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exemplary 3rd grade educating
by John Cock 05 Oct '12

05 Oct '12

Granddaughter Lyndon's weekly report to parents from teachers of her 3rd grade class in Davidson, NC.

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10/04/12, Spong: "Think Different–Accept Uncertainty" Part XVIII: The Resurrection of Jesus
by Ellie Stock 04 Oct '12

04 Oct '12

HOMEPAGE MY PROFILE ESSAY ARCHIVE MESSAGE BOARDS CALENDAR "Think Different–Accept Uncertainty" Part XVIII: The Resurrection of Jesus The literal details are familiar: the third day, the empty tomb, the experience of seeing the risen Christ. These details stand at the heart of the Christian story, forming its essential climax if you will. It is celebrated annually in Easter services, normally with packed congregations. Its secular observances involve Easter parades, Easter egg hunts and the prolific Easter Bunny. It comes, at least in the northern hemisphere where Christianity was born, in the spring of the year when the doldrums of winter have been pushed aside by new shoots of green and new flowers to brighten the countryside. It captures and speaks to the deepest human anxiety, the experience of mortality and finitude. Death is a reality for every living thing, but only human beings are self-consciously aware that this destiny awaits us all. Only human beings anticipate death, plan for it, fear and dread it and seek to avoid it. Is it possible that the story of Jesus’ resurrection is an expression of human wish fulfillment? Or is there something about the story of the resurrection that is real, that is trustworthy and that is measurable inside the flow of history? The whole of Christianity seems to rest on the answer being “yes” to each of these questions. We start our examination of the resurrection of Jesus by examining the biblical texts that purport to tell us about it. The reality of resurrection is assumed in almost every verse of the New Testament, but the details that purport to describe the resurrection are consistently both confused and in many cases actually contradictory. There are five separate sources consisting of only six chapters in the entire New Testament that purport to tell us about what happened at the time of the first Easter. The first and earliest of these five sources is Paul and his account is found in I Corinthians 15. That epistle was written in the mid-fifties, or some twenty-five years after the crucifixion and about two decades before the first gospel, Mark, ever saw the light of day. Paul is, however, quite sparse in details. He gives us the first specific time reference. It happened, whatever “it” was, he says, “on the third day,” presumably following the crucifixion. When Paul talks about the resurrection of Jesus he always uses a passive verb form. Jesus did not rise in Paul’s writing, he “was raised,” presumably by God, and it was done, he says, “in accordance with the scriptures.” There being no New Testament in existence when Paul was writing, this reference was clearly to the Jewish Scriptures, which Paul, as a rabbi, knew quite well. To what particular biblical texts he was referring, however, he failed to say, leaving us only to speculate. The primary Old Testament reference, to which most scholars now believe he was alluding, seems to be II Isaiah (40-55), but there is nothing in that segment of the book of Isaiah that hints at what we now call resurrection. It does, however, talk about the indestructibility of the “servant” figure who gives his life away. Then Paul proceeds to give us a list of those to whom this raised Christ had appeared, i.e., those who have been enabled to see and thus to be called “witnesses.” To this list, however, he provides not a single narrative detail. The list includes three individuals: Peter, James and Paul and three groups of people: “the twelve,” “500 brethren at once” and “the apostles.” Note that “the twelve” and “the apostles” appear to be two different groups, which many find surprising. The “500 brethren at once” is a reference not corroborated by any other note found anywhere in the written Christian tradition. The most fascinating of these witnesses, however, is Paul himself. Most scholars, following the lead of the early 20th century church historian Adolf Harnack, date the conversion of Paul somewhere between one and six years following Jesus’ crucifixion. If whatever it was that Paul saw up to six years after the crucifixion, was, as he claims, identical with what others saw, it could hardly have been a resuscitated body that walked out of a tomb three days after being crucified. Literalists are thus confounded. Paul, the first figure in the New Testament to write about what came to be called “resurrection,” could not possibly have been referring to a physical body; yet whatever Paul’s experience was, he believed it was real and it was certainly life changing. So we have in this our earliest source in the New Testament the elements that constitute an ultimate mystery. Whatever the resurrection of Jesus was, it was real, but it was not physical. Paul gives us a hint as to what it was to which he was referring when he writes later in his letter to the Romans that “Christ being raised from the dead will never die again. Death no longer has dominion over him” (Rom. 6:9). If Paul was referring to a physically resuscitated body that returned to the life of the flesh, then presumably at some point this Jesus would have had to die again. That is the nature of all things that are living and physical. So, whatever it was that this epistle was trying to communicate, it is not about a body resuscitated and restored to the physical realm of human history. This Romans text goes on to say that “he died to sin once for all, but the life he lives, he lives to God.” The clear implication in these words is that Paul’s concept of the raising of Jesus was that he was raised into the life of God from which he “appeared to certain chosen witnesses,” among whom Paul included himself. It also means that whatever that appearance to Paul was, it would have had to have occurred somewhere between one and six years after Jesus’ death. Studying the biblical accounts of the resurrection is not quite as simple as literal-minded Christians want to make it. The interpretive task became even more complicated when the first gospel was written. The resurrected Jesus is never seen in Mark’s narrative. All Mark gives us in his Easter morning story is an announcement made to the women at the tomb in which it is stated: “He is not here, he has been raised.” This announcement was made by a messenger, Mark says, who is not yet regarded or pictured as an angel. So what do these words mean? Was Jesus raised back into the physical life of this world or was he raised into the life of God? That is a question that Mark does not answer. The messenger goes on to direct the women to go tell “Peter and the disciples” that the raised Christ will go before them into Galilee and there they will see him. If the disciples are still in Jerusalem when this announcement was first made, as this text suggests, we need to know that Galilee was a seven to ten day journey, so the promised “appearance” in Galilee of the raised Jesus would fall outside the three day time measure. So in this earliest gospel the promise of a future appearance is made, but in fact in this account the raised Christ appears to no one after the crucifixion. That is to many a startling reality, but it is also a biblical fact. When Matthew writes the second gospel a decade or so after Mark, he has Mark in front of him and he incorporates most of Mark directly into his account. He also changes, heightens and adds to Mark’s text from time to time and this happens in his account of the first Easter. First the messenger in Mark has become in Matthew a clearly identified, supernatural angel. Second the raised Christ actually does appear to the women in the garden in Matthew and in a form physical enough for them to “grasp his feet.” Matthew then adds a second appearance story designed to give content to the messenger’s promise in Mark that the disciples would see the raised Christ in Galilee. It occurred, said Matthew, on top of a mountain. The disciples presumably trudged up the mountain, but the raised Jesus came mysteriously out of the sky. Does this imply that he has come out of heaven or out of God? He is transformed and clothed in the garments of the Son of Man, who, in Jewish mythology, was to come at the end of the age. For the first time in the Bible, this resurrected figure is given words to speak. They constitute a charge: “Go into all the world and proclaim the gospel,” followed by a promise: “For I am with you always, even to the end of the world.” The resurrection story is clearly growing as the years roll by. When Luke, the author of the third gospel, written about a decade after Matthew, pens his version of the story, the angelic messenger in Mark, who became an angel in Matthew, has now become two angels and the physicality of the raised Jesus has been enhanced to the place where we are told that he walks, talks, eats, offers his flesh to be felt and interprets scripture. Luke also says that all of the resurrection appearances occurred in the Jerusalem area, dropping all references to a return to Galilee. Then Luke introduces the story of Jesus’ ascension. Having made the resurrection into the physical resuscitation of a deceased body, he has to provide a way to get this physical body out of the world without dying again. The ascension was his answer. Finally, when the Fourth Gospel is written near the end of the first century (95-100), its author offers new and sometimes contradictory material. There are four apparently separate vignettes that the Fourth Gospel has woven together, sometimes rather awkwardly. The first one stars Mary Magdalene alone at the tomb and the focus of this story is that one cannot cling to the idea of Jesus as a physical body. The second vignette focuses on Peter and the “beloved disciple” coming to an empty tomb and we are told that the “beloved disciple” believes without ever seeing a physical body. The third focuses on the disciples in a secured upper room on the evening of the first day of the week and that is the time for this gospel when the disciples receive the Holy Spirit; that is, Easter is viewed in this final gospel as the Pentecost transformational experience for the disciples. The fourth episode stars Thomas and its message is “Blessed are those who do not see (a resuscitated body) and yet who still believe.” That is a brief summary of all the specific resurrection material in the New Testament. It remains now to weave this material together into a coherent form. That I will do in the next episode, which will conclude this series entitled, “Think Different–Accept Uncertainty.” ~John Shelby Spong Read the essay online here. Question & Answer Pastor Dan Sire, via the Internet, writes: Question: Your theology is intriguing but I have many questions. Two are: If Jesus Christ is not the incarnate divine one then who or what is he? If Jesus Christ is not the incarnate divine one then what is the significance of naming yourself a Christian? Answer: Dear Pastor Dan, Thank you for your questions. I fear, however, that the categories of theological understanding in which you frame your two questions are far too rigid and even dated for you to be able to hear the responses that I need to make to them. You are using the language of Greek dualism in which the creeds were hammered out in the fourth century when Christianity was in the process of being incorporated into a Greek thinking world. Incarnation is a Greek term not a biblical term. Fourth Century concepts have frozen Christianity into something neither Paul nor the gospel writers would ever have recognized. I spent over 300 pages trying to separate the Jesus experience from this creedal language in my book entitled Jesus for the Non-Religious: Discovering the Divine in the Heart of the Human. It is not an easy or simplistic task, but it means that in the way you frame your questions it is all but impossible for me to respond in a meaningful way. We Christians have made many claims for Jesus. There is general agreement even in the Bible that “God was in this Christ.” What that means and how God and Jesus came to be viewed as related to each other in a deep and even total way is not nearly as clear as the affirmation we make about him. If you go to the New Testament, you will discover that the earliest affirmation about Jesus that we have in that book is that in his humanity the presence of God has been experienced as real. “God was in Christ” was the way Paul described that experience. Since the only way first century people could understand God was in the common definition as a supernatural being who lived above the sky, the only way the debate was framed was about how this distant God could have gotten into the human Jesus. The debate is easy to follow. Paul, writing to the Romans about 58 CE, said that God lifted Jesus into the meaning of God at the Resurrection (Rom. 1:1-4). Mark, writing 12-14 years later, says that God entered the fully human Jesus at the time of his baptism. Matthew, writing somewhere between 82-85, and Luke, writing between 88-93, say that God entered Jesus at the moment of his conception. That was when the Virgin Birth stories entered the tradition. The Fourth Gospel, written between 95-100, agreed that Jesus was part of who God is, but argued that it had been so from the dawn of creation. Jesus was for him was the enfleshment of the word or logos of God that came out of God when God said: “Let there be light.” All of these explanations, conflicting as they are, are written into pages of the New Testament. It is not the explanation of how God became human that I regard as important, it is the reality of the human experience that the explanations seek to explain. In the mystical tradition, the union of the human with the divine is said to be the goal of life. Humanity is not destroyed by the presence of God, it is expanded. Divinity is not the opposite of humanity it is an expression of humanity’s fullness. Divinity does not take over our humanity or even Jesus’ humanity; it becomes the depth expression of who we are. Incarnation language is the language of the Greek world. It served the church well in the past, but it cannot be the language of the 21st century. Our task is to find a way to express the same truth that the concept of “incarnation” sought to convey, but in the language of our world. That is my goal in ministry and it is the reality of that goal that makes me a Christian. My best to you in your ministry. ~John Shelby Spong Announcements Any questions or concerns, please contact us at support(a)johnshelbyspong.com or 503-236-3545. Copyright © 2012 ProgressiveChristianity.org, All rights reserved. You are receiving this email because you have a membership at our website. Our mailing address is: ProgressiveChristianity.org 3530 SE Hawthorne Blvd. Unit 1 Portland, OR 97214 Add us to your address book

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Did you listen to JWM's Talk at the Global Archives?
by steve har 03 Oct '12

03 Oct '12

Not everyone has found the Global Archives Fall Sojourn web page: see fallsojourn.posterous.com There are several new posts there about the work of the Fall Sojourn. You can also find an audio clip of a Joe Mathews talk from 1964 and listen to it or down load it. if you -want tArchive email updates or -want to offer a question or comment please send an email to: fallsojourn(a)gmail.com and include your own name and email address. Steve

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Re: [Dialogue] Group Facilitation - Online
by Sunwalker 03 Oct '12

03 Oct '12

Wow! We'll have to make you a "sister" yet! From my Android phone on T-Mobile. The first nationwide 4G network. -------- Original message -------- Subject: [Dialogue] Group Facilitation - Online From: Wayne Nelson <wnelson(a)ica-associates.ca> To: Colleague Dialogue <dialogue(a)lists.wedgeblade.net> CC: Just a wee update. We are teaching our very first Group Facilitation course in a totally online environment. We're teaching the straight-up GFM course, but not trying to teach them to facilitate online at all. There are a total of 6 two hour sessions. 3 for the Focused Conversation method and 3 for the Consensus Workshop method. Monday - Wednesday and Friday. They have homework assignments between sessions including practicing the method in a real setting. We have people from across Canada as well as one in Barbados and one who is, for this week, located in Hawaii. We're using Blackboard Collaborate - a shared whiteboard - small group rooms - very good audio and a bunch of group work tools. We can share our own computer screen, go to a website, play videos. It uses PowerPoint for contextual material, instructions and pages for group work. For example, we upload the Focused Conversation worksheet and they can type directly on it. A small group works together to help someone design a conversation. The person can download it, refine it and use it. At least one of the participants will be using the conversation in his church group this evening. They seemed to grasp the basics of the method and they can see themselves using it in their life and workplaces. It's our first time and there are a few clumsy spots, but we are very excited about the possibilities. \\/ - - - - - - - - - - Wayne Nelson wnelson(a)ica-associates.ca O - 416-691-2316 M - 647-229-6910 _______________________________________________ Dialogue mailing list Dialogue(a)lists.wedgeblade.net http://lists.wedgeblade.net/listinfo.cgi/dialogue-wedgeblade.net

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NASA software developer moves on ...
by Tim Wegner 01 Oct '12

01 Oct '12

Yesterday I turned in my badges at the United Space Alliance. My NASA career started when Susan and I were re-assigned from Egypt to Houston. The only thing I knew about the Space Shuttle was what I had read in Time magazines bought on the streets in Cairo. When we arrived at the Houston House, Susan stayed "in house" and I was assigned to work. Larry Henschen helped me arrange an interview with McDonnell Douglas, a NASA contractor. I had never programmed a computer and had no qualification other than a Master's degree in mathematics and an "all-but-thesis" not-quite-a-PhD. In retrospect, those were great credentials, since the state of computer programming when I was in college was using punch cards. When I was working programming NASA's first Unix computers, I remember thinking "I wish I had studied Unix in college" - then realizing that Unix didn't exist when I was in college! But the principles and laws of mathematics and physics I learned in the late 60's have stood up very well. My career has been spent in the abstract world of mathematical models of gravity, drag, solar pressure, and accelerations - space, the final frontier. Hard to beat that. I missed the first four shuttle flights but arrived in time for STS-5. My first project was an analysis of the shuttle drag model. My supervisors weren't watching closely, so I learned FORTRAN on a UNISYS mainframe and implemented my results in a program called HOPE. (There was another program called LOVE, but not one called FAITH.) Shortly thereafter I was re-assigned as a programmer, and remained a software developer (and software project manager) for my whole career, which extended more then a year past the last Shuttle flight in July 2011. I ended up working for various NASA contractors for a bit over 30 years. Shortly after I started at NASA, Larry Henschen and I were instrumental in helping Lynn Oden, another Houston House order member, in also getting a job. For a few years Lynn and I commutred together. Lynn retired a few years ago, having had a fine career as a Shuttle Navigation Flight Controller. Susan and I never "left" the Houston House; it melted away around us as the Order transitioned away from corporate living. Conna Wilkinson was the last one to leave when she moved back to Oklahoma. So Susan and I turned out the lights of the Houston House and got an apartment, and later bought a house. I am grateful today for all the experiences we had assigned to San Franscisco, San Jose, Melbourne, Adelaide, Bayad, and finally Houston. Susan and I arrived in Houston with no assets but no debts in our mid-thirties, and are now both retired. We still have no debts, but now we have a few assets. I amazed that that was possible! I am still working with a small group of your colleagues keeping the wedgeblade.net glue connecting our far flung community alive. Retirement is, of course, just another "assignment" to new challenges. Tim Wegner

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50th Anniversary
by Terry Bergdall 01 Oct '12

01 Oct '12

Last week was a time for major events in Chicago connected with ICA's 50th Anniversary. One was more external while the other was more internal. On Saturday, September 15, ICA-USA was the organizing sponsor for the "Accelerate 77" Share Fair. This event has dramatically re-positioned us for the sake of expanding our national programs. Several colleagues from across the country were present. If you would like to see some photos and video, click on the following link: http://ica.site-ym.com/news/news.asp?id=103496 Two days before, we had an unveiling of the an art piece which will serve hang at 4750 for the next 50 years. The artist, Gina Alicea, named the completed piece "Ocean of Devotion." You can view her description about the work on the following link: * * http://www.ustream.tv/recorded/25387580 The work consists of more than a thousand pieces of cloth. On each appears written information that originated from one of three sources. First, about 350 pieces name deceased staff members and colleagues who worked at one time or another with EI/OE/ICA during the past 50 years. Others identify important past programs and projects --- RS-1, the Academy, and 24 Human Development Projects, etc. Second, several pieces highlight current programs and supporters, e.g., Technology of Participation (ToP), Accelerate 77 and its advisory committee, names of donors, etc. Third, 600+ pieces were created during fifty events that occurred across the country and around the world to mark the 50th Anniversary. Participants at these events wrote statements on strips of cloth to express their hopes and dreams, or, as we like to say, "claim a promise," for the next fifty years. The piece therefore includes symbolism of ICA's past, present, and future. It has been a full week. I am particularly grateful that Carol Pierce joined us at the Share Fair and celebrated our 50th Anniversary just a few days before she passed. Terry Bergdall

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An Amazing Two Days at ICA Chicago-Telling Our Story & The Global Archives
by Ellie Stock 30 Sep '12

30 Sep '12

Thanks, Herman for your reflection and forwarding the accessions chart and for all the folks working on the archives. Ellie elliestock(a)aol.com -----Original Message----- From: Herman Greene <hfgreene(a)mindspring.com> To: 'Order Ecumenical Community' <oe(a)lists.wedgeblade.net> Sent: Sun, Sep 30, 2012 5:44 pm Subject: [Oe List ...] An Amazing Two Days at ICA Chicago-Telling Our Story & The Global Archives In the below I meant a memory that goesback 40-45 years, not 50-55 years and I have corrected it. From: Herman Greene[mailto:hfgreene@mindspring.com] Sent: Sunday, September 30, 20126:40 PM To: 'Order Ecumenical Community' Subject: An Amazing Two Days at ICA Chicago-Telling OurStory & The Global Archives I spent what for me were an amazing two days in Chicago last Thursday andFriday. I went because Jack and Judy Gilles were working on the Global Archivesand were going to leave this morning, September 30. It was the only time Icould get to see them. I am finding a yearning to tell our story and bring some ofit forward. More particularly I miss working with people who were formed out ofthe same fire as I was. I work with activists, truly “Those WhoCare,” but something is missing for me. It’s primarily an interioraspect—that “die on the march” aspect, that “live themystery” aspect, that “the past is approved and the future is open(to be created)” aspect, that “we can get anything down that isnecessary” aspect, that “we can drop everything and focus . . . andsacrifice” aspect,” that “we can leave all our possessionsbehind” if need be aspect. One could argue that the Marines also create this kind ofinterior steel and discipline, but it is different. (Actually the Marines mightexcel in honor of country and even willingness to die, but it is stilldifferent.) I have only experienced this in the Order. I know this hasmade me much of what I am and I have a yearning to pass it on to others, especiallyas I realize my own age, 67, and see so many colleagues passing away. So while a part of me thinks its silly for grownups to befiling all the town meeting 76 event folders (and all the work that goes intothat), another part of me also claws back to recover that past . . . for thefuture. What we were as the Order has passed away (I mean in termsof being able to re-create it as it was again), and all of those magnificentmoments and events we created have passed away. Yet there is an echo in thehallway that will not stop. I will go into this more later, but what past it is that Iwant to pass on is difficult to grasp. Is it the Order, RSI, EI, ICA, EI and ICA, all beforeJoe died (or in my case before 1975 when I left the Order), all up to todayincluding the recent history of ICA?I have some ideas, but they are not important for this email. All that’simportant now is that I was drawn back to Chicagoto discuss, primarily with Jack, how the spirit transformation part of who wewere then (and inside are now) can be transmitted to the future as we whoexperienced this grow older and older and pass away. The “we” I am talking about is those of us whocarry a memory back of 40-45 years (other may have adifferent time span) when it seems to me the really creative breakthroughsoccurred. I’m at the younger end of those who experienced that as adults(I was 21 when I joined the Order in 1967). Now some may have joined in 1972 orlater and still have “gotten it,” but what I am talking about issomething that was gotten or it was not, back then. So we are a dying cohort and the question has arisen for mewhether there is something we still need to do together? My answer is I thinkthat if there is something that we still need to do together it is to transmitthat legacy as a living legacy for present and future generations. Part of thisis transmitting facts, part the interior narrative, but most of all it istransmitting the timeless spiritual reality we came to know and which hasshaped our lives but this is not easy because it is not a simple thing.It’s much more than just coming out of an RS-1, or any other short even,inspired I had many important moments of understanding this past weekin Chicago and felt tremendous gratitude for what Marge Philbrook andcolleagues have done on the archives, and for the work Jack has done inthinking through how this can be a living legacy. I In brief Jack and those who workshopped with him, realizedthat its not just a matter of preserving the past by putting facts in filecabinets and waiting for someone to want it, but it is giving people a way ofunderstanding what’s in the collection (Jack uses the term“curation” like a museum curator) and applying that material to thecutting edge issues of our time. What I especially appreciated though was theattached chart in three formats, because it gave me a way to grasp the entiretyof what it is that we were/are/may need in some fashion to pass on. In a certain sense the attached chart overwhelms me becauseI thought there were a few key things like “contextual ethics” andthe RS-1 dynamic and a few other things that might “really need tobe” passed on . . . just a few key things. But now I see it was“all of it”—a giant spiritual event and happening that unfoldedover many years and took many forms all of which were a single event. Torecreate this would require thousands of people in summer assemblies and a neworder and that is not going to happen. Yet I think there is something we can doand need to do and which no one else can do. So, in conclusion, I believe there is something we stillneed to do together and that is to pass on a living legacy. By distinguishinglegacy from living legacy I meant this: “Legacy” is preserving thepast for its own sake. “Living legacy” is recovering the past sothat it might continue to transform the future. The attached Accessions chart is just a beginning. I knowthat Jack would like to receive your suggestions. More soon, Herman _____________________________________________ Herman Greene 2516 Winningham Drive Chapel Hill, NC 27516 919-929-4116 (h) 919-624-0579 (c) 919-942-4358 (f) Skype: hgreene-nc hfgreene(a)mindspring.com _______________________________________________ OE mailing list OE(a)lists.wedgeblade.net http://lists.wedgeblade.net/listinfo.cgi/oe-wedgeblade.net

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Re: [Dialogue] The old Order passing away
by Del Morrill 27 Sep '12

27 Sep '12

A great story about Ellery, Pat. I've had a few clients who came to try to recover an earlier language they've learned. Of course, if one has never learned French, they are unlikely to recall it. But if you've learned it, it's still there somewhere within. It may be childlike if learned only as a child, but from there, can be recalled and developed quickly into mature vocabulary and use. I've contended, ever since I became a hypnotherapist, that events, lost items, etc. can be recovered from one's "memory bank" much more easily when one is relaxed. I believe that witnesses would remember far more if, instead of the interrogation style they are usually subjected to, they were asked to close their eyes, take 3 long, deep breaths and let themselves sink into their chair, allowing themselves to speak of whatever comes into their mind WITHOUT interruption. Further questions can, then, come after that. Some people specialize in hypnotic forensics for this reason. Best always, Del Del Hunter Morrill, M.S., N.B.C.C.H. Personal Guide & Hypnotherapist, Teacher, Lecturer And Author of the GREAT ESCAPES Script Volumes TRANSITIONS, a Center for Personal Guidance & Hypnosis And home of NEW BEGINNINGS PUBLISHING 3217 North Mason Avenue, Tacoma Washington 98407 USA Phone (253) 383-5757; <http://www.hypnocenter.com/> www.hypnocenter.com There can be nothing to frighten you if you refuse to be afraid. (Mahatma Gandhi) _____ From: dialogue-bounces(a)lists.wedgeblade.net [mailto:dialogue-bounces@lists.wedgeblade.net] On Behalf Of DOUGLAS DRUCKENMILLER Sent: Wednesday, September 26, 2012 6:36 PM To: dialogue(a)lists.wedgeblade.net; oe(a)lists.wedgeblade.net Subject: Re: [Dialogue] The old Order passing away I remember Ellery's talking about having lived in the Philippines as a high school girl. (Her dad was a missionary and they were evacuated when WWII broke out.) When she was assigned to Manila, she thought the Tagalog language she had been fluent in would come back to her fairly easily. She was very frustrated to find that it was gone and not coming back. About 6 months in to her assignment, she had been doing development in Manila and was exhausted. She got on the bus to go home and wanted nothing much more than a good nap. But the women just behind her would not let that happen. They kept yammering away about the most stupid and trivial things: their kids and their squabbles, the troubles in their marriages, and other nonsense. Ellery was furious; why couldn't these women shut up and let her sleep? Suddenly, she realized that the women were speaking Tagalog and she was understanding every word. She was so tired that she had lost all her inhibitions and the Tagalog that lay just beneath her conscious mind came out. So from then on, she both understood and spoke Tagalog fluently. She had a great time telling this story on herself. Pat _____ From: sunwalker(a)comcast.net To: dialogue(a)lists.wedgeblade.net; oe(a)lists.wedgeblade.net Date: Wed, 26 Sep 2012 11:49:46 -0600 Subject: [Dialogue] The old Order passing away First, a reflection on Ellery - as a young and inexperienced Global Prior, Ellery was one of the ones who was gracious enough to let me learn from my mistakes without rancor and yet with continued nourishing support. Just her face was a human support mechanism. She spiritually nourished me and we rarely even spoke. And with mortality on my mind as so many saints are called home, knowing you have gone with God, I will let go a bit of the anticipation of my own return. For Carol, while there are many, many memories: one that popped to the top was the time we were at the IERD in Delhi and had boarded the VERY tiny elevator on the top floor (about the 22nd as I recall) of the hotel where we were housed. We pushed the button for the ground floor and about a third of the way down, the elevator shuddered to a stop and the door opened.on a brick wall. Well, I was a little claustrophobic and unaware that Carol was extremely claustrophobic. That hour waiting to be rescued (it could have been 15 minutes, but seemed like SEVERAL hours) was revealing of the wondrous woman of steel (Superman move over) who kept us breathing and laughing to avoid injuring ourselves in the mad panic of fear that sets in when you MUST get OUT and you cannot. Clearly our circumstances were not our problem. While in "Heaven," do a few cartwheels for me, my dear, as I know we both would enjoy them. Sunny Sunny Walker SunWalker Enterprises 303-587-3017 (cell) 303-671-0704 (home/office) sunwalker(a)comcast.net Aurora, CO No mattter how far you've gone down the wrong road, turn back. ~ Turkish Proverb _______________________________________________ Dialogue mailing list Dialogue(a)lists.wedgeblade.net http://lists.wedgeblade.net/listinfo.cgi/dialogue-wedgeblade.net

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9/27/12, Spong: An Open Letter to Ross Douthat, New York Times Columnist
by Ellie Stock 27 Sep '12

27 Sep '12

HOMEPAGE MY PROFILE ESSAY ARCHIVE MESSAGE BOARDS CALENDAR An Open Letter to Ross Douthat, New York Times Columnist Dear Ross, A few weeks ago in an op-ed piece of the Sunday New York Times, you began your regular column with these words, “In 1998, John Shelby Spong, then the reliably controversial Bishop of Newark, published a book entitled, “Why Christianity Must Change or Die.” Spong was a uniquely radical figure – during his career, he dismissed almost every element of traditional Christian faith as so much superstition – but most recent leaders of the Episcopal Church have shared his premise. Thus their church has spent the last decade changing and then changing some more from a sedate pillar of WASP (White Anglo-Saxon Protestant) establishment into one of the most self-consciously progressive bodies in the United States. As a result, the Episcopal Church looks roughly how Roman Catholicism would look if Pope Benedict suddenly adopted every reform ever urged on the Vatican by liberal pundits and theologians.” I was quite honored that you gave me the credit that you did for influencing the history of my own church as well as yours. I was also intrigued by the image of Pope Benedict XVI holding back the tide of liberal reform in Roman Catholicism. Your column caused me to think of His Holiness standing on the shore trying to defend the land from the incoming tide. I also appreciate having my books referred to in a widely-read, highly-respected medium like the New York Times. As a direct result of your column, I have had interviews with other journalists from as far away as Poland. I want to express my thanks to you for opening those opportunities to me. But, Ross, your column was profoundly uninformed about the developments in both biblical and theological scholarship over at least the last two hundred years. In a free country, anyone is able to put into the public arena his or her two cents worth on any subject, but if you really want to be part of the modern theological conversation, you do have some responsibility to do some basic research into the subject about which you choose to write. The fact that you so obviously did not do that has left you exposed as being little more than a frightened and uninformed man. You appear to mourn the fact that it is no longer the 13th century, that the world and the church are changing, and that “infallible” truth no longer appears to be infallible. For example, only someone totally out of touch with the tides of history could seriously object to the fact that the Episcopal Church is no longer “a sedate pillar of the WASP establishment.” You seem to regard that as a virtue. I went to that kind of church when I was a child growing up in the Bible Belt of North Carolina. My church taught me that segregation was the will of God; that women were by nature inferior to men; that it was OK to hate other religions, especially the Jews, and that homosexuals were either mentally sick people, who ought to be cured or morally depraved people who ought to be forcibly converted and changed. The interesting thing is that on each of these issues, my church quoted their literal understanding of the Bible to justify those life-distorting prejudices. I suppose they skipped over Jesus’ invitation that says, “Come to me all who labor and are heavy laden.” At that time, we also sang hymns like “Just as I am without one plea, O Lamb of God, I come.” We quoted Jesus’ summary of the law that enjoins us “to Love our neighbors as ourselves” and when Jesus was asked to define the meaning of “neighbor” he is quoted as having responded with the parable of the Good Samaritan, which defines neighbor to include a “half breed, heretical” Samaritan, who was the object of the deepest, prevailing prejudice in first century Judaism So seeking to be true to this Jesus I rejoice that my Episcopal church today in North Carolina has elected a gifted African-American, Michael Curry, to be its bishop; that my church nationally has chosen a multi-talented woman, Katharine Jefferts-Schori, to be our Primate, and that my church has elected and ordained two openly-gay and well qualified bishops, Gene Robinson in New Hampshire and Mary Glasspool in Los Angeles, both of whom live with their partners in faithful committed partnerships. I also am pleased to note that when my church last revised our prayer book in 1979, we asked a panel of rabbis to go over it to assure us that no undetected anti-Semitism lay hidden in its words. My church has also removed all prohibitions in the ordination process based on race, gender or sexual orientation. I celebrate these steps as steps into a new consciousness that refuses to denigrate or to marginalize any child of God on the basis of who he or she is. That says to me not that the church has somehow lost its way, but that it is hearing and engaging the gospel of Jesus Christ in dramatically new and life-giving ways. It is still breaking down barriers and making it clear that so much of what church people once called “sacred tradition” is little more than human sin perfumed by the pious pronouncements of would-be “holy” people. Those who continue to hold what you seem to believe are the “true” patterns of the past are not seeking the “Kingdom of God” nearly so much as they are trying to protect their own power and privilege. That is shamefully revealed to me when I see the leadership of your church, which you seem to see as virtuous, refusing to investigate and purge its culture of child abuse, but eager to launch an investigation of Catholic Nuns, who in the service of their people press for reforms in that male dominated institution. When you charge, as you do, that I have “dismissed almost every element of traditional Christian faith as so much superstition,” you clearly reveal that your passion and fear are running far ahead of your knowledge and understanding. In the 17th century, the Christian Church forced Galileo to recant from his conclusion that the earth was not the center of a three-tiered universe. In 1991, the Vatican issued a formal paper declaring that they now believed that Galileo was correct. In the meantime, we human beings had begun not only to investigate, but even to travel in space. Would it be your preference that the Christian Church spend its time defending the indefensible or that we begin to engage the vast knowledge revolution that marks the modern world? When the Bible was written between 2000 and 3000 years ago anything its various authors did not understand, they defined as a miracle. As human knowledge has expanded, the arena in which miracles are claimed has shrunk to non-existence. The way we have traditionally told the Jesus story still assumes that there was originally a perfect creation from which we have fallen (into sin, that is “original sin”) and because we cannot rescue ourselves from that debilitating fall, God had to mount a rescue operation to “overcome the sin of the world.” This was accomplished, traditional voices assert, by Jesus who in his death somehow “paid the price” or broke the power of sin and thus restored us to our pre-fallen status of perfection that had been God’s original intention. Since death was conceived in the Bible, not as a natural stage in the course of all living things, but as punishment for the “fall,” it has also been said by traditional voices that Jesus broke the “unnatural” power of death at the first Easter. Well, whether you and traditional church leaders like it or not, Ross, a man called Charles Darwin, writing as long ago as 1859, challenged that entire set of presuppositions very successfully. He demonstrated that there was no original perfect creation at the beginning, but an on-going and ever changing process of evolution. Given that fact there could have been no “fall” into “sin’ from a non-existent perfection. In the approximate 3.8 billion years that we believe life has been on this planet earth, we have moved from living single cells to complex, self-conscious living people. We cannot fall from a perfection we have never possessed, we cannot be rescued from a fall that never happened and we cannot be restored to a status that we have never possessed. Death, we now know, is a part of life. It is not punishment for the fall and the death of Jesus on the cross cannot break either the power of death or the power of sin under which the church has asserted that life is lived. We Christians can ignore these realities if we choose and become as irrelevant as traditional religious bodies have become in our generation. I, however, do not see that as a virtue as you seem to do. I think that this “new” knowledge requires that we Christians re-think and re-consider the explanations of our religious past and then re-cast the Jesus experience into language and concepts that do not require that we have to twist our brains into first century pretzels in order to worship God in the 21st century. That is not “dismissing almost every element of traditional Christian faith as so much superstition,” it is engaging our faith and our world in a new way. To press this discussion a bit deeper, Ross, the Virgin Birth is not about biology. If it were, the 18th century discovery that women have an egg cell would render such stories as both inoperative and nonsensical. Resurrection is also not about bodily resuscitation, but about transformation. If you had ever studied Paul, or looked carefully at Mark you might know this. No, Ross, I and others like me are deeply committed to the Christian faith, but we are also committed to escaping the literalistic nonsense of a pre-literate world. What we seek to do is to separate the experience of God in Jesus from the explanation of that experience that was formed in the first century. We seek to preserve that experience from literal absurdity by finding ways to talk about it in language that people living today might be able to hear. This is not some effort to disturb the “faithful,” as you seem to assume, this is the work of a lifetime, the most important task of contemporary Christians. You seem, not only not to know these things, but not even to know that you do not know them. Denial of reality, even in the name of “traditional” Christianity, is never a doorway into the life of the future. My best, ~John Shelby Spong Read the essay online here. Question & Answer Michael Wagner from Promise Keepers writes: Question: It puzzles me that you believe we do not need a savior and that Jesus is not the same as God. You say that the word savior refers to God, but not Jesus till later in the Bible but Jesus is God. The Old Testament tells of the coming of a savior. Scripture says that there is no way to the father except through Jesus, that Jesus' death upon the cross saved us from our sins and gave us the chance to know God. Why do you think that Jesus said while on the cross: "My God, why hast thou forsaken me?” It is because that is when Jesus took on the sin of the world. God cannot look at sin. If you believe that we do not need a savior, then all I can do is pray for you, since you are missing the most important reason why Jesus came to earth. Just because the actual word is not mentioned does not mean that Jesus is not our savior. Of all the words used like man’s salvation and Jesus died for us all points us to see that Jesus dies so we can have a personal relationship with God, so we can have forgiveness of sins. I can go on forever. Psalm 22:27 says that all shall be blessed in Christ Jesus. I pray that God will show you that we do need a savior and that through Jesus we have been given that. I also pray that you are deceived when you say that the Devil does not exist. Even from the very beginning in scripture God warns that the Devil is a roaring lion looking for who he can consume. Jesus is the savior we all need to help us in our daily walk and understand the temptations and to live our lives the way God wills us to. I pray that the Spirit of God will show you the true meaning of what Jesus our Lord and Savior really means. Answer: Dear Michael, I wrestled long before deciding to use your letter in the Q&A section of my column. I sense an obvious sincerity in your words and a concern for me that I appreciate. At the same time, Michael, your letter reveals a serious lack of theological understanding and a very childlike misunderstanding of what the Bible is all about. I have no desire to point this out to you since it is clear that you, with your level of knowledge, will not understand anything I say. I also find no pleasure in attacking you in public, but the fact is that you made these issues public by your letter and by doing so you have opened the door to the possibility that you might be ready to grow and to learn. On that assumption I have chosen to respond to your public letter in this column. Let me begin by saying that your letter makes all kinds of assumptions that are typical of those who have confused a version of evangelical fundamentalism with Christianity. I can understand why, given your presuppositions, you are puzzled that I do not need a savior. You clearly do not understand that what I reject is a literal understanding of the ancient Hebrew myths that suggest that human life has fallen into “original sin.” Because of this I do not think that “savior” language is either meaningful or necessary. I see no evidence in the study of human origins that human life was ever created perfect only to fall into sin as the stories in the book of Genesis suggest.. What I do see is overwhelming data to support the idea that human life has evolved from single cell simplicity into self-conscious complexity over the 3.8 billion years that we now know that life in some form has been on this planet. If that is so, I believe Jesus needs to be understood as empowering us to become more deeply and fully human, not as a divinely sent invader who came to save us from our sins. No, Jesus is not the same as God. That is biblical non-sense. Even the doctrine of the Trinity was designed to prevent so simplistic an identification. In the gospels we are told that Jesus prayed. Was he talking to himself? We are told that Jesus died. Can God die and still be God? To suggest, as you do, that the Old Testament tells of the coming of the savior or that Psalm 22:27 speaks of Jesus is nothing more than a Christian misreading of the messianic hope of Israel. Only John’s gospel contains the claim that Jesus is the only way to God and for that to be used as a justification for religious triumphalism and imperialism, as you seem eager to do, is to do a grave injustice to the Fourth Gospel. The prayer, “My God, why have you forsaken me?” occurs only in Mark and Matthew. These authors are actually quoting Psalm 22, a psalm that early Christians used to provide content to the first narrative of the cross, which was not written, you need to know, until more than forty years after the crucifixion. It is not an eye-witness report. Luke and John, who wrote some 20 to 25 years after Mark, both omit that saying from the cross so that we must assume that they did not see it as Jesus taking on the sin of the world. Each of these later gospel writers adds other sayings that were supposed to have been said by Jesus from the cross about which neither Mark nor Matthew seemed to be aware and neither Luke nor John contains a saying from the cross that the other includes. So, given this conflict we have grave doubts that any of the words attributed to Jesus from the cross were ever spoken by him. I welcome your prayers for me, but your religious judgment, based on your total lack of biblical knowledge, renders these prayers as little more than pious insincerity. Your real agenda is to affirm your own religious authority, which, based upon your limited knowledge, is hardly inspiring or impressive. I have been a Christian all of my life and have served as a priest in my church for 21 years and as an elected bishop for 24 years. Yes, I have been wrong lots of times, but escaping the fundamentalism of my childhood was not one of those times. I walk the Christ path daily and I trust it will carry me into the mystery of God, the God who is ultimately real and yet who is beyond all of the pious formulas that religious people have tried to place on the Ultimate and Holy One; and no, I do not believe that Jesus died for my sins, nor am I attracted to that guilt producing, God destroying kind of pious rhetoric. ~John Shelby Spong Announcements Any questions or concerns, please contact us at support(a)johnshelbyspong.com or 503-236-3545. Copyright © 2012 ProgressiveChristianity.org, All rights reserved. You are receiving this email because you have a membership at our website. 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The old Order passing away
by Sunny Walker 26 Sep '12

26 Sep '12

First, a reflection on Ellery - as a young and inexperienced Global Prior, Ellery was one of the ones who was gracious enough to let me learn from my mistakes without rancor and yet with continued nourishing support. Just her face was a human support mechanism. She spiritually nourished me and we rarely even spoke. And with mortality on my mind as so many saints are called home, knowing you have gone with God, I will let go a bit of the anticipation of my own return. For Carol, while there are many, many memories: one that popped to the top was the time we were at the IERD in Delhi and had boarded the VERY tiny elevator on the top floor (about the 22nd as I recall) of the hotel where we were housed. We pushed the button for the ground floor and about a third of the way down, the elevator shuddered to a stop and the door opened.on a brick wall. Well, I was a little claustrophobic and unaware that Carol was extremely claustrophobic. That hour waiting to be rescued (it could have been 15 minutes, but seemed like SEVERAL hours) was revealing of the wondrous woman of steel (Superman move over) who kept us breathing and laughing to avoid injuring ourselves in the mad panic of fear that sets in when you MUST get OUT and you cannot. Clearly our circumstances were not our problem. While in "Heaven," do a few cartwheels for me, my dear, as I know we both would enjoy them. Sunny Sunny Walker SunWalker Enterprises 303-587-3017 (cell) 303-671-0704 (home/office) sunwalker(a)comcast.net Aurora, CO No mattter how far you've gone down the wrong road, turn back. ~ Turkish Proverb

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