To the UMC newly christened “diaspora”

““I feel absolutely no moral or theological obligation to the “power take all” mentality and strategies of the radicalizing right in our churches. They got their way, now let them enforce it. They are losing this battle in the wider culture and doing great damage to the witness of the church. We struggle against the principalities and powers in the Continue Reading

IRD: Church home wreckers

Amen. The founders and leadership of the IRD are despicable, paranoid, devious and deceitful.  Much like the insitigators of the SBC takeover (and were very much behind that, too). Moyers did a God and Politics episode on the UMC missionaries who were hounded by the IRD anbout their work in Central America. Right wing crusaders without a Christ heart.

“unlivable by any standard we have today”

“There is nothing stopping us from four degrees other than our own will to change course, which we have yet to display. Because the planet is as big as it is, and as ecologically diverse; because humans have proven themselves an adaptable species, and will likely continue to adapt to outmaneuver a lethal threat; and because the devastating effects of Continue Reading

battle of opinions and interpretations

This is a battle of opinions and interpretations, far from truly being a matter of “The Authority of Scripture”. It is a battle of the “Authority” of what we think that authority actually says. Those who cannot/will not understand that are sealing themselves inside their own minds, to the detriment of “that they may be one” (which does NOT say Continue Reading

we must mobilize

“It is important to mobilize people who at the moment are concerned, but basically complacent, and turn them into people who are much more activated and essentially voting about climate as a first-order political priority rather than a third- or fourth-order priority – judging politicians on the basis of their climate policy.”— David Wallace-Wells in an interview in The Guardian Continue Reading

Time to step aside and listen to those who inherit this mess

Feinstein: “Ive been doing this for 30 years”.What? Putting off meaningful and sufficient action on the mess we’re making? Voting to kick the can down the road? I think it’s enough (and too much). Please step aside. (My comments inspired by McKibben’s article in the New Yorder, and observation that it’s been 30 years since James Hansen testified before Congress Continue Reading

The Powers That Be Need To See a real grassroots “threat”

“Of course it mattered to have FDR in power instead of Herbert Hoover, but it mattered even more to have an organized population which was flexing its muscles in every conceivable way in the 1930s—from sit-down strikes in auto plants, to shutting down the ports on the West Coast, to shutting down entire cities with general strikes. And it mattered Continue Reading

“a time of multiple overlapping crises”

On the #GreenNewDeal: “It’s about understanding that we are in a time of multiple overlapping crises, and that we are on an incredibly tight deadline when it comes to lowering greenhouse-gas emissions in time to prevent truly catastrophic warming. In order to bring people along with these necessary changes, there have to be benefits in the here-and-now in terms of Continue Reading