be known by their love? How does religious anger fit in with the Fourth Gospel’s interpretation of Jesus’ purpose to be that of bringing life more abundantly?Perhaps the time has come to recognize that Christianity was never meant to be about religion; it is to be about life. The achievement of personal security is the goal of religion. The ability to live with integrity in the midst of the insecurity of life is the goal of Christianity. Religion seeks to control life with guilt. Christianity seeks to free people to be all that they can be. There is a vast difference. Perhaps it will take the death of religion to open us once again to the meaning of Christianity, even ‘Religionless Christianity.’ For the purpose of Jesus was not to make us religious but to make us fully human.~ John Shelby Spong | | | | | | | | 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! | | | | | | | | Announcements | | | A Universal Christmas Join us this December to take delight in the deeper meanings and wonders of Christmas. In eleven emails, sent to you on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, you will receive: * Thomas Moore’s reflections on Christmas from an inclusive and soulful point of view. * Ideas for discussion and practice. * Access to a Practice Circle, a forum open 24/7 for you to share with and learn from our worldwide e-course community. This online e-course will be guided by Thomas Moore from December 3rd through January 7th. Click here for more information ... | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |

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