Church! she cried. Why would I ever go there? I was already feeling terrible about myself. They’d just make me feel worse.
As I said before, evolution doesn’t bother me. If you tell me that God created the earth by hand in six days some thousands of years ago, I am impressed. If you tell me instead that God set a whole co...
There's one thing worse than a failed old religion: a naïve and arrogant new one.
Our choice, it seems, is whether we will let our past and present sufferings be sufficient to soften and break us, or whether we will resist and harden ourselves so even more suffering is required.
Columbus wrote this of his dehumanized cargo: It is possible, with the name of the Holy Trinity, to sell all the slaves which it is possible to sell….Here there are so many of these slaves…although th...
What today throws at you will force you to become better or bitter for tomorrow; it will push you toward breakdown or breakthrough...
We must never underestimate our power to be wrong when talking about God, when thinking about God, when imagining God, whether in prose or in poetry. A generous orthodoxy, in contrast to the tense, na...
The Church has little idea how unorthodox it is at any given moment. If a church can't yet be perfectly orthodox, it can, with the Holy Spirit's help and by the grace of God, be perpetually reformable...
In religion as in parenthood, uncritical loyalty to our ancestors may implicate us in an injustice against our descendants: imprisoning them in the errors of our ancestors.
In other words, when the community of faith gathers, its purpose is to equip its members for a life of love and good deeds when the community scatters.
I have no doubt that Jesus would actually practice the neighborliness he preached rather than following our example of religious supremacy, hostility, fear, isolation, misinformation, exclusion, or de...
I do know this about pride: pride is tiring, a cruel task-master, a complicator, a destroyer. Humility, in contrast, relaxes, refreshes, relieves, simplifies, renews. To the degree that becoming child...
Here’s the papal proclamation of 1455 that empowered the Christian kings of Europe to enslave, plunder, and slaughter in the name of discovery: invade, search out, capture, vanquish, and subdue all Sa...
Community has become a buzzword in the church in recent years. Overbusy individuals hope they can cram it into their overstuffed schedules like their membership to a health and fitness club (which the...
Can you imagine Jesus saying, Believe that I am the only way. Why? Because I said so, that’s why! And if you don’t believe, then you’re going straight to hell! But isn’t that how we present him throug...
Being able to know and feel what Karl knows and feels… that no matter what, I am God’s, and God is mine… that we have a connection; we have a relationship. Faith in your life brings God in your life.
Who do we think we are — we small creatures with three-pound brains, a few limited senses, and life spans barely long enough to get to know our neighborhood, much less the planet, and much less the ga...
What is the most significant conversation you have every day? People would respond piously, Your conversation with God, of course. No, Lewis would reply. It’s the conversation you have with yourself b...
Trying to stop people from learning, sharing, and loving is a losing game because it means working against God and the plotline of God's universe.
The surface causes of environmental carelessness among conservative Christians are legion, including subcontracting the evangelical mind out to right-wing politicians and greedy business interests. To...