It has been shown that wealth actually changes the structure of a person’s brain, destroying a sense of empathy for others while at the same time creating a sense of entitlement.
What is a heart alive with compassion and joy and spontaneity? A heart not continually weighed down by drivenness, anger, and fear? A heart at rest?
In his book “Radical Love: An Introduction to Queer Theology”. The Rev. Dr. Patrick Cheng says, “God is the very manifestation of a love that is so extreme that it dissolves existing boundaries.” So, it seems to me, living a life that dismantles existing boundaries is the very definition of being in relationship with God.
One of the many ways to read the Bible is to view it as God’s autobiography.
In his Letters and Papers from Prison, Dietrich Bonhoeffer wrote in 1945 that the Western world was on the precipice of a new era, an era without religion. God, as the “answer” to unsolvable questions, was continually being put out of a job as science continually extended the boundaries of human knowledge.
From Ezekiel to Jesus to the voices of the gospels, the proclamation is clear: civilization will not, indeed cannot, survive if wealth and power, and therefore food and shelter, are in the possession of but a few. Equally so, democracy will not and cannot survive if the bullies are allowed free reign.
Such is the looking at the figures in the crèche scene at the birth of Jesus. The crèche is a window into the eternal quality of the now, an icon of the divine point of view. It is the slack-jawed, timeless, aimless, free, worshipful Awe that is Love that is God.
“Man [Humankind] can’t become attached to higher aims and submit to a rule if he sees nothing above him to which he belongs. To free him of all social pressure is to abandon him to himself and demoralize him.”
This article is a continuation of : 10 Things Smart Progressive Churches Know About Worship, Part 1.
What an existential conundrum it is for us human beings as we long for someone to see us for the truth of what we are, while at the same time fearing to be seen for the truth of what we think we are and that others might perceive. A very tiring dance.