23 May 10

Yes and No

jesus-headYes, Jesus is the Son of God, Lord and Christ; the Light of the World and the Bread of Life; and the Way, Truth and Life. He is all of this for me, as a Christian who is also a historian of early Christianity.

And yet I do not think that Jesus spoke of himself with these grand terms and phrases.

Together with most mainstream scholars, I see the gospels as containing earlier and later layers of Christian traditions about Jesus as they developed during the first century. The gospels (and to some extent, the New Testament as a whole) contain the early Christian movement’s memory of Jesus and their testimony to what Jesus had become in early Christian experience, conviction and thought.

continue »

10 Comments Posted in definitions, early Christianity, historical, Jesus, revelation by
Tagged , , , ,
15 May 10

2010 Summer Seminar

Speaking Christian: Redeeming Christian Language

Join Marcus Borg and Dom Crossan as they explore “the surplus of meaning” behind some of the most important words in the Christian language. The seminar will be held June 21-24 at Center for Spiritual Development in Portland, Oregon. Understanding words like God, salvation, justice, compassion, and collections of words such as the Lord’s Prayer, parables by and about Jesus, the creeds, and eucharistic language, shape what it truly means to be Christian.

The Christian language must be reclaimed, redeemed, and liberated from the distorted meanings it has acquired, bound to conventional domestications. Dom Crossan and Marcus Borg suggest that the key to setting it free, discussed in this year’s Summer Seminar, is through an historical and metaphorical approach – a parabolic and symbolic understanding of the language itself. The material is a snapshot of upcoming books by both Crossan and Borg.

For more information, click here. To register, please click here.

Update: Thank you so much to all who attended!

4 Comments Posted in definitions, faith, Jesus, word meanings by
26 Apr 10

Lecture, Reading, Book Signing

Putting Away Childish Things
Friday, May 21st, 2010
7:00pm – 8:15pm; free admission

Those of you who live near Portland, Oregon are invited to hear Dr. Borg give a free lecture on Friday, May 21 in Kempton Hall at Trinity Episcopal Cathedral. He will reflect on why he decided to write his novel, do a reading from Putting Away Childish Things, and allow time for questions. He will follow with a book signing. For more information or directions, click on the calendar page or email Communications Coordinator Pam Knepper.

Update: Thank you so much to all who attended!

1 Comment Posted in My Books by
20 Apr 10

My New Novel

putting-away-childish-thingsMy new novel, Putting Away Childish Things, was released April 20, 2010. Here my teachings on Christianity are present in a new form—fiction. I hope my book will be an engaging way for readers to learn about the important issues dividing Christians today. Along the way, we join with the characters to ask the hard questions such as what does the Bible really teach? Who is Jesus? What is the nature of faith today? This is a story that promises to leave us different in the end than when we started, as we learn how even in the twenty-first century, God works in mysterious ways.

In this story, we meet Kate—a popular religion professor at a liberal arts college in a small Midwestern town who thinks her life is right on track. She loves her job, is happy with her personal and spiritual life, and her guilty pleasure consists of passing her afternoons at the local pub with a pint of Guinness and a cigarette. Life is good. Kate is up for tenure when it all starts to go wrong.

The novel is available at a 10% discount in the Trinity Episcopal Cathedral Bookstore (503-790-2877, email) or online here.

14 Comments Posted in faith, Jesus, My Books, understanding God by
Tagged , , , ,
10 Apr 10

For God So Loves the World

Jerusalem city view

Of course care for creation should be a priority, but when the Bible was written, there was no “environmental issue” as we think of it.

That there might someday be a human threat to the environment, to nature, did not occur to our ancient ancestors. Human “control” over nature was very modest, recent, and understandably seen as good. Only for about 10,000 years have some animals been domesticated for human use. Agriculture (as distinct from horticulture) is even more recent, originating in the fourth millennium BCE. With agriculture came settled life, a stable source of food, and cities and towns with walls that provided some protection against the wildness of nature. It is no wonder that the “control” of nature was seen as a boon to human life.

continue »

2 Comments Posted in environment, politics by
Tagged , ,
2 Apr 10

Repent and Return to God

The biblical meaning of “repentance” is quite different from an apology. In the Jewish Bible, the Christian Old Testament, “repentance” means “to return” – that is, to return from exile, to return to life in the presence of God, to a life centered in God.

In the Christian New Testament, the word “repentance” carries this meaning, and one more. The roots of the Greek word for “repentance” mean “to go beyond the mind that you have.”

So apology and repentance, forgiveness and repentance, are quite different. Apology and forgiveness do not in themselves imply change. Repentance does.

Originally posted on The Washington Post website.

2 Comments Posted in faith, understanding God, word meanings by
Tagged , , ,
17 Mar 10

Agnostic About the Afterlife

jesus-stained-glassI am a committed Christian and a complete agnostic about the afterlife. I use “agnostic” in its precise sense: one who does not know. Moreover, I know that I cannot resolve “not knowing” by “believing” – whatever we believe about an afterlife has nothing to do with whether there is one or what it is like.

There is more to say. I think that conventional Christianity’s emphasis on the afterlife for many centuries is one of its negative features. I have often said that if I were to make a list of Christianity’s ten worst contributions to religion, it would be its emphasis on an afterlife, for more than one reason.

continue »

7 Comments Posted in afterlife, understanding God by
Tagged , ,
16 Mar 10

Blind Acceptance is Idolatry

Without questioning, faith is idolatrous. Just as patriotism without questioning risks becoming idolatrous nationalism, so faith without questioning risks becoming idolatrous religion.

To explain: when faith is defined as unquestioning acceptance of “tenets or traditions,” whether drawn from the Bible or doctrine or both, then the object of faith is no longer God, but the tenets and traditions themselves. Something other than God has been given an absolute status – which is what makes it idolatrous.

continue »

4 Comments Posted in faith, understanding God by
Tagged ,
14 Mar 10

Children and Religion

Don’t Tell Them Anything They’ll Need to Unlearn

Our children deserve to know the stories that matter to us. So tell them the stories of your tradition –and of other traditions, when appropriate. If and when they ask, “Is that a true story?”, they may be asking, “Did that really happen?” But you don’t have to answer that question. You can say, “I don’t know if it happened that way or not, but I know this is an important and truthful story.”

continue »

3 Comments Posted in parenting, understanding God by
Tagged , , ,
9 Mar 10

Prayer Transforms Us

I pray all the time. I do not mean “every minute,” but many times a day.

My understanding and practice of prayer are grounded in my understanding of God, the Sacred. I see God as a presence, as the one “in whom we live and move and have our being,” to quote words attributed to Paul in Acts 17.28.

For me, prayer – addressing God, paying attention to my relationship with God – is about reminding me of the reality and presence of God in the course of my day and days. It is about centering more deeply in God and about “opening” to God. It helps me to be more centered, more present, more appreciative.

continue »

7 Comments Posted in faith, prayer, understanding God, word meanings by
Tagged ,

« Older Posts

Newer Posts »