sermons and notes posted on this blog are not necessarily what came out of my mouth during the services,
but they'll offer a sense my dance with the Holy Spirit while preparing to preach

Monday, November 4, 2013

Christian theology on the run this morning over breakfast...

(from a response I just wrote to a family member of a friend of mine who has been struggling with her faith and religious identity)


...it sounds like you're struggling to claim a sense of identity and belonging (likely 'Christian,' but maybe not) among a bunch of religious garbage that's been put in your way. Time to throw out the mess, without tossing out Jesus by mistake.


God loves you... love us... loves people who are not like us (even people we don't particularly like or agree with) more than we can imagine.


Yes, it's pretty clear in what we're told that Jesus said that there will be some 'judgement' by God about people's fitness and readiness for God's ultimate plan... and, we're also told it's not our role to presume we know how all this is going to work out or when it's going to happen. There's plenty of stuff right here and right now for us to focus one... mainly, are we denying God's providence and hurting each other, or honoring God and taking care of each other?

I don't recall that Jesus worried about what 'religion' people were as much as he wanted us to keep our minds and hearts focused on God and to love each other in extraordinary ways well beyond social pretenses and contrived conventions that tend to separate and demoralize people for the sake of elevation of a few rather than uniting all sorts of people for the better.

Jesus likely weeps that institutions and people waving Christ's name as some sort of war-banner have caused you harm, made it more difficult for you to build a loving relationship with God and other people of faith, and have failed to affirm you as a beloved and sacred child of God.

The good news is that Jesus' very earthly ministry was about holding people accountable for self-righteous hypocrisy and misuse of religious authority while also looking out for those in need of help and healing, calling them back into communities of hope and charitable love, testifying to God's unreasonably generous mercy and grace, and challenging his followers to do the same back then... and still today!

If you're interested in finding a Christian faith community that will respect your dignity, celebrate and encourage your good/faithful way of approaching life, and embrace your appropriately critical thinking and questions, they're out there.


E.g., The Episcopal Church has become my denominational community of Christian faith. Though not every parish in our denomination might be equally embracing or supportive of you in ways that are most helpful to you (given your own history and frustrations about 'church'), our denomination as a whole supports the balancing of time-tested traditions, continual reflection on and study of holy scriptures, and our use of critical reasoning in our discernment and decisions in our faithful discipleship. Earlier in my own journey I appreciated a church friend saying to me, "Joining with us in searching for God doesn't mean you have to lose you mind." A sign we used keep on the front of my church in Santa Monica read, "Visitors are not just welcome here... we're expecting you" and we'd say at each church service, "No matter where you are on your journey of faith, you are welcome here... it's Jesus Christ who calls us all to this community."

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