Part IV Matthew - The Sermon on the Mount

Column by Bishop John Shelby Spong on 24 October 2013 4 Comments
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Question

Thank you for all your wonderful books and the ideas in them. Having read your books and listened to many of your lectures on YouTube, I want you to know that they have been a great help for me to sort things out. This morning, I realized that I am a Christian person. Do I believe in a God up there? – NO. Do I believe in a God rising physically from the dead? – NO. Do I believe in Christ being born by a virgin? – NO. Do I believe in Christ walking on water? – NO. Do I believe that Christ resurrected people’s self-worth in an age of religious tyranny where the priests and the religious values of that day deprived people of their dignity – YES!!!!! And that is for me the sole important thing. As you say – salvation does not come from God or a Christ that is no longer here. Salvation comes when brave people help other people to regain their belief in themselves. If you are mentally dead and a person gives you your sanity back – then that person has resurrected you from the “dead”…not physically but mentally. If this is what Jesus did – then I do believe he has showed us the way. Unfortunately, as you point out, that has been buried under piles of religious and political nonsense. So, thank you for helping me to see that which I have always believed in since a kid – the resurrection of self-worth being the key for the salvation of man and woman– and that this is what Jesus did. But the religion of Jesus had to bury this simple truth in order to stay in power. This revelation of believing in what Jesus did rather than what he was has taken a long time to prepare. Doing the ground work has taken a long time – realizing the truth in it was instant – at 8:40 this morning 5/23/13, it just sat there crystal clear in my mind.

 

Answer

Dear Frederick,

I enjoyed this letter from you more than all the others you have sent me over the years. You seem, beyond so many of my readers, to have broken free of the religious literalism that organized Christianity has so often sought to substitute for faith.

To say that God is a symbol does not mean that there is no reality to which the symbol points. To say that resurrection was not physical does not mean that resurrection is not real. I frequently quote a retired bishop who said to me, “The older I get, the more deeply I believe but the less beliefs I have.” That is where I am today. God is infinitely real to me, but no words can capture or describe that reality. Your letter captures the essence of faith for me. I thank you for it.

John Shelby Spong

 

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