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11/20/17, Spong/Vosper: The Season of Relief; Spong: Insights from Finland
by Ellie Stock via OE 20 Apr '17

20 Apr '17

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target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="http://johnshelbyspong.us2.list-manage.com/track/click?u=b51b9cf441b059bb23…">Homepage</a> <a style="color: #4487cf;text-decoration: none;" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="http://johnshelbyspong.us2.list-manage.com/track/click?u=b51b9cf441b059bb23…">My Profile</a> <a style="color: #4487cf;text-decoration: none;" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="http://johnshelbyspong.us2.list-manage.com/track/click?u=b51b9cf441b059bb23…">Essay Archive</a> <a style="color: #4487cf;text-decoration: none;" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="http://johnshelbyspong.us2.list-manage.com/track/click?u=b51b9cf441b059bb23…">Message Boards</a> <a style="color: #4487cf;text-decoration: none;" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="http://johnshelbyspong.us2.list-manage1.com/track/click?u=b51b9cf441b059bb2…">Calendar</a></h5></td> </tr> </tbody></table> </td> </tr> <tr> <td align="center" valign="top"> <table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" width="600" id="aolmail_templateBody"> <tbody><tr> <td valign="top" class="aolmail_bodyContent" style="background-color: #ffffff;"> <table border="0" cellpadding="20" cellspacing="0" width="100%"> <tbody><tr> <td valign="top"> <div style="color: #000000;font-family: Georgia;font-size: 16px;line-height: 150%;text-align: left;"><h1 style="color: #003d4a;display: block;font-family: Georgia;font-size: 34px;font-weight: normal;line-height: 100%;margin-top: 0;margin-right: 0;margin-bottom: 10px;margin-left: 0;text-align: left;">The Season of Relief</h1> <h3 class="aolmail_null" style="color: #4487cf;display: block;font-family: Georgia;font-size: 26px;font-weight: normal;line-height: 100%;margin-top: 0;margin-right: 0;margin-bottom: 10px;margin-left: 0;text-align: left;">By Gretta Vosper</h3> <p><a style="color: #4487cf;font-weight: normal;text-decoration: underline;" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="http://"><img align="left" alt="Gretta Vosper" class="aolmail_wp-image-49753 aolmail_alignleft" height="154" style="border: 0px;width: 125px;height: 154px;margin: 0px 10px 0px 0px;font-size: 14px;font-weight: bold;line-height: 100%;outline: none;text-decoration: none;text-transform: capitalize;display: inline;" width="125" src="https://johnshelbyspong.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/Gretta-Vosper-copy-2…"></a>The calendars we give and receive as Christmas gifts – Sudoku-a-Day desk tear-offs, or expensive, hang-on-the-wall art photography – don’t pay much heed to the Christian calendar aside from noting its two largest festivals – Christmas and Easter – and helping retailers take advantage of a few minor ones – Valentine’s, St. Patrick’s, and Hallowe’en. Denominational church calendars fill in more of the blanks, but we all know that the year we follow starts on the first of January, a bleak and dreary date in the northern hemisphere and a riot of colour and beauty in the southern. I don’t know anyone who hangs up a calendar that starts the first day of Advent and marks their year in the way Christians once did long ago. Of course, I don’t know any monks. Perhaps they do.</p> <p>The Christian calendar moves the church through a series of festivals and seasons beginning with Advent at the very end of November or the beginning of December and concluding three hundred and sixty-some days later with the celebration of the Reign of Christ. And then it starts all over again. Whether the calendar was established to deepen the faith and devotion of the simple Christian or came into being as an elaborate, guided tour through the narratives and, thus, the theology of the Christian faith, there are others better equipped to discuss than I. Bishop Spong, for that matter, has explored liturgy – Christian and Hebrew – on many occasions and drawn rich conclusions regarding the story behind the story, revelations that most Christians do not know. <em>Liberating the Gospels: Reading the Bible with Jewish Eyes: Freeing Jesus from 2,000 Years of Misunderstanding</em> is an engaging exploration of the rolling back of the gospel stories over the Hebrew liturgical calendar. It is a fascinating read.</p> <p>Technically, as many of you may know, Easter is so much more than Easter Sunday. We merely enter the <em>season</em> of Easter on that day. After that, we fall victim to the stronghold commercial calendars have on the naming of the year and live as though Easter’s over and done with. Oddly, considering the potential for extended chocolate sales, the commercial world never alludes to the fact that Easter lasts for fifty days and covers seven Sundays. Indeed, until mainline denominations began to show more interest in liturgy in the mid-seventies, I don’t think many self-respecting Protestants would have been able to tell you how long Easter lasts, even if they did notice the absence of a Prayer of Confession for several weeks.</p> <p>Is the Meaning of Easter Getting a Little Fuzzy?</p> <p>I recall driving some years ago past this clever quip on the sign outside a church not far from my own. Word on the street now has it that the church, the local outlet of another mainline denomination, is within months, if not weeks, of closing. Who knew the sign would prove to be more ironic than clever? The use of one of the classic attacks on liberal Christianity by her conservative big brothers – that it isn’t doctrinally pure enough – may very possibly be what has resulted in the congregation’s own demise. As liberal Christianity moved further and further away from literal belief in the stories that framed its original doctrine, a journey that kept pace with its social embrace of reason, younger generations no longer found Sunday mornings in church services still couched in classical theology a meaningful use of their time. Church closures at the dying edge of too many missing generations are one of the more obvious results.</p> <p><strong>Seasonal Mania</strong></p> <p>I know Easter preparation and survival well and I know the challenges of leaning into liturgies with which I do not resonate and trying to infuse them with new life. Lent isn’t just about penitence and seeking forgiveness. It isn’t just about wandering through the wilderness and seeking a new way. It is the great prelude to Holy Week. To Palm Sunday, Maundy Thursday, and Good Friday. It is about building the drama and coming up with new ways to make it come alive. It is about (sometimes real) donkeys and crosses and all the lead-up to rolled away stones. There’s a lot of drama building during Lent. For clergy creatives, it was as bad as Christmas, which simply means “a disaster waiting to happen.” One of my church secretaries used to get so high-strung during these periods in the Christian calendar that I stopped requiring bulletins for any of the extra services. It didn’t help. Her anxiety was most likely a manifestation of my own.</p> <p>I remember a Good Friday service that had gone on longer than expected. The organist took it upon himself to speed it up a bit, playing “O Sacred Head, Sore Wounded” at a pace faster than any Christian hymn I’ve ever heard. He literally trilled his way through it. I was devastated. The service had been perfect right down to the very last piece. He had destroyed the whole thing.</p> <p>And then there was the Maundy Thursday Tenebrae service during which the hall was reverently stripped of all decoration and the lights completely extinguished, perfectly in synch with trays of candles previously imbued with deep meaning. I’d marked the light switches carefully so that the last spotlight glared baldly down on the thirty-foot-tall steel cross suspended above the congregation. But one whole bank of lights, I realized too late, didn’t have a switch on the inside of the hall. You needed to be outside to turn that bank off. So the when it got down to the last minute, instead of the drama of a single light illuminating the cross and then, bam, utter darkness, it was the cross illuminated and then, bam, one side of the sanctuary still bathed in light. I wept all the way home.</p> <p>I spent one whole season of Lent developing an art installation that grew and changed each week. Starting with two plain purple banners, I first added black vines with twisted paper on each, then joined them across the space in between. Eventually, thorns appeared on the vines and then, the whole thing was draped in black for Good Friday. Easter morning, I had to stand outside the building as the installation was completed. I was so nervous, I thought I was going to throw up. Two brave volunteers tore the black drape from the wall to reveal golden banners covered with Sunday School crafted lilies. Nothing crashed to the floor. Everything went as planned. But I was a wreck. The next year, a permanent fabric sculpture was installed. You have no idea the relief I felt.</p> <p><strong>Maniac Analysis </strong></p> <p>What was all that about? Why the need to be ever more dramatic, ever more artistic, ever more ever more? My craziness came down to one simple reality, as much of our craziness often does. It was easier to worry about the art installation or the choreography or the music than it was to face the truth. I didn’t believe the Easter story. It was that simple. I created huge distractions so that no one, not even I, would notice that, when it came to the biblical story, the lengthy reading of the passion narrative, the Easter hymns, the rock and the empty tomb, I believed none of it.</p> <p>For my liberal and progressive colleagues, surviving Easter is a major dilemma. We’ve studied critical contemporary theology and been challenged by all the big Christian festivals to line up a poorly-known human Jesus alongside the biblical claims made about his divine alter-ego. These high holy days eat holes in clergy consciences, though many struggle as I did, oblivious to the underlying source of their anxiety. Stress levels skyrocket, diversionary tactics abound, and congregations swell and disappear with the Christmas and Easter crowds who leave delighted by the fanfare and often none the wiser.</p> <p><strong>Brought to Our Knees</strong></p> <p>Most of the time, the biblical narrative is not an issue. Much of it shares ageless wisdom about how we should live (though much of that is very wrong) and the rest lays a people’s history alongside the passage of ancient time. But Christmas and Easter are particularly difficult because at these very crucial moments in the Christian calendar, the biblical narrative lines up literally alongside doctrine many of us no longer embrace. So when Easter is all over, we sink to our knees, not in prayer, but in mental and emotional exhaustion and move, gratefully, into the longest and newest season on the Christian calendar: the Season of Relief. There, we get to relax through the many weeks between Easter and the renewed challenges of Christmas.</p> <p>The dissonance with which leaders in liberal and progressive branches of Christianity live exacts a great cost to themselves, their congregants, and Christianity in general. Held fast by expectations we believe our congregations have, we neglect the very real human narratives that underlie the biblical story of passion, death, and resurrection. In the decades of our doing so, we have driven ourselves near crazy, watched generations abandon the church and us (let’s face it, we take that personally), and compromised the very real good our faith tradition might have continued to do. We have sealed our own passion away. It’s time that tomb broke open.</p> <p><strong>An Endless Season</strong></p> <p>It took more than a few deep breaths, no small amount of naivete, and an engaged and educated congregation to get me through the shift that freed me of the stress of my high holy perfectionism and allows me to lead every Sunday, all year long, in the Season of Relief. Together with my congregation, we explored and unearthed the human drama of Easter – dream, celebration, devastation, new dream – and tell it each year, still a bit manic on the production side, but lived without any sense of dissonance or delusion.</p> <p>Turning ourselves into love for the world is too great and all-consuming a task to compromise it by perceived obligation to the images, stories, and metaphors a people, long ago, used to inspire that very same work. We are to create our own stories, our own rituals, our own narratives of passion for our own time. Only in the Season of Relief, away from suffocating expectation, do we have the perspective and the space to consider how we might better do that.</p> <p>Welcome to that season and to this exhilarating work.</p> <p>~Gretta Vosper</p> <p>Read Online <a target="_blank" style="color: #4487cf;font-weight: normal;text-decoration: underline;" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="http://johnshelbyspong.us2.list-manage.com/track/click?u=b51b9cf441b059bb23…">Here</a> <strong>About the Author</strong></p> <p>The Rev. Gretta Vosper is a United Church of Canada minister who is an atheist. Her best selling books include <a style="color: #4487cf;font-weight: normal;text-decoration: underline;" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="http://johnshelbyspong.us2.list-manage.com/track/click?u=b51b9cf441b059bb23…"><em>With or Without God: Why The Way We Live is More Important Than What We Believe</em></a>, and <a style="color: #4487cf;font-weight: normal;text-decoration: underline;" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="http://johnshelbyspong.us2.list-manage.com/track/click?u=b51b9cf441b059bb23…"><em>Amen: What Prayer Can Mean in a World Beyond Belief</em></a>. She has also published three books of poetry and prayers.</p> </div> </td> </tr> </tbody></table> <table border="0" cellpadding="20" cellspacing="0" width="100%"> <tbody><tr> <td valign="top"> <div style="color: #000000;font-family: Georgia;font-size: 16px;line-height: 150%;text-align: left;"><hr> <h2 style="color: #4487cf;display: block;font-family: Georgia;font-size: 30px;font-weight: normal;line-height: 100%;margin-top: 0;margin-right: 0;margin-bottom: 10px;margin-left: 0;text-align: left;">Question & Answer</h2> <p><span style="font-size:18px">Andrea from Atlanta, GA writes:</span></p> <h4 style="color: #4487cf;display: block;font-family: Georgia;font-size: 22px;font-weight: normal;line-height: 100%;margin-top: 0;margin-right: 0;margin-bottom: 10px;margin-left: 0;text-align: left;">Question:</h4> <p>How does the death of Jesus 2000 years ago save me? What is the substitutionary doctrine of the atonement?</p> <h4 style="color: #4487cf;display: block;font-family: Georgia;font-size: 22px;font-weight: normal;line-height: 100%;margin-top: 0;margin-right: 0;margin-bottom: 10px;margin-left: 0;text-align: left;">Answer: <span style="font-size:20px">By Cassandra Farrin</span></h4> <p><img alt="Cassandra Farrin" class="aolmail_size-full aolmail_wp-image-49713 aolmail_alignleft" height="125" style="border: 0px;width: 125px;height: 125px;margin: 0px 10px 0px 0px;float: left;font-size: 14px;font-weight: bold;line-height: 100%;outline: none;text-decoration: none;text-transform: capitalize;display: inline;" width="125" src="https://johnshelbyspong.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/Cassandra-Farrin.jpg">Dear Andrea,</p> <p>Thanks for this challenging question! The standard definition of substitutionary atonement is that Jesus, as God’s son, fully human and fully divine, took the sin and corruption permeating the world upon himself and was sacrificed on the cross like a lamb on the altar. He did this as a radical act of divine intervention to rescue the world from darkness.</p> <p>If you go hunting in the Bible for the explanation I just gave, you won’t really find it there. It is an amalgamation of many different statements and stories from the sacred texts of the Christian and Jewish traditions. Actually one of the best places to read and thoroughly understand the Christian concept of substitutionary atonement, ironically, is John Bunyan’s 17th-century work <em>Pilgrim’s Progress</em>, or the children’s version, <em>Dangerous Journey</em>, as abridged by Oliver Hunkin in 1985. A man named Christian embarks on a journey to remove a terrible burden, which only leaves him after the following encounter as recounted in <em>Dangerous Journey</em>:</p> <p><span style="color:#FFFFFF">.<em>.........</em></span><em>At the foot of a hill, he passed an open tomb. Then up again, <span style="color:#FFFFFF">..........</span>upon a little knoll, he found himself beneath a wayside cross. <span style="color:#FFFFFF">..........</span>And as its shadow fell across him, so suddenly the burden, <span style="color:#FFFFFF">..........</span>slipping from his shoulders, fell from off his back. It tumbled <span style="color:#FFFFFF">..........</span>down the hill, it tumbled into the mouth of the tomb. It was <span style="color:#FFFFFF">..........</span>never seen again.</em></p> <p>The vision continues from there, but it’s important to see that this idea of atonement is not due to the work of the person but is envisioned as a gift freely given to those who seek it. All Christian had to do was set out on his journey, and once he did, the relief from his burden came almost as a surprise—an unforeseen event. Christian’s journey is not even close to finished at this point in the narrative, as he still has to make his way to the heavenly city without returning to the old life with the old burdens (sin), but it is clear that the moment of freedom was not the result of his own actions.</p> <p>When I was a teenager attending a Pentecostal church, one of our youth ministers created a vivid “choose your own adventure” game based on this and the works of C. S. Lewis to help instill the message in our young minds. Do I believe in this anymore? Well, no. I hate that it requires God to be so rigid and punishing, an old-world being that demands an old-world sacrifice in blood. Also, I think it fundamentally misunderstands corruption. Decay is a natural element of creation. Decay is an underpinning of life. We literally are born out of the destruction of what came before us, carrying with us the energy of the past lives of other entities, both living and nonliving. I think our biggest mistake (like the Apostle Paul) is in collapsing <em>moral</em> corruption with <em>physical</em> corruption. That’s a necessary assumption of atonement theology, and I can’t go along with it.</p> <p>What I do believe and <em>will</em> carry forward from this childhood belief I held, is that we can find relief from our burdens in this life. We do not have to cling to and carry our vices and our failures as <em>burdens</em> with us into every new relationship and situation. We can carry them in other ways, such as a commitment to do better next time, but we don’t have to remain shackled. And sometimes, amazingly and wonderfully, we are unshackled by free acts of love done on our behalf by others. If we can be that person for someone else, too, we should.</p> <p>~ Cassandra Farrin</p> <p>Read and Share Online <a target="_blank" style="color: #4487cf;font-weight: normal;text-decoration: underline;" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="http://johnshelbyspong.us2.list-manage.com/track/click?u=b51b9cf441b059bb23…">Here</a></p> <p><strong>About the Author</strong></p> <p>Cassandra Farrin is the marketing director of the <a style="color: #4487cf;font-weight: normal;text-decoration: underline;" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="http://johnshelbyspong.us2.list-manage.com/track/click?u=b51b9cf441b059bb23…">Westar Institute</a> and the editor of Polebridge Press. Her poetic retelling of the Nag Hammadi text On the Origin of the World is forthcoming in <em>Gender Violence, Rape Culture, and Religion</em> (Palgrave Macmillan). A US-UK Fulbright Scholar with more than ten years' experience with cross-cultural and interfaith engagement, she has an M.A. in Religious Studies from Lancaster University (England) and a B.A. in Religious Studies from Willamette University.</p> <hr> <h3 class="aolmail_null" style="text-align: center;color: #4487cf;display: block;font-family: Georgia;font-size: 26px;font-weight: normal;line-height: 100%;margin-top: 0;margin-right: 0;margin-bottom: 10px;margin-left: 0;"> <strong>Bishop John Shelby Spong Revisited</strong></h3> <div style="text-align: center;color: #000000;font-family: Georgia;font-size: 16px;line-height: 150%;"><strong><span style="font-size:24px"><span style="font-family:georgia,times,times new roman,serif">Insights from Finland</span></span></strong> </div> <div style="text-align: left;color: #000000;font-family: Georgia;font-size: 16px;line-height: 150%;"><img align="left" height="106" style="border: 0px;width: 100px;height: 106px;margin: 0px 10px 0px 0px;font-size: 14px;font-weight: bold;line-height: 100%;outline: none;text-decoration: none;text-transform: capitalize;display: inline;" width="100" src="https://gallery.mailchimp.com/b51b9cf441b059bb232418480/images/84fbd945-363…">Finland is a beautiful country, bounded on the west by Scandinavia, the east by Russia, the north by the Arctic Circle and the south by the Baltic Sea. Its five million ethnically diverse people include Laplanders, central Europeans and Russians. The Finnish language is closely related to the language of Hungary. Historically Finland has been a pawn, passing back and forth between the ancient kingdoms of Sweden and Russia. As a relatively new independent state, it has always been a social democracy. Women now serve this EU member state as prime minister, president and chief justice. I had a chance to visit Finland this past month. It was exciting for me for two reasons. First, Finland has always projected a favorable image. It was extolled as “the only nation in the world that repaid its World War I loans,” and it won my boyish admiration when its brave army, whose soldiers fought on skis in white camouflaged uniforms designed to blend into the snow, held off the army of the Soviet Union in 1939. Second this trip to Finland offered me an opportunity to test a proposition that I had long suspected about the vitality of the Christian Church. Part of the Church’s propaganda about itself is that it seeks unity in obedience to Jesus’ high priestly prayer recorded in the 17th chapter of John’s Gospel, “that they all may be one as you, Father, and I are one.” However, my reading of Church History suggests that when the church is monolithic it spawns things like the Inquisition that sought to remove any non-conformist idea. Heretics were burned at the stake to preserve the myth of unity. When that monolithic power was broken in the Reformation the first effect was a century of religious wars as Protestants and Catholics tried to recover their dream of religious unity by imposing a single religious system, their own, on all people whether they wanted it or not. A willingness to tolerate diversity was quite impossible with each side claiming to be the “only true Church of God.” Given the wide range of human personalities, tastes, cultures and life styles, I always wondered why there could not be multiple paths by which people could walk into the mystery of God. My reading of history also suggested to me that wherever the Christian Church spoke with a single voice it became less vital, less alive and more corrupt. I had earlier had an opportunity to test this proposition in the monochromatic Roman Catholic country of Belgium. Now Finland was going to offer me the opportunity to test that premise in a monochromatic Protestant country. Observing Christianity’s decline, especially in the West, it seems to me that this decline is most pronounced in those nations where there are no competing voices. At the invitation of a Roman Catholic monastic, I went to Belgium last year to meet with his order, to lecture at the University of Ghent and to have conversations with teachers on a theological faculty where Roman Catholic priests were trained. In Belgium the Roman Catholic Church is dominant to the point of exclusivity. So powerful is its Catholic identity that religion was the principle reason that the Netherlands and Belgium became separate nations in the 19th century. Belgium could unify its Dutch speaking Catholic constituency with its French speaking Catholic constituency far more easily than the nation could combine Dutch-speaking Catholics with Dutch-speaking Protestants. What I found, however, in this religiously uniform nation was a dying church. The four churches nearest to the University of Ghent, that had once been vital and filled, were today almost empty and their congregations quite elderly. Few priests remain to serve even these small numbers. The average age of the priests and nuns in Belgium has moved above 70. The theological college, where I met with faculty who trained future priests, had not graduated a single ordinand since 1998. At that moment there was not a candidate for ordination in the entire pipeline. The theological faculty was thus, for all practical purposes, unemployed, though they continued to draw their stipends from the State. By every measure the Christian Church in Belgium was dying and the depression among its leaders was palpable. The rest of Europe revealed a similar picture in other monolithic Roman Catholic nations. Germany, on the other hand, divided generally between the Roman Catholic South and the Protestant North, has in the last century produced world-class theologians and biblical scholars such as Rudolf Bultmann, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Paul Tillich, Emil Bruner and Hans Kung. The Netherlands has tension between its Protestant and Catholic constituencies and traditionally has encouraged freethinking and debate. The Vatican keeps trying to suppress this rebellious quality expressed in such people as radical New Testament Catholic Scholar Edward Schillebeekx, who though actually a citizen of Belgium enjoys the protection of the more open Dutch Catholic Church. The United Kingdom has religious divisions that are real with Presbyterian Scotland, Anglican England and the religious tensions in Northern Ireland, where Protestants seeks to remain on the island that Catholics believe belongs to them. Yet within England, even with its established Church, there is a vibrant Roman Catholic and Free Church presence, to say nothing of growing numbers within the immigrant population, who are adherents of Islam, Buddhism and Hinduism. Charles, the Prince of Wales, created an enormous public debate several years ago when he announced that as king he hoped to be “the defender of faiths not the defender of The Faith.” I think it is fair to say that Christianity is more vital in these nations where religious pluralism exists than it is in Belgium where religion is uniform and monolithic. So Finland which claims a 96 per cent identity with Lutheranism, intrigued me. Does being a monolithic Protestant country make a difference? If the same problem that I saw in Belgium is also present in Finland, would it not say something negative about religious uniformity, no matter what the dominant religion is? Finnish Lutheran leaders told me that the Lutheran Church of Finland is in a serious decline. Less than 4% of Finland’s citizens ever darken the church doors. That 4%, I was later told, included worshippers who attended weddings, funerals and baptisms, reducing the Sunday worshippers to something closer to 1%. The Lutheran Bishops were portrayed to me as managers of a declining institution. With one notable exception, their primary concern, I was told, was preserving the unity of their decreasing membership. That still observant core reflected a rather conservative fundamentalist attitude, and were greatly disturbed at the prospect that someone might actually challenge their presuppositions and think outside the box of their particular dogmatism. I discovered that merely my presence, plus the fact that I had been invited to address something called “Church Days,” an annual event of the Lutheran Church of Finland, was a source of great controversy in the religious press weeks before my arrival. I was amazed first, that I was even known and, secondly, that I was considered controversial and threatening to the religious status quo. None of my books had yet been translated into Finnish, yet before my plane had landed, the debate was real. The result was intense media coverage, including a twenty-minute interview on Finland’s version of “Good Morning America” or similar programs in England, Australia, Canada and New Zealand. When I addressed the Lutheran “Church Days” audience, it was three times the usual gathering. The Sunday morning church attendance where I preached was far larger than usual. Tension obviously creates vitality and interest. Controversy is not destructive, it is a life sign. That was my learning. The primary difference between the dying monolithic Catholicism of Belgium and the dying monolithic Protestantism of Finland was not that one was less dead than the other. On that score there was little difference. It was rather that in Protestant Finland, which was less autocratic and less punitive of deviation, it was demonstrably easier to challenge a moribund hierarchy in a Protestant setting than it is in a Catholic setting. There is in the Protestant system less ability to stifle discussion or to penalize those who want to chart a different vision. In Belgium I found a defeated theological faculty who appeared to have no options. They complained of powerlessness but did nothing. In Finland I found a feisty group of minority voices unwilling to watch their faith die without a struggle and people whose vision for a revitalized, engaged Lutheran church would not allow their silence. My conclusions thus challenge the common wisdom of church people. Dominance is not a virtue. Unity is not a desirable goal. Competitive voices for Christ are a sign of hope that give rise to visions that will challenge old stereotypes. The quest for unity is revealed as little more than an institutional power game. It is not a sign of life. Controversy is a necessary gateway into growth. Diversity is resisted only when security and not truth has become the unconscious goal of entrenched religious systems. What wonderful insights to be gained from a brief visit to beautiful Finland. ~John Shelby Spong Originally published June 11, 2003</div> </div> </td> </tr> </tbody></table> <table border="0" cellpadding="20" cellspacing="0" width="100%"> <tbody><tr> <td valign="top"> <div style="color: #000000;font-family: Georgia;font-size: 16px;line-height: 150%;text-align: left;"><hr> <h2 style="color: #4487cf;display: block;font-family: Georgia;font-size: 30px;font-weight: normal;line-height: 100%;margin-top: 0;margin-right: 0;margin-bottom: 10px;margin-left: 0;text-align: left;">Announcements</h2> As we count down to <a target="_blank" style="color: #4487cf;font-weight: normal;text-decoration: underline;" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="http://johnshelbyspong.us2.list-manage.com/track/click?u=b51b9cf441b059bb23…">Embrace Festival</a> think about joining your friends at ProgressiveChristianity.org for one day, two or just an evening of socializing! <div style="text-align: center;color: #000000;font-family: Georgia;font-size: 16px;line-height: 150%;"><a style="color: #4487cf;font-weight: normal;text-decoration: underline;" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="http://johnshelbyspong.us2.list-manage.com/track/click?u=b51b9cf441b059bb23…"><img height="333" style="border: 0px;width: 500px;height: 333px;margin: 0px;font-size: 14px;font-weight: bold;line-height: 100%;outline: none;text-decoration: none;text-transform: capitalize;display: inline;" width="500" src="https://gallery.mailchimp.com/b51b9cf441b059bb232418480/images/0fe13b45-6a5…"></a></div> <p style="text-align: center;">Click here to go to Embrace Festival <a target="_blank" style="color: #4487cf;font-weight: normal;text-decoration: underline;" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="http://johnshelbyspong.us2.list-manage2.com/track/click?u=b51b9cf441b059bb2…">website</a>/sign up for <a target="_blank" style="color: #4487cf;font-weight: normal;text-decoration: underline;" rel="noopener noreferrer" href="http://johnshelbyspong.us2.list-manage.com/track/click?u=b51b9cf441b059bb23…">email list</a></p> </div> </td> </tr> </tbody></table> </td> </tr> </tbody></table> </td> </tr> <tr> <td align="center" valign="top"> <table border="0" cellpadding="10" cellspacing="0" width="600" id="aolmail_templateFooter" style="background-color: #FDFDFD;border-top: 0;"> <tbody><tr> <td valign="top" class="aolmail_footerContent"> <table border="0" cellpadding="10" cellspacing="0" width="100%"> <tbody><tr> <td colspan="2" valign="middle" id="aolmail_social" style="background-color: #FAFAFA;border: 0;"> <div style="color: #707070;font-family: Arial;font-size: 12px;line-height: 125%;text-align: center;"></div></td></tr><tr><td colspan="2" valign="middle" id="aolmail_utility" style="background-color: #FDFDFD;border: 1px dashed #d3d3d3;"><div style="color: #707070;font-family: Arial;font-size: 12px;line-height: 125%;text-align: center;"><div class="aolmail_vcard"><div class="aolmail_adr"><div class="aolmail_street-address"></div></div></div></div></td></tr><tr><td colspan="2" valign="middle" id="aolmail_utility"><div style="color: #707070;font-family: Arial;font-size: 12px;line-height: 125%;text-align: left;"></div></td></tr></tbody></table></td></tr></tbody></table></td></tr></tbody></table></td></tr></tbody></table></center><center><table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" width="100%" id="aolmail_canspamBarWrapper" style="background-color:#FFFFFF; border-top:1px solid #E5E5E5;"><tbody><tr><td align="center" valign="top" style="padding-top:20px; padding-bottom:20px;"> </td></tr></tbody></table></center></div> </div> <style type="text/css">#AOLMsgPart_2_614aa880-b533-4ddd-a7e7-2bc1cac79b46 td{color: black;} @media only screen and (max-width: 480px){ .aolReplacedBody table#aolmail_canspamBar td{font-size:14px !important;} .aolReplacedBody table#aolmail_canspamBar td a{display:block !important; margin-top:10px !important;} } </style>

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Easter Reflections
by John Epps via OE 19 Apr '17

19 Apr '17

Coming to terms with the meaning of the Easter story for us is difficult since times and world-views have changed. We find it difficult even to grasp what it meant for those who first told it, much less for us. Yet we are compelled to try by Paul’s admonition, “If Christ is not raised, then our faith is in vain.” (I Cor. 15:14) One factor in the story must be recognized: this is a tale of a bodily resurrection, not a “spiritual” one. The risen one takes pains to force people to touch his wounds and so dispel the notion of an ectoplasmic appearance. Whatever the implications, they are physical, this worldly. The second factor is that stories of dying and rising gods (or superheroes) were widespread throughout the Ancient Near East and ancient Greece. So what unique implications can we draw from the story that are important today? Another way to ask it is “Where today do we experience death and resurrection?” Both occur at the individual, natural, and corporate levels. A word about each: Lately I have “died” when the classes I have taught for 15 years were cancelled; I was “raised” when the University called on me for 3 new classes. The slow and painful death of a dear aunt was followed by a celebration honoring her life that brought back the wonder of her artistry and love. These may seem trivial examples but dramatize the dynamics in the story: Death/Resurrection happens to us all. In nature, “Resurrection” has long been a metaphor for the return of plant life in the Spring, at least in the Northern hemisphere. And certainly, the emergence of leaves on barren trees, of green in brown fields, and flowers from “dead” plants seem quite miraculous. At the corporate level, the death and dying dynamic seems much more obvious that does resurrection. Many of our hopes and dreams died with the November election. The horrors and complexity of the Middle East conflicts and the appearance of global warming both represent a death to life as we have known it. What resurrection will look like remains to be seen. Numerous efforts taken for environmental protection certainly mark an awakening to the need for change, but are faint heralds of a resurrected life. Numerous conferences aimed at achieving some sort of resolution of Middle East conflicts so far remain fruitless. As the story goes, it’s God who does the raising, not us. And when it occurs, it’s far beyond our expectations. As I have said elsewhere, “Humankind has unimaginable capacities to screw things up; yet Mystery generates unaccountable wonders out of our messes.” (*Theology of Surprise*, p. 39) Our current situation brings to mind a sermon that we heard in the Philippines during the last days of Marcos. It was entitled “It feels like Friday, but Sunday is A-Coming!” Whether we’re enmeshed in the death or the resurrection part of the dynamic, both are operative. That’s what Easter celebrates.

16 20

Easter
by Margaret Aiseayew via OE 17 Apr '17

17 Apr '17

I am always slow. My life is circumscribed by demands that don't fit the normal weekly schedule of most. I struggle with my small congregations and am intent on speaking to them of the reality of their faith in the world we live in. This was my Easter witness. If you are not interested, please delete. If you find theological error, please help me. Margaret Living in Christ Grace be unto you and Peace from God our Creator and the Lord Jesus Christ. This has been a week of formidable challenges. We have been compelled to live our lives in Jerusalem. Have you found yourself focusing on yourself in this journey or focusing on others and how they were managing the journey? For me, there has been some whiplash in this week. I am focusing on myself and then Peter denies Jesus. I really struggle with this one. If you try to think of what might have happened if he had not denied Jesus, I quickly end up in a morass where I wonder if we would even be here in the Church. Then again, denying Jesus? I have to wonder how I have denied Jesus this week-in every week? Am I a proclaimer or denier? It felt a bit to me this week like we got to watch the crucifixion first hand, and then thanks to the cameras in everyone's phone we got to watch it over and over. Do you know what I am talking about? The characters are almost all the same. Instead of the perfidious Roman government you have a business giant named United Airlines. This overly sanctified organization decided that four of its passengers must leave the plane. Three leave and one stays. He says he is a doctor and has patients to see the next morning. Just as the priests handed Jesus over to the Romans, so the pilot or stewards of the flight handed the passenger who said no over to the Chicago Police. The doctor was battered and drug off the plane. The passengers took pictures and screamed that it should stop, that the airline shouldn't be doing this. (If you listen carefully to all the replays you can hear more than one person saying, "Oh God! Oh, my God.") Some passengers were in tears. It has been said that some of the passengers became ill. The doctor ended up in the hospital. Were people praying to God? Were they cursing God for letting this happen? What were they saying with their "Oh God! Oh, my God." No one stood up and said, "Take me." No one said, "Here I am Lord, send me?" None of the officials of the airline suggested reconsidering the arrangement. The good doctor was left alone after he was drug to the lobby and he came back to the plane-bleeding profusely from his face. He stood holding on to the divider between the first and regular class sections of the plane. Did you hear what he said? "Just kill me." He stood there holding on to the partition and begging, "Just kill me." Then he was drug off a second time. No one of sound mind intervened. No one volunteered to bring any rationality to the situation. In the story we know, the people were given the option of choosing to release a different prisoner. They all chose to release Barabbas rather than Jesus. What does abba mean in the Bible? (Father) What does bar mean? (son of) They chose to release the son of God. How could it be that no one on that plane could see the doctor as a Child of God? How is it that no one found the courage to take responsibility for a situation they knew was wrong, negative, divisive and dehumanizing? A situation that was hurting everyone on the plane. At what point do we say, "Not my will, but thine?" At what point do we stand up to the Romans? What are we waiting for to know that it is time to stand up to the priests and Pharisees? You may be more than ready to say that I have carried this analogy too far. You may want to say that the doctor did not die. You may be wanting to remind me that the doctor has acquired a lawyer to sue the airlines. Imagine your life after this has happened to you. There have been millions of views through news organizations and You Tube. Once you are out of the hospital do you imagine that you can just go home and start seeing patients again? How do you get home? Do you have enough nerve to get on another airplane? I want to assure you that the crucifixion and resurrection are real. They are present in our world today. If we are moving through the world with our eyes open, we will see them. We have the opportunity to participate at any moment. We can say no (and yes) to the crucifixion through intervention. We can enable the resurrection, by being the neighbor prepared to lift another up. We need to see God in each person we meet. We need to love the God in ourselves so very much that we are not stopped by fear or anxiety or even the thought of what others might think. We need to love our Creator so completely that we are compelled to protect the God in others. Look around. This is where the journey to Jerusalem leads us. The challenges will always be formidable. Let us embrace God's blessings and face them together. In the times we are apart, pray for one another.

5 4

Easter Monday 2017
by James Wiegel via OE 17 Apr '17

17 Apr '17

There is a line, in the 5th City Video, by Harold Washington while he is dedicating the shopping center. Something happens off camera -- a bus or something goes by -- causing him to stop and laugh, and he shakes his head and comments, "Nothing like being Mayor of Chicago!" Thanks for the Easter posts -- Nothing like being on these wedgeblade listserves . . . and a quote read by the lead musician yesterday: Is it any wonder people find it hard to believe in the resurrection of Jesus if we don't throw our hats in the air? Is it any wonder we find it hard to live the resurrection if we don't do it exuberantly in our worship?" -NT Wright Surprised By Hope Jim Wiegel Sent: Monday, April 17, 2017 4:35 AM Subject: Re: [Oe List ...] An Easter gift =20 Thank you for this witness, George. Among the many wisdom teachers, Jesus, = Buddha, Mohammad and many more, you are included.=C2=A0 Loving the continua= tion image of resurrection. Helps to embrace the sermons on promises of ete= rnal life. Peace, Judi White On Apr 16, 2017 6:53 PM, "George Holcombe via OE" <oe(a)lists.wedgeblade.net>= wrote: In our service this Easter morning at a Presbyterian church we sang a hymn = written by a Methodist (Jesus Christ is Risen Today) and a closing hymn by = a Muslim (Morning Has Broken) and following the Scripture reading of John 2= 0 this quote (below). A profound sermon, and a fuller understanding of the = idea of resurrection.Thich Nhat Hang, Zen monk"I think there's a way of tra= ining ourselves in order not to become the victim of fear and grief- that i= s to look deeply into ourselves and to see that we are made of non-self ele= ments. And when we look around ourselves, we can recognize ourselves in the= non-self elements, like a father looking at his children can see himself i= n his children, can see his continuation in his children. So he is not atta= ched to the idea that his body is the only thing that is him. He's more tha= n his body.He is inside of his body but he is also at the same (time) outsi= de of his body in many elements. And if we have the habit of looking like t= hat we will not be the victim of our attachment to one form of manifestatio= n, and we will be free. And that freedom makes happiness and peace possible= .. Other than meditation is there any specific practicer that can help you c= ome to this understanding?Yes. The Buddha advised us to bear in mind that e= verything is impermanent, that nothing has an absolute entity that remains = the same. And when we keep that insight in mind, we can see more deeply int= o the nature of reality, and we will not be locked in the notion that we ar= e only this body, this life span is the only life span we have. In fact, be= cause nothing can be by itself alone, no one can be by himself or herself a= lone, everyone has to inter-be with envy one else. That is why, when you lo= ok outside, around, you can see yourself. And when you look into yourself, = you can see the outside. So that is a training.=E2=80=9D George Holcombe geowanda1(a)me.com "Whatever the problem, community is=C2=A0the answer.=C2=A0 There is no powe= r greater=C2=A0than a community discovering what it=C2=A0cares about." =C2= =A0Margaret Wheatley On Apr 16, 2017, at 2:33 PM, Doris Hahn via OE <oe(a)lists.wedgeblade.net> wr= ote: >From Doris Hahn -=C2=A0 Pat Moriarty asked me to Pass this link along to you;so here it is: http://www.justathoughtbypat.c om/wp-admin/post.php?post=3D1913 &action=3De= dit ______________________________ _________________ OE mailing list OE(a)lists.wedgeblade.net http://lists.wedgeblade.net/ listinfo.cgi/oe-wedgeblade.net ______________________________ _________________ OE mailing list OE(a)lists.wedgeblade.net http://lists.wedgeblade.net/ listinfo.cgi/oe-wedgeblade.net _______________________________________________ OE mailing list OE(a)lists.wedgeblade.net http://lists.wedgeblade.net/listinfo.cgi/oe-wedgeblade.net =20 ------=_Part_1878509_1302938865.1492442344614 Content-Type: text/html; charset=UTF-8 Content-Transfer-Encoding: quoted-printable <html><head></head><body><div style=3D"color:#000; background-color:#fff; f= ont-family:Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, Lucida Grande, sans-serif;font= -size:16px"><div id=3D"yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1492441944070_6555"><span id=3D"yu= i_3_16_0_ym19_1_1492441944070_6554">There is a line, in the 5th City Video,= by Harold Washington while he is dedicating the shopping center.  Som= ething happens off camera -- a bus or something goes by -- causing him to s= top and laugh, and he shakes his head and comments, "Nothing like being May= or of Chicago!"</span></div><div id=3D"yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1492441944070_6555= "><span><br></span></div><div id=3D"yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1492441944070_6555"><= span id=3D"yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1492441944070_9047">Thanks for the Easter post= s -- Nothing like being on these wedgeblade list serves!!</span></div><div>= </div><div id=3D"yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1492441944070_6592"> </div><div id= =3D"yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1492441944070_6592"><div style=3D"font-family: "= Helvetica Neue", "Segoe UI", Helvetica, Arial, "Lucida = Grande", sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: normal; color: rgb(= 69, 69, 69);" id=3D"yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1492441944070_9215" dir=3D"ltr"><span= style=3D"font-size: 17pt;" id=3D"yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1492441944070_9216">. .= . and a quote from the lead musician yesterday:  "Is it any wonder pe= ople find it hard to believe in the resurrection of Jesus if we don=E2=80= =99t throw our hats in the air? Is it any wonder we find it hard to live th= e resurrection if we don=E2=80=99t do it exuberantly in our worship?"</span= ></div><div style=3D"font-family: "Helvetica Neue", "Segoe U= I", Helvetica, Arial, "Lucida Grande", sans-serif; font-size= : 13px; line-height: normal; color: rgb(69, 69, 69);" id=3D"yui_3_16_0_ym19= _1_1492441944070_9217"><span style=3D"font-size: 17pt;" id=3D"yui_3_16_0_ym= 19_1_1492441944070_9218"><br id=3D"yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1492441944070_9219"></= span></div><div style=3D"font-family: "Helvetica Neue", "Seg= oe UI", Helvetica, Arial, "Lucida Grande", sans-serif; font-= size: 13px; line-height: normal; color: rgb(69, 69, 69);" id=3D"yui_3_16_0_= ym19_1_1492441944070_9220"><span style=3D"font-size: 17pt;" id=3D"yui_3_16_= 0_ym19_1_1492441944070_9221">-NT Wright</span></div><div style=3D"font-fami= ly: "Helvetica Neue", "Segoe UI", Helvetica, Arial, &qu= ot;Lucida Grande", sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: normal; c= olor: rgb(69, 69, 69);" dir=3D"ltr" id=3D"yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1492441944070_9= 222"><span style=3D"font-size: 17pt;" id=3D"yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1492441944070= _9223">"Surprised By Hope"</span></div></div><div class=3D"signature" id=3D= "yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1492441944070_6622"><a rel=3D"nofollow" target=3D"_blank= " href=3D"http://partnersinparticipation.com/?page_id=3D123">Jim Wiegel</a>=  <br><div class=3D"MsoNormal" style=3D"margin-bottom:0.0001pt;" id=3D= "yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1492441944070_6624"><span style=3D"font-family:Helvetica= Neue, 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, 'Lucida Grande', sans-serif;line-= height:18.3999996185303px;background-color:rgb(255, 255, 255);" id=3D"yui_3= _16_0_ym19_1_1492441944070_6623">=E2=80=9CIf you want an adventure . . . wh= at a time to be alive!=E2=80=9D. Joanna Macy</span></div><br><span style=3D= "font-family:Arial, sans-serif;font-size:12pt;background-color:white;" id= =3D"yui_3_16_0_ym19_1_1492441944070_9327">401 North Beverly Way,Tolleson, A= rizona 85353</span><div class=3D"MsoNormal" style=3D"margin-bottom:0.0001pt= ;background:white;"><span style=3D"font-size:12pt;font-family:Arial, sans-s= erif;">623-363-3277</span><span style=3D"font-size:14.5pt;font-family:'Sego= e UI', sans-serif;"></span></div><div class=3D"MsoNormal" style=3D"margin-b= ottom:0.0001pt;background:white;"><span style=3D"font-size:14.5pt;font-fami= ly:Arial, sans-serif;"><a rel=3D"nofollow" target=3D"_blank" href=3D"mailto= :marilyn.oyler@gmail.com"><span style=3D"color:blue;">jfwiegel(a)yahoo.com</s= pan></a></span><span style=3D"font-size:14.5pt;font-family:'Segoe UI', sans= -serif;"></span></div><div class=3D"MsoNormal" style=3D"margin-bottom:0.000= 1pt;background:white;"><span style=3D"font-size:14.5pt;font-family:Arial, s= ans-serif;"><span style=3D"font-size:12.0pt;color:blue;"><a rel=3D"nofollow= " target=3D"_blank" href=3D"http://www.partnersinparticipation.com/">www.pa= rtnersinparticipation.com</a></span></span></div><br><div><div id=3D"yui_3_= 16_0_1_1423152614990_64964" style=3D"font-family:'Helvetica Neue', 'Segoe U= I', Helvetica, Arial, 'Lucida Grande', sans-serif;font-size:13px;background= -color:rgb(255, 255, 255);"><span id=3D"yui_3_16_0_1_1423152614990_64963"><= a rel=3D"nofollow" target=3D"_blank" href=3D"http://partnersinparticipation= ..com/?page_id=3D10">Upcoming ToP training opportunities in Arizona</a></spa= n></div><div id=3D"yui_3_16_0_1_1423152614990_64964" style=3D"font-family:'= Helvetica Neue', 'Segoe UI', Helvetica, Arial, 'Lucida Grande', sans-serif;= font-size:13px;background-color:rgb(255, 255, 255);"><br></div><div id=3D"y= ui_3_16_0_1_1423152614990_64969" style=3D"font-family:'Helvetica Neue', 'Se= goe UI', Helvetica, Arial, 'Lucida Grande', sans-serif;font-size:13px;backg= round-color:rgb(255, 255, 255);">More info on:</div><div id=3D"yui_3_16_0_1= _1423152614990_64976" style=3D"font-family:'Helvetica Neue', 'Segoe UI', He= lvetica, Arial, 'Lucida Grande', sans-serif;font-size:13px;background-color= :rgb(255, 255, 255);"><br></div></div><div><a rel=3D"nofollow" target=3D"_b= lank" href=3D"http://partnersinparticipation.com/?page_id=3D48">ToP=C2=AE F= acilitation Methods</a> </div><div><a rel=3D"nofollow" target=3D"_blan= k" href=3D"http://partnersinparticipation.com/?page_id=3D50">ToP=C2=AE Stra= tegic Planning</a>: </div><div><a rel=3D"nofollow" target=3D"_blank" h= ref=3D"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3DCz3mniiYCdI">Mastering the Technol= ogy of Participation</a>  </div><div><br></div><div><a rel=3D"nofollow= " target=3D"_blank" href=3D"http://www.top-training.net/">Register on line = / see the ToP National Schedule</a></div><div>AICP Planners: 14.5 CM for al= l ToP=C2=AE courses</div><div><br></div><div><a rel=3D"nofollow" target=3D"= _blank" href=3D"http://partnersinparticipation.com/?page_id=3D203">The AZ T= oP=C2=AE Community of Practice</a> meets the 1st Friday, of every month, 1-= 4 pm, at ACYR, <a rel=3D"nofollow" target=3D"_blank" href=3D"https://www.go= ogle.com/maps/place/648+N+5th+Ave/@33.456329,-112.080545,16z/data=3D!4m2!3m= 1!1s0x872b123a5312512d:0x93c9f71171108956?hl=3D">648 N. 5th Avenue, Phoenix= , AZ 85003</a></div><div><br></div></div><div class=3D"qtdSeparateBR"><br><= br></div><div class=3D"yahoo_quoted" style=3D"display: block;"> <div style= =3D"font-family: Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, Lucida Grande, sans-seri= f; font-size: 16px;"> <div style=3D"font-family: HelveticaNeue, Helvetica N= eue, Helvetica, Arial, Lucida Grande, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"> <div d= ir=3D"ltr"> <font size=3D"2" face=3D"Arial"> <hr size=3D"1"> <b><span style= =3D"font-weight:bold;">From:</span></b> Judi White via OE <oe(a)lists.wedg= eblade.net><br> <b><span style=3D"font-weight: bold;">To:</span></b> Ord= er Ecumenical Community <oe(a)lists.wedgeblade.net>; George Holcombe &l= t;geowanda1(a)me.com> <br> <b><span style=3D"font-weight: bold;">Sent:</sp= an></b> Monday, April 17, 2017 4:35 AM<br> <b><span style=3D"font-weight: b= old;">Subject:</span></b> Re: [Oe List ...] An Easter gift<br> </font> </di= v> <div class=3D"y_msg_container"><br><div id=3D"yiv0199286726"><div><div>T= hank you for this witness, George. Among the many wisdom teachers, Jesus, B= uddha, Mohammad and many more, you are included.  Loving the continuat= ion image of resurrection. Helps to embrace the sermons on promises of eter= nal life. Peace, Judi White</div><div class=3D"yiv0199286726gmail_extra"><b= r clear=3D"none"><div class=3D"yiv0199286726gmail_quote">On Apr 16, 2017 6:= 53 PM, "George Holcombe via OE" <<a rel=3D"nofollow" shape=3D"rect" ymai= lto=3D"mailto:oe@lists.wedgeblade.net" target=3D"_blank" href=3D"mailto:oe@= lists.wedgeblade.net">oe(a)lists.wedgeblade.net</a>> wrote:<br clear=3D"no= ne"><blockquote class=3D"yiv0199286726gmail_quote" style=3D"margin:0 0 0 .8= ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex;"><div class=3D"yiv019928672= 6yqt8646904779" id=3D"yiv0199286726yqt35099"><div style=3D"word-wrap:break-= word;"><div style=3D"font-family:'San Francisco', -apple-system, BlinkMacSy= stemFont, sans-serif;color:rgb(29,33,41);font-size:14px;letter-spacing:-0.2= 3999999463558197px;white-space:pre-wrap;"><div class=3D"yiv0199286726m_8073= 230402283814399_1mj yiv0199286726m_8073230402283814399_1mf" style=3D"direct= ion:ltr;font-family:inherit;"><span style=3D"font-family:inherit;">In our s= ervice this Easter morning at a Presbyterian church we sang a hymn written = by a Methodist (Jesus Christ is Risen Today) and a closing hymn by a Muslim= (Morning Has Broken) and following the Scripture reading of John 20 this q= uote (below). A profound sermon, and a fuller understanding of the idea of = resurrection.</span></div></div><div style=3D"font-family:'San Francisco', = -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, sans-serif;color:rgb(29,33,41);font-size= :14px;letter-spacing:-0.23999999463558197px;white-space:pre-wrap;"><div cla= ss=3D"yiv0199286726m_8073230402283814399_1mj yiv0199286726m_807323040228381= 4399_1mf" style=3D"direction:ltr;font-family:inherit;"><span style=3D"font-= family:inherit;">Thich Nhat Hang, Zen monk</span></div></div><div style=3D"= font-family:'San Francisco', -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, sans-serif;= color:rgb(29,33,41);font-size:14px;letter-spacing:-0.23999999463558197px;wh= ite-space:pre-wrap;"><div class=3D"yiv0199286726m_8073230402283814399_1mj y= iv0199286726m_8073230402283814399_1mf" style=3D"direction:ltr;font-family:i= nherit;"><span style=3D"font-family:inherit;">"I think there's a way of tra= ining ourselves in order not to become the victim of fear and grief- that i= s to look deeply into ourselves and to see that we are made of non-self ele= ments. And when we look around ourselves, we can recognize ourselves in the= non-self elements, like a father looking at his children can see himself i= n his children, can see his continuation in his children. So he is not atta= ched to the idea that his body is the only thing that is him. He's more th= an his body.He is inside of his body but he is also at the same (time) outs= ide of his body in many elements. And if we have the habit of looking like = that we will not be the victim of our attachment to one form of manifestati= on, and we will be free. And that freedom makes happiness and peace possibl= e. Other than meditation is there any specific practicer that can help you = come to this understanding?</span></div></div><div style=3D"font-family:'Sa= n Francisco', -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, sans-serif;color:rgb(29,33= ,41);font-size:14px;letter-spacing:-0.23999999463558197px;white-space:pre-w= rap;"><div class=3D"yiv0199286726m_8073230402283814399_1mj yiv0199286726m_8= 073230402283814399_1mf" style=3D"direction:ltr;font-family:inherit;"><span = style=3D"font-family:inherit;">Yes. The Buddha advised us to bear in mind t= hat everything is impermanent, that nothing has an absolute entity that rem= ains the same. And when we keep that insight in mind, we can see more deepl= y into the nature of reality, and we will not be locked in the notion that = we are only this body, this life span is the only life span we have. In fac= t, because nothing can be by itself alone, no one can be by himself or hers= elf alone, everyone has to inter-be with envy one else. That is why, when y= ou look outside, around, you can see yourself. And when you look into yours= elf, you can see the outside. So that is a training.=E2=80=9D</span></div><= div class=3D"yiv0199286726m_8073230402283814399_1mj yiv0199286726m_80732304= 02283814399_1mf" style=3D"direction:ltr;font-family:inherit;"><span style= =3D"font-family:inherit;"><br clear=3D"none"></span></div></div><div> <div style=3D"color:rgb(0,0,0);letter-spacing:normal;text-indent:0px;text-t= ransform:none;white-space:normal;word-spacing:0px;word-wrap:break-word;">Ge= orge Holcombe<br clear=3D"none"><a rel=3D"nofollow" shape=3D"rect" ymailto= =3D"mailto:geowanda1@me.com" target=3D"_blank" href=3D"mailto:geowanda1@me.= com">geowanda1(a)me.com</a><br clear=3D"none"><br clear=3D"none">"Whatever th= e problem, community is the answer.  There is no power greater&nb= sp;than a community discovering what it cares about."  Margaret W= heatley<br clear=3D"none"><br clear=3D"none"></div> </div> <br clear=3D"none"><div><blockquote type=3D"cite"><div>On Apr 16, 2017, at = 2:33 PM, Doris Hahn via OE <<a rel=3D"nofollow" shape=3D"rect" ymailto= =3D"mailto:oe@lists.wedgeblade.net" target=3D"_blank" href=3D"mailto:oe@lis= ts.wedgeblade.net">oe(a)lists.wedgeblade.net</a>> wrote:</div><br clear=3D= "none" class=3D"yiv0199286726m_8073230402283814399Apple-interchange-newline= "><div><div dir=3D"ltr"><div>From Doris Hahn - </div><div><br clear=3D= "none"></div>Pat Moriarty asked me to Pass this link along to you;so here i= t is:<div><br clear=3D"none"></div><div><div class=3D"yiv0199286726MsoNorma= l" style=3D"margin:13.6pt 0in 6.8pt;line-height:normal;"><a rel=3D"nofollow= " shape=3D"rect" target=3D"_blank" href=3D"http://www.justathoughtbypat.com= /wp-admin/post.php?post=3D1913&action=3Dedit" style=3D"font-size:12.8px= ;">http://www.justathoughtbypat.c om/wp-admin/post.php?post=3D1913 &act= ion=3Dedit</a><br clear=3D"none"></div></div></div> ______________________________ _________________<br clear=3D"none">OE maili= ng list<br clear=3D"none"><a rel=3D"nofollow" shape=3D"rect" ymailto=3D"mai= lto:OE@lists.wedgeblade.net" target=3D"_blank" href=3D"mailto:OE@lists.wedg= eblade.net">OE(a)lists.wedgeblade.net</a><br clear=3D"none"><a rel=3D"nofollo= w" shape=3D"rect" target=3D"_blank" href=3D"http://lists.wedgeblade.net/lis= tinfo.cgi/oe-wedgeblade.net">http://lists.wedgeblade.net/ listinfo.cgi/oe-w= edgeblade.net</a><br clear=3D"none"></div></blockquote></div><br clear=3D"n= one"></div></div><br clear=3D"none">______________________________ ________= _________<br clear=3D"none"> OE mailing list<br clear=3D"none"> <a rel=3D"nofollow" shape=3D"rect" ymailto=3D"mailto:OE@lists.wedgeblade.ne= t" target=3D"_blank" href=3D"mailto:OE@lists.wedgeblade.net">OE(a)lists.wedge= blade.net</a><br clear=3D"none"> <a rel=3D"nofollow" shape=3D"rect" target=3D"_blank" href=3D"http://lists.w= edgeblade.net/listinfo.cgi/oe-wedgeblade.net">http://lists.wedgeblade.net/ = listinfo.cgi/oe-wedgeblade.net</a><br clear=3D"none"> <br clear=3D"none"></blockquote></div></div></div></div><div class=3D"yqt86= 46904779" id=3D"yqt84538">_______________________________________________<b= r clear=3D"none">OE mailing list<br clear=3D"none"><a shape=3D"rect" ymailt= o=3D"mailto:OE@lists.wedgeblade.net" href=3D"mailto:OE@lists.wedgeblade.net= ">OE(a)lists.wedgeblade.net</a><br clear=3D"none"><a shape=3D"rect" href=3D"h= ttp://lists.wedgeblade.net/listinfo.cgi/oe-wedgeblade.net" target=3D"_blank= ">http://lists.wedgeblade.net/listinfo.cgi/oe-wedgeblade.net</a><br clear= =3D"none"></div><br><br></div> </div> </div> </div></div></body></html> ------=_Part_1878509_1302938865.1492442344614--

1 0

An Easter gift
by Doris Hahn via OE 17 Apr '17

17 Apr '17

>From Doris Hahn - Pat Moriarty asked me to Pass this link along to you;so here it is: http://www.justathoughtbypat.com/wp-admin/post.php?post=1913&action=edit

7 6

Kjell Knutsen: 1928 - 2016.
by Andrew Knutsen via OE 17 Apr '17

17 Apr '17

Hi, Knutsen family would like to share this celebration with the OE mailing list members. We are gathering this weekend in Boise, ID for two events to celebrate Kjell’s life. On Saturday, we will have a family memorial event, followed by a Sunday memorial service with Hillview Methodist Church. Kjell was part of the congregation and served as a visiting minister. Kjell is survived by his wife, Debbie Cheong, five sons - Lester, Andrew, Bernhard, Reinard, Svend. Kjell is survived by two siblings - Roger, younger brother living in Seattle and and Britt, older sister living in Oslo. There are six grandchildren, and four great grandchildren. Kjell’s celebrated his 88th birthday last year. We have a photo of him cradling his youngest grandson, Finely Parks Knutsen, born a few months earlier to Svend and Amanda. Here is my very brief summary of some chapter’s in Kjell life: Earliest chapters include growing up in Norway and living under German occupation during WW2. When he left Norway after WW2, he left to become an ordained minister and missionary, attending Garret Biblical Institute in Evanston, Illinois. Kjell met and married Margynell Bynum during this time. He was ordained in 1950, and was posted to Malaya as a Methodist missionary. During this time (1950 - 1987), Kjell and family served congregations in Taiping, Kuantan, Raub, Klang, and Seremban. All five sons were born in Malaysia. Our family attended the 1967 summer program in Chicago, interning in the Order while Kjell studied for his PhD. Kjell was part of the team that set up the Religious House in Petaling Jaya in 1968. He was part of teams that taught RS-1 courses, ITI’s, Academies and two early Human Develop Projects. Kjell married Debbie Cheong in 1977. Svend was born in 1982. His last position in Malaysia was Director of St. Nicholas School for the Blind in Penang. In 1988, Kjell began his Idaho chapter, serving a congregation in Emmett, followed by part time position with the Hillview Methodist Church in Boise. Kjell retired in 2009, beginning his golden years. Debbie is a public school teacher in Boise, Svend is married and raising a family with Amanda. Our family appreciates your emails and prayers. I will be collecting your emails and sharing them in printed and email formats with our family this weekend. Peace, Andrew ack2.trailhiker(a)gmail.com

5 4

Easter gifts for you, Beloved Virtual Community
by via OE 15 Apr '17

15 Apr '17

Went as a guest of my daughter-in-law to a Brethren Church last evening, for foot-washing and Maundy Thursday supper. Very sweet, very pious and I felt pretty conflicted. Had to keep reminding myself to uncross my arms. But what is Easter week for, if not reflection on self and society? Here are some articles I've wholeheartedly liked this week. My favorite is this timely and masterful example of imaginal education: https://www.youtube.com/watch?google_comment_id=z120gxw45pfnfxmni22xg5frnyb… Let's have a "Community Pondering" campaign to match Town Meeting 76: https://feminismandreligion.com/2017/04/13/the-nature-of-communal-pondering… And an oldie but goodie from Clarissa Pinkola Estes: http://www.awakin.org/read/view.php?tid=2195 Thanks for indulging me, Jann McGuire

2 1

PEANUTS REVISED
by Frank Knutson via OE 13 Apr '17

13 Apr '17

Everybody is a genius. But if you judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing that it is stupid. ― Albert Einstein ❤ Frank

2 1

Spong: (third article) "Easter: In Need of Reinterpretation!"; Bigger, Stronger, Wiser, Kinder
by Ellie Stock via OE 13 Apr '17

13 Apr '17

HOMEPAGE MY PROFILE ESSAY ARCHIVE MESSAGE BOARDS CALENDAR Bigger, Stronger, Wiser, Kinder By Cassandra Farrin After a hard winter for many of us, of deep snows and lost loves, in this holy week commemorating death and resurrection, the cherries and pears and plums are blossoming and our thoughts are opening with them. What are we also becoming? In Chapter 4 of the Dhammapada, “Flowers,” the Buddha is said to have offered this teaching: A monk should dwell and act in the village, Like a bee extracting honey from the flower But leaving the flower and fragrance intact. Pay no attention to the harsh words uttered by others. Do not be concerned with what others have or have not done. Observe your own actions and inactions. Like a beautiful brightly colored flower without fragrance Is the well-spoken word without action. Like a beautiful brightly colored flower full of fragrance Is the well-spoken word and the deed that matches the word. When the Buddha says pay no attention… he does not conclude pay no attention to others but rather, pay no attention to the harsh words. Likewise, a bee extracting honey is not the same as a drill extracting oil. One action is certainly gentler than the other. When we are attentive to our words and actions, it should be an act of love. It’s the place to begin. Radical changes may be wrought on the world by beginning in this place, the blossoming of conscious words, actions, and inactions. I think we get truth backwards. Truth is not the root from which we grow but the fragrance from the bloom. In a sense, truth can be acknowledged only after an experience awakens our sense of it. The root is relationship—with others, with the world, with God. This is a difficult but important outcry at a time when we’re all wondering what it means to live in a society suddenly flooded with phrases like “post-truth” and “alt fact.” I feel the need to become grounded, and perhaps you do too, so please allow me to share a story with you that is grounding me through this painful time. Five years ago my twin sister and I adopted two children, 2 and barely 4 years old, who survived more violence in their most vulnerable years than I have in my entire life. Their birth family, Marshall Islanders who emigrated to the United States for work and lost their children due to neglect, could not have known that the kids would be placed with an abusive foster family. So the children’s suffering escalated from the bare pain of hunger to the acute pain of abuse. At the time we adopted our kids, the abuse had not yet been discovered, and we confronted each horrific revelation as it was unburied. Perhaps the greatest lesson I learned from our process of transitioning from Stranger/Other to Family was the meaning of our foster parent trainer Erma Brundidge’s mantra: “bigger, stronger, wiser, kinder.” Be the bigger person, be the stronger person, be the wiser person, be the kinder person in every situation—not just one of the four, but all four. Children who have suffered often relive their suffering because it is what they know, so when the children come into your home, you may find that they intentionally recreate the chaos that drove them through your door. Perhaps you know people like this. We often carry our childhood traumas into our adult lives. I remember lying in bed one night only a couple months into our adoption and suddenly realizing, much to my horror, that I was identifying with the abusive person who hurt my children instead of with my children themselves— Why? In the drama our new family was unwittingly playing out, the children were waiting for the monster to emerge, and we could sense the monster, too. We just didn’t know who or what it was. Let me circle back for a moment to our foster care and adoption training, because this is just so critical to understanding the rest of my family’s story. My sister and I joined that training with many other couples, of course, including several who had struggled for years to conceive. As these couples in particular shared about all the self-doubt and indignities of infertility treatment, it became clear that they were expecting a lot of their future adoptive child: this child would be the healer of their wounds. What a burden for a child! Yet also, can’t you just feel the ache of the would-be parents, too? Painfully, one couple was not accepted by the department as foster parents because their desire for a perfect, healing child was so overwhelming. How were they going to be “bigger, stronger, wiser, kinder” for a child who had suffered when their own suffering was so raw and intense they could barely see past it? Rainer Maria Rilke understood God as belonging to the world and often expressed God through the metaphor of roots and soil, as that from which could be drawn sustenance. He believed in the reciprocity of the mundane and the divine; God, too, can wither and fade like a plant without water or like a father forgotten by his son. Rather than saying, “God cannot be one who relies on me,” Rilke inverted darkness into one of relationship: Whom should I turn to if not the one whose darkness is darker than night. The only one who keeps vigil with no candle and is not afraid— Sometimes I imagine God as a foster child on that first night in a new home, wondering who is keeping “vigil with no candle” for her. She is a being capable of infinite love and grace and extraordinary action in the world, and yet in such absolute darkness she doesn’t even know who or what she is. Relationships make security—truth, understanding—possible for her, for us, for God. I sometimes also imagine God as the weave of all those relationships, and yet I think we have to appreciate that God is a living idea. I find it helpful to maintain the tension between God as a candle waiting to be lighted and as the light itself. Returning to my own family’s story, our breakthrough moment came when our daughter’s counselor encouraged us to believe that our children wanted our love and were not afraid of us. They were afraid of a monster none of us could see, and we—my sister and I—were mistaking ourselves for that monster. We felt the children’s fear; we just didn’t realize it was directed at something else. So we took responsibility for our own household and we set the tone of our family’s relationship as something other than fear. We began to demonstrate brazenly, excessively, wastefully, that here was a space for love, safety, and fun. And it worked. The terror that seemed to pursue us slowly dissipated, and home became a refuge for us all. Old patterns have a way of resurfacing under strain. Our family confronts these secret terrors whenever we lose our equilibrium, so mindfulness and connection have become critical to our survival. Yet it does work, and we are living proof of it. I hope that you can take some encouragement from this when you are feeling fearful. To speak the truth in power means to speak from one’s relationships first and foremost, by being “bigger, stronger, wiser, kinder,” and to set the tone for one’s own household and community. So let me once again ask, what are we becoming? ~ Cassandra Farrin Read Online Here About the Author Cassandra Farrin is the marketing director of the Westar Institute and the editor of Polebridge Press. Her poetic retelling of the Nag Hammadi text On the Origin of the World is forthcoming in Gender Violence, Rape Culture, and Religion (Palgrave Macmillan). A US-UK Fulbright Scholar with more than ten years’ experience with cross-cultural and interfaith engagement, she has an M.A. in Religious Studies from Lancaster University (England) and a B.A. in Religious Studies from Willamette University. Question & Answer Terry R. from the Internet, writes: Question: Hi Eric, I enjoy what you have been saying about Jesus, and I am becoming much more progressive than I used to be, but still I have a hard time understanding why someone with your beliefs still remains a Christian? If the Jesus you still “believe” in is not the Jesus that resurrected and was God incarnate, then why do you still call yourself a Christian? Answer: Answer by Eric Alexander Thanks Terry. That’s a very honest (and common) question I hear a lot. I would start by saying that I only use the word Christian casually. I call myself a lot of things depending on the context. As it relates to Jesus, I more often call myself a Jesist, which you can see more about here. But with the proper disclaimers, caveats, and addenda I don’t mind the word Christian either. Additionally, I feel a sense of responsibility to help spare the younger generations from much of the indoctrination and deconstruction that I had to go through. As someone who has become educated I want to keep a foot within Christianity and help guide it toward a more meaningful existence. If everyone who finds some degree of enlightenment bails out, then it only leaves behind the fundamentalist echo chamber, and that is a scary thought to me, both spiritually and politically. ~ Eric Alexander Read and Share Online Here About the Author Eric Alexander is an author, speaker, and activist. He is a board member at ProgressiveChristianity.org, and is the founder of Jesism, Christian Evolution, and the Progressive Christianity and Politics group on Facebook. Eric holds a Master of Theology from Saint Leo University and studied negotiations at Harvard Law School, and authored the popular children's emotional health book Teaching Kids Life IS Good. Bishop John Shelby Spong Revisited Easter: In Need of Reinterpretation! The Christian Faith was born in the experience that we have come to call Easter. It was this Easter experience that invested Jesus with a sense of ultimacy. It caused his followers to regard his teaching as worthy of being preserved. It was the reason that Saint Paul could write, “if Christ has not been raised then your faith is in vain.” Clearly without Easter there would be no Christianity. That assertion hardly seems debatable. At this point I discover that I am at one with the most literal fundamentalists. What is debatable, however, is the question of what the experience of Easter really was. Here the distance between the Christianity of biblical scholarship and the Christianity of the fundamentalists opens and begins to widen. Fundamentalists are quite sure of their truth. On Easter the crucified Jesus, who was laid in the grave as a deceased man on Good Friday, was by the mighty act of God, restored to life on Easter. He had thus broken the power of death for all people. If the body of Jesus was not physically restored to life, the fundamentalists claim, then Easter is fraudulent. There can be no compromise here. Those who waver on this foundational truth of Christianity have, according to this perspective, abandoned the essential core of their faith tradition. Well, my only comment on this would be to borrow the words from an old song and say, “It ain’t necessarily so!” When one reads the New Testament in the order in which these books were written, a fascinating progression is revealed. Paul, for example, writing between the years 50 and 64 or some 20 to 34 years after the earthly life of Jesus came to an end, never describes the resurrection of Jesus as a physical body resuscitated after death. There is no hint in the Pauline corpus that one, who had died, later walked out of his grave clothes, emerged from the tomb and was seen by his disciples. What Paul does suggest is that Easter meant that God had acted to reverse the verdict that the world had pronounced on Jesus by raising Jesus from death into God. It was, therefore, out of God in a transforming kind of heavenly vision that this Jesus then appeared to certain chosen witnesses. Paul enumerates these witnesses and, in a telling detail, says that this was the same Jesus that Paul himself had seen. No one suggests that Paul ever saw a resuscitated body. The Pauline corpus later says, “If you then have been raised with Christ, seek the things which are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God.” Please note that the story of the Ascension had not been written when these Pauline words were formed. Paul did not envision the Resurrection as Jesus being restored to life in this world but as Jesus being raised into God. It was not an event in time but a transcendent and transforming truth. Paul died, according to our best estimates, around the year 64 C.E. The first Gospel was not written until the early 70’s. Paul never had a chance to read the Easter story in any Gospel. The tragedy of later Christian history is that we read Paul through the lens of the Gospels. Thus we have both distorted Paul and also confused theology. When Mark, the first Gospel, was written the Risen Christ never appears. The last time Jesus is seen comes when his deceased body is taken from the cross and laid in the tomb. Mark’s account of the Resurrection presents us with the narrative of mourning women confronting an empty tomb, meeting a messenger who tells them that Jesus has been raised and asking these women to convey to the disciples that Jesus will meet them in Galilee. Mark then concludes his Gospel with a picture of these women fleeing in fear, saying nothing to anyone (16:1-8). So abrupt was this ending that people began to write new endings to what they thought was Mark’s incomplete story. Two of those endings are actually reproduced in the King James Version of the Bible as verses 9-20. But thankfully, these later creations have been removed from the text of Mark in recent Bibles and placed into footnotes. The sure fact of New Testament scholarship is that Mark’s Gospel ended without the Risen Christ ever being seen by anyone. Both Matthew, who wrote between 80-85, and Luke, who wrote between 88-92, had Mark to guide their compositions. Both changed, heightened and expanded Mark. It is fascinating to lift those changes into consciousness and to ask what was it that motivated Matthew and Luke to transform Mark’s narrative. Did they have new sources of information? Had the story grown over the years in the retelling? The first thing to note is that Matthew changes Mark’s story about the women at the tomb. First, the messenger in Mark becomes a supernatural angel in Matthew’s story. Next Matthew says the women do see Jesus in the garden. They grasp him by the feet and worship him. This is the first time in Christian history that the Resurrection is presented as physical resuscitation. It occurs in the 9th decade of the Christian era. It should be noted that it took more than 50 years to begin to interpret the Easter experience as the resuscitated body of the deceased Jesus. When Matthew presents the story of the risen Jesus to the disciples, it is on a mountaintop in Galilee where he appears out of the sky armed with heavenly power. Recall once again that when Matthew wrote this narrative the story of Jesus’ ascension had not yet entered the tradition. Luke follows Mark’s story line about the women at the tomb, stating that they do not see Jesus in the garden on Easter morning. Luke, however, has turned Mark’s messenger into two angelic beings. He has also transferred the locale of Easter to Jerusalem specifically denying Mark’s words spoken through the messenger that Jesus will meet them in Galilee. Luke has heightened dramatically the physicality of Jesus’ resuscitated body. In Luke, the resuscitated Jesus walks, talks, eats, teaches and interprets. He also appears and disappears at will. He invites the disciples to handle his flesh. He asserts that he is not a ghost. Finally in order to remove this physically resuscitated Jesus from the earth, Luke develops the story of Jesus’ Ascension. Even in the Ascension narrative, however, Luke is not consistent. In the last chapter of his Gospel the Ascension takes place on Easter Sunday afternoon. In the first chapter of Acts, which Luke also writes, the Ascension takes place 40 days after Easter. Whereas the messenger in Mark, who becomes an angel in Matthew, directs the disciples to Galilee for a meeting with the risen Christ, Luke specifically denies any Galilean resurrection tradition. He orders the disciples to remain in Jerusalem until they are endowed with power from on high. The narrative is clearly growing. In John, the Fourth Gospel (95-100), the physicality of the Resurrection is even more enhanced. In the 20th chapter of this Gospel Jesus appears first to Mary Magdalene in the garden and says to her, “Mary do not cling to me.” One cannot cling to something that is non-physical. Then John suggests that Jesus ascends immediately into heaven before appearing, presumably out of heaven, that night to the disciples, who are missing Thomas. Though Jesus appears able to enter an upper room in which the windows have been closed and the doors locked, he is once again portrayed as being quite physical. This physical quality is further enhanced a week later when Jesus makes a second appearance to the disciples, this time with Thomas present. It is in this narrative that Thomas is invited to touch the nail prints and to examine the place in his side into which the spear had been hurled. All of these appearances take place in Jerusalem. Chapter 21 of John’s Gospel portrays a Galilean appearance much later in time after the disciples have actually returned to their fishing trade. Here Jesus directs them to a great catch of fish, 153 of them to be specific. Then he eats with them. Finally he restores Peter after his three-fold denial. The Easter story appears to have grown rather dramatically over the years. Something happened after the crucifixion of Jesus that convinced the disciples that Jesus shared in the eternal life of God and was thus available to them as a living presence. This experience was so profound that the disciples, who at his arrest had fled in fear, were now reconstituted and empowered even to die for the truth of their vision. This experience had the power to force the Jewish disciples to redefine the God of the Jews so that Jesus could be seen as part of who God is. Finally this experience was so profound that it ultimately created, on the first day of the week, a new holy day that was quite different from the Sabbath, to enable Christians to mark this transforming moment with a liturgical act called “the breaking of bread.” When these biblical data are assembled and examined closely, two things become clear. First something of enormous power gripped the disciples following the crucifixion that transformed their lives. Second, it was some fifty years before that transforming experience was interpreted as the resuscitation of a three days dead Jesus to the life of the world. Our conversation about the meaning of Easter must begin where these two realities meet. ~John Shelby Spong Announcements NOW! Single Day Passes Available - click here Click here for more information/registration READ ON... Any questions or concerns, please contact us at support(a)progressivechristianity.org or 253-507-8678. Copyright © 2017 ProgressiveChristianity.org, All rights reserved. You are receiving this email because you have a membership at johnshelbyspong.com. Our mailing address is: ProgressiveChristianity.org 4810 Pt. Fosdick Dr. NW #80 Gig Harbor, WA 98335 Add us to your address book If you are a paying subscriber, you may login and cancel your account. This email was sent to elliestock(a)aol.com why did I get this? unsubscribe from this list update subscription preferences ProgressiveChristianity.org · 4810 Pt. Fosdick Dr. NW · #80 · Gig Harbor, WA 98335 · USA

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by Frank Knutson via OE 12 Apr '17

12 Apr '17

Looking through “stuff”, found this. Memories! “Illusions are the way we maintain our sanity when reality bursts in.” ❤ Frank

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