[T]his impulse toward spiritual intimacy is found not only in the Abrahamic faiths, but in Buddhism, Hinduism, and native religions. Far too many people who understand God in these ways probably do no...
When the Bible is read from the perspective of divine nearness, it becomes clear that most prophets, poets, and preachers are particularly worried about religious institutions and practices that perpe...
Irenaeus of Lyon (ca. 115–202): The glory of God is the human person fully alive.
Fear brings out the basest instincts, writes British political scientist Sue Goss, and narrows our sense of belonging to self-preservation.16
We must abandon the external height images in which the theistic God has historically been perceived and replace them with internal depth images of a deity who is not apart from us, but who is the ver...
The biggest issue of the twenty-first century is not necessarily the decline of neighborhood. It may be that we have all moved to a new neighborhood and have not learned how to get along with the new...
The baby, the star, and the wise men: a story of gifts and radical gratitude. Joy to the world!
That it is precisely when we recognize our common humanity—when we recognize our own humanity in the face of the other—it is then that we also recognize the face of God.
Our most basic common link is that we all inhabit this small planet. We all breathe the same air. We all cherish our children’s future. And we are all mortal. —John F. Kennedy
Who, Abelard demanded, would forgive such a God for killing his own son? Abelard proposed that Christ died for the sake of love, providing a model of self-sacrificial passion for humankind. Salvation...
Everything is a gift. The degree to which we are awake to this truth is a measure of our gratefulness, and gratefulness is a measure of our aliveness. —DAVID STEINDL-RAST
There is, however, something odd about this pattern. Other than joining a political party, it is hard to think of any other sort of community that people join by agreeing to a set of principles. Imagi...