[like cool spring rain over the hot, parched wilderness]

An excerpt from Donald Spoto's The Hidden Jesus: A New Life, "contrasting the message of John the Baptist—a message of repentance and imminent judgement—with the message of Jesus, a message of "good news" and forgiveness" (Beck):

What was the reason for this urgent and positive action [in Jesus's ministry], so different from the tone of the Baptist's message and typical Jewish reasoning? The answer was clear from what Jesus began to say and to do almost immediately. He not only taught, he healed; he not only preached, he blessed, consoled and transformed lives. Not only was there good news for the poor, but for everyone. He was "a friend of tax collectors and sinners," and of the sick and possessed, the smug and the sedate, the demented and the lonely, the impolite and the unattractive--everyone who was unacceptable and every kind of outcast came within the reach of his saving embrace.

It was no longer a matter of people repenting of their oppression of the poor, receiving a baptism of water as a sign of that repentance and a desire for a newness of heart. Now—in everything that Jesus was saying and doing—God's mercy was washing over the world for everyone, like the sweep of a cool spring rain over the hot, parched wilderness.

As seen on Richard Beck's blog.

heavenly homonyms

Straight people. People in dire straits. People in straitjackets. People in Armani jackets.

Is there really that much difference between us?

Does the bouncer at heaven's gate let some in and keep others out? On what basis?

be careful little mouth (what you say)

Oops. This unfortunate ending could have been avoided by loving one's neighbour, don'tcha think?

[our lady of lourdes]

How's this for a welcome!

Here's the full text from the bulletin at Our Lady of Lourdes Catholic Parish in Daytona Beach, Florida:

We extend a special welcome to those who are single, married, divorced, gay, filthy rich, dirt poor, yo no habla Ingles. We extend a special welcome to those who are crying new-borns, skinny as a rail or could afford to lose a few pounds.
 
We welcome you if you can sing like Andrea Bocelli or like our pastor who can’t carry a note in a bucket. You’re welcome here if you’re “just browsing,” just woke up or just got out of jail. We don’t care if you’re more Catholic than the Pope, or haven’t been in church since little Joey’s Baptism.
 
We extend a special welcome to those who are over 60 but not grown up yet, and to teenagers who are growing up too fast. We welcome soccer moms, NASCAR dads, starving artists, tree-huggers, latte-sippers, vegetarians, junk-food eaters. We welcome those who are in recovery or still addicted. We welcome you if you’re having problems or you’re down in the dumps or if you don’t like “organized religion,” we’ve been there too.
 
If you blew all your offering money at the dog track, you’re welcome here. We offer a special welcome to those who think the earth is flat, work too hard, don’t work, can’t spell, or because grandma is in town and wanted to go to church.
 
We welcome those who are inked, pierced or both. We offer a special welcome to those who could use a prayer right now, had religion shoved down your throat as a kid or got lost in traffic and wound up here by mistake. We welcome tourists, seekers and doubters, bleeding hearts … and you!

source 1 source 2

special number

Pastor Stickman has invited a friend to be part of the worship service. An unexpected friend.

If you attend a church, what do you think would happen if this took place on a Sunday morning? The parishioners might be unsure how whether to applaud or not. Some might be shocked or outraged. And some who have read Bad Girls of the Bible might be quite pleased to meet Rahab in person.

But in general, while many Christian have heard Rahab mentioned in sermons, we don't expect her to be a hero if she showed up today, especially if announced as a prostitute. Now to be fair, there is some debate as to why she is referred to that way, considering that she was an innkeeper and likely made fabrics (based on the quantity of flax on her roof). But the Bible is full of stories of God using unlikely people to further His kingdom, so why not?

Why not indeed?

While I don't know of any Old Testament characters known for singing (aside from the woman in the song of solomon, perhaps), you can imagine what kinds of names might have popped into people's minds when the pastor first started speaking. Moses, Abraham, Sarah, Naomi, and other familiar ones. But today, the visitor is Rahab who protected the spies when they came to her city.  And because of what she did, she and all who were in her household were spared.

What might her song be?

Can you hear it?

ecclesia fishing

This is the third cartoon in the 'ecclesia' series. As in the other cartoons, it is Ecclesia who is speaking here, and not Jesus Christ the head.

(click on image for larger view)

[a reckless, scandalous expenditure]

What are the hallmarks of the ministry of Jesus Christ? Do we embody them? Here is what William Stringfellow says about this:

Perhaps it is helpful to notice a few things about the ministry of Christ. One is that the ministry of Christ is a ministry of great extravagance--of a reckless, scandalous expenditure of His life for the sake of the world's life. Christ gives away His life. The world finds new life in His life and His gift of His life to the world. His is not a very prudential life, not a very conservative life, not a very cautious life, not--by ordinary standards--a very successful life.

He shunned no one, not even adulterers, not even tax collectors, not even neurotics and psychotics, not even those tempted to suicide, not even alcoholics, not even poor people, not even beggars, not even lepers, not even those who ridiculed Him, not even those who betrayed Him, not even His own enemies. He shunned no one.

The words that tell of the ministry of Christ are words of sorrow, poverty, rejection, radical unpopularity. They are words of agony.

It seems ridiculous to apply such words to the ministry of churches nowadays. Yet where these words cannot be truthfully applied to the ministry of churches today they must then be spoken against the churches to show how far the churches are from being the Body of Christ engaged in the ministry of Christ in the world.

As posted on Richard Beck's blog post The William Stringfellow Project: A Private and Public Faith, Part 4. Stringfellow quote from "The Fear of God", chapter 4 of A Private and Public Faith.

love. period.

Pastor Stickman's first sermon, his first Sunday after inadvertantly outing himself. Quite a contrast to some of the things which he said previous to that point in time. Now he can be more open, more honest.

Love. Period.

What do you think? Is there something more to say?

Do you want to qualify love in some way? Put conditions or limits on it?

---

Previous pastor stickman cartoon

culture war

Are we in a culture war?

What cultures are involved?

On a friend's blog, Jarred posted a comment which speaks to this:

Jarred said...
Emily: I would encourage you to beware of the Middle Ground Fallacy when it comes to speaking of the "culture war." After all, only one "side" of the "culture war" thinks of it in terms of being a "culture war" and has invested much time and effort in painting the other "side" as thinking in the same terms and behaving accordingly. The other "side" thinks of it in terms of struggling to gain the same human dignity and legal protections for all people.
May 16, 2012 10:10 AM  (source)

So there is the question of, "are we really in a culture war" or are Christians just not happy about no longer being in power. There is also the reality of the gap between what pastors and denominations believe and what the parishioners believe, and correspondingly, what each is willing to "fight" for.

 Ironically, in a world where the dominant perception of Christians is that we are judgemental and anti-gay, many evangelicals are rushing to support and promote Chick-fil-A now that its owner has publically stated that his company is against same-sex marriage. That's sure to help everyone to see and know that Jesus loves them no matter what!!

---

More reading: Some words for Christians on both sides of the Chick-fil-A war by Rachel Held Evans.

[joel mckerrow :: confession for the white part in me]

"Joel McKerrow is an international touring performance poet, writer, educator, youth worker, thinker and activist based out of Melbourne, Australia. He is the founder of ‘The Centre for Poetics and Justice’ (www.cpj.org.au/), a not-for-profit, community arts organisation focused on using poetics as a form of literary education, self-expression and social engagement for marginalised teenagers." (from his website).

 What Joel confesses in these videos fits perfectly with this site, in terms of addressing marginalization and in terms of saying sorry for what has been done from positions of power and privilege. These are amazing videos -- both in terms of the confessions being made, the speaking of them, and the appropriately artistic videography.

The four videos in the series:
my confession part 1: for the white part in me (featured above)

my confession part 2: for the rich part in me

my confession part 3: for the Christian part of me

my confession part 4: for the masculine part of me

---

For those of you living near Edmonton, Joel will be part of an evening event on Thursday, August 2nd at the Bleeding Heart Arts Space.

just as we are

Last time: Pastor Stickman, at the first Sunday service after accidently outing himself, was unsure of what to say. A parishioner gave the traditional greeting of "The Lord be with you", and Pastor Stickman responded with "And also with you".

Somehow – and frankly, I don't know how – he is still the pastor! Many pastors in similar situations have been fired and blacklisted in their denominations. In his case, half the parishioners have left the church, but that's to be expected.

Those who have stayed have been encouraging him. Perhaps a card, or an email. Maybe some fresh muffins dropped off at the house. And he begins to understand more deeply that even in this the worst of times, God loves him. No longer the proud leader with all the answers, he needs the body of Christ that meets in this building. They need each other. We all need each other.

[the sacrament of friendship]

What does true friendship look like? What does it offer the other person? What expectations are involved?

Richard Beck has been reading A Private and Public Faith by Stringfellow, and says the following:

So what does this sacramental life look like? For Stringfellow one proxy is simply friendship. In this chapter he describes his relationship (Stringfellow was living in a Harlem tenement at the time) with a boy addicted to narcotics. Stringfellow discusses how various clergy and social workers had come to view this boy with suspicion, as a lost cause, as a waste of their time and effort. And Stringfellow agrees that the boy probably is a lost cause from those pragmatic and programmatic perspectives. And insofar as Stringfellow can help the boy he helps. But his central concern is simply being a sacrament of life in the world of this boy. To be a life-giving oasis. To bring resurrection where only death is at work. To being a friend.

He often visits me when he is free, and we have talked a lot together. I am not aware that I have ever told him that he has a bad and costly and very debilitating habit. He knows that better than I do. And while he and I have talked about how his habit might be controlled or even cured, our relationship is not contingent upon his breaking his addiction. Acceptance of another person is acceptance of the other as he is, without entailing any demands that he change in any empirical way. This boy is an addict, and while I would rejoice if he were freed from this affliction, that would not change or increase my acceptance of him as a person. And though I am not an addict, that makes me no better nor worse than he. I am not his judge. I am just his friend. (Stringfellow)

And that, according to Stringfellow, is the central and primary witness of the Christian in the world.


The sacrament of friendship.

Overall excerpted from Richard Beck's blog post The William Stringfellow Project: A Private and Public Faith, Part 4. Stringfellow quotes from chapter 4 of  A Private and Public Faith.

standard reply

This is the standard reply that many Christians use to apply to those who are—in their eyes—"sinners."

I saw this just the other day on a friend's blog. She had posted about generous spaciousness and the invitation to rest, and one of the comments from a reader went as follows:

Steven said...

"Jesus, it is well known, had dinner with the wrong kind of people, touched the wrong kind of people, had conversation with the wrong kind of people, went to the wrong places, triggered and exposed social taboos, broke dividing walls, and announced a new kind of level playing field."

And then He told them to "go and sin no more".

July 15, 2012 9:10 PM source

Perhaps someone should have told Jesus to "go and sin no more," considering he was associating with the wrong people....

Let's unpack this a bit.

First, the reader repeatedly refers to "the wrong kind of people" without explanation or quotation marks. Consider the difference between the following two sentences:

1. Jesus had dinner with the wrong kind of people. Generally speaking, unless someone says more to qualify this, it means that they believe that these were indeed the wrong kind of people and perhaps even that Jesus should not have been having dinner with them at all. Think of Simon the Pharisee seeing the woman who was wiping Jesus' feet with her hair and perfume, who then said to himself, “If this man were a prophet, he would know who is touching him and what kind of woman she is—that she is a sinner.” (Luke 7:36-50 NIV).
2. Jesus had dinner with the "wrong kind" of people. The quotation marks indicate that while some think of these people as the wrong kind of people, the writer himself does not think so.

Not only does the reader not have quotation marks, but he makes no statements to indicate that he is in disagreement with these people being the wrong kind of people. Nothing is said about Jesus loving everyone regardless of what the general society thought of them, nor anything contrasting Jesus' treatment of them with how the religious people treated them.

And then we have the reader's statement that Jesus "told them to 'go and sin no more'." Biblically, we have only the account of the woman caught in adultery where Jesus says "go and sin no more." So to say "He told them" (emphasis added) is simply not correct. It takes personal bias and applies it to Jesus.

While I do not know the Steven who posted the comment, I would guess that most likely, he himself feels that these were the wrong kind of people for Jesus to be spending time with, and that perhaps exposing social taboos and breaking down dividing walls is not such a great idea.

A standard phrase like "go and sin no more" is pretty handy. I simply label someone as a sinner (based on the simple evaluation: are they like me, or not?) and then I tell them to go and sin no more. Black and white. No nuances. No consideration that perhaps we have different ways of understanding something, or different approaches.

But labelling someone and giving them a pat answer is not grace, it's not love, it's not compassion, and it's not what Jesus did.

Perhaps "go and sin no more" is one of those phrases that we should give up... forever.

[the gospel of Rutba]

Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove tells this amazing story of embracing one's enemy:

During the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003, Leah and I traveled with the Christian Peacemaker Teams to Baghdad, believing that the way of Jesus called us to interrupt the unjust war our country was initiating. Three days after U.S. planes bombed the hospital in Rutba, our American friends’ car hit a piece of shrapnel on the highway outside of town and landed in a side ditch. Iraqis stopped by the roadside, took our bleeding friends into their car, and drove them to a doctor in Rutba. “Three days ago your country bombed our hospital,” he said, “but we will take care of you.” He sewed up their heads and saved their lives. When we asked the doctor what we owed him for his services, he only said, “Please, go tell the world what is happening in Rutba.”

The more we told the story, the more it sounded like a modern day Good Samaritan story. A good Iraqi—a good Muslim—not only saved our friends’ lives; he also showed us what God’s love looks like. We can’t be saved apart from the stranger, even the stranger who seems to be our enemy. The gospel of Rutba is that hope lies in the “enemy.”

Read the rest of Jonathan's post about The Gospel of Rutba (on his blog)

Check out the Gospel of Rutba website and read the book.

I'm gay unless...

Can people be themselves around those of us who are Christians?

Or do they feel they have to hide part of who they are, for fear of being laughed at, rejected, or otherwise mistreated?

If the cross around my neck is there because I have chosen to follow Jesus, will I follow Him in treating other people the same way he did?

---

On a related note, a pastor in Washington State has decided to reclaim the word gay -- to take it away from those who use it in ways related to sexual orientation and use it for the original meaning of happy and joyful.

He says he is "on a mission to take back words, phrases and symbols he believes groups, such as homosexual activists and other liberal organizations, have "hijacked" from the American lexicon." (source: christian post).

While he's at it, maybe he could "take back" some of the love and acceptance that these groups have hijacked from the church, 'cuz it sure seems that they have far more of it than some churches.