7th Christmas without Dad
Christmas day will be the 7th since Dad died on that day, 2011.
Month: December 2018
5th Christmas without Mom
Today is Mom’s 85th birthday. Her 80th was her last with us, so this is our 5th Christmas without her among us.
Trusting God involves seeing reality
My previous post (“Hope in the Age of Climate Change”) raises a phrase that I tend to avoid using, although I believe it. It is this: Christian hope, however, is different. It is reasonably skeptical of the human capacity to bring good out of the deepest tragedy because humans lack the power to do so. I am just cautious about Continue Reading
Hope in the Age of Climate Change
“Being optimistic is based upon a trust in our capacity to achieve something out of nothing or in some cosmic notion of fate. Christian hope, however, is different. It is reasonably skeptical of the human capacity to bring good out of the deepest tragedy because humans lack the power to do so. It also rejects the concept of fate because Continue Reading
Empire-Friendly Jesus and church
Amen to this! From Mark Davies: “By giving Christianity legitimacy and imperial protection and support, the empire was able to co-opt Christianity more effectively for its own purposes and create an image of Jesus and form an institutional church that would be empire friendly. Once the empire co-opted the Jesus movement, it focused on the otherworldly aspects of Christianity in Continue Reading
Some think this “normal and patriotic and the stance of good Christians”
Normal And Patriotic People by Mark Davies- The Oklahoma Observer https://buff.ly/2SZJpft A similar cartoon could show some WCA** people pointing to GLBTQ people seeking full inclusion, saying “No way, they will destroy us”, while the Ecological Crisis continues to worsen. (*** Wesleyan Covenant Association within the UMC movement to encourage split over the GLBTQ Full-inclusion issue)
When “Scriptural Authority” means what **I** say it means
This UMNS News story ( “Delegation chairs look toward General Conference” https://buff.ly/2QDZNWA ) contained a comment “The issue is Scriptural Authority! ” Which, in this context means: “What **I** say the Bible says is what it means, and to “fail” to agree to that is to “question Scriptural Authority”. In other words, difference in interpretation is the issue, and the issue Continue Reading
“The Reason for the Season”
My previous post reminds me again of one of my neighborhood neighbors, who puts out a yard sign every year that says “Jesus is the Reason for the Season”. The first year I noticed it there it was alongside a “Bush/Cheney” sign, and again in 2003 after the Iraq debacle where they bombed and killed thousands upon thousands of innnocent Continue Reading
Be careful what you sing about
“If you’re going to rejoice over the refusal of refugee families at our borders, you probably shouldn’t be sweetly singing about a baby with “no crib for a bed.”” —John Pavlovitz https://buff.ly/2STaWPH
Facebook Memories Post : Stewardship is on behalf of another
Dale Lature 3 yrs ago December 15, 2015 “Stewardship is always on behalf of another. As stewards we are entrusted with responsibility for, not possession of, the Earth.” – BrianHenning in For Our Common Home: Process-Relational Responses to Laudato Si
Modern Conservative Christianity’s mistrust of immanence
“In popular religious practice there isn’t always a clean line between this “immanent” religion and the transcendent alternative offered by Christianity and Judaism. ” https://buff.ly/2C8e98H Douthat should then re-write and re-think what he wrote in the paragraphs before this. His attempts henceforth in this article to explain the difference are awkward and shallow and full of caricature. “Until then, those Continue Reading
Biblical Faith is not “world denying” aside from the ideology known as “the world”
“this paganism is …deliberately agnostic about final things, what awaits beyond the shores of this world, and it is skeptical of the idea that there exists some ascetic, world-denying moral standard to which we should aspire.” — Douthat buff.ly/2C8e98H You’d better believe that it is “skeptical “, because “some ascetic, world-denying moral standard” is a dualism that is not found Continue Reading
Ecotheology as idolatry; dualism is to blame
“return of a pagan religious conception, which was half-buried (though never fully so) by the rise of Christianity. What is that conception? Simply this: that divinity is fundamentally inside the world rather than outside it; that God or the gods or Being are ultimately part of nature rather than an external creator, and that meaning and morality and metaphysical experience Continue Reading
Mr. Sandman
One of those mornings when I get up to go to the bathroom (this time at 2am) and sleep does not come when I get back into bed. Tried for over an hour. Got up finally at 3:30. Finally Mr. Sandman seems to be in the neighborhood.
“You now have Eagle vision!”
I love it! From chapter 2 of the online (on Facebook) novel of Dennis C Benson: “Dee steps out onto his outdoor perch pod. He is standing overlooking Lake Michigan. His breath catches as he surveys the awesome vista before him, and on each side of him. He can see forever. This high dune vista is one of the true gifts of Continue Reading
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