We live in a world defined by the cheapness of human life, indeed, all life. Migrants and refugees are treated no better than the Amazon rainforest. And yet, as entanglement shows us and as the tolling bell reminds us, all is One.
The people behind HeGetsUs don’t get him. But that doesn’t prevent us from using their campaign to help folks get who Jesus really was – and making his compassionate personality the welcoming face of our progressive faith communities.
I don’t know about you, but in recent times, I can hardly bear to watch the news. It’s simply too depressing. Gun violence continues to spin out of control with scant hope of any sensible resolution in sight.
The following is Part 2 of two columns drawn from an interview with Rachel Laser, President of Americans United for the Separation of Church and State
I very much appreciated Brian McLaren’s recent column, Thanks Presiding Bishop Curry, and his thoughtful exploration of the bishop’s advice to find a voice that is non-partisan, and why this is easier said than done.
In his speech, Bishop Curry twice emphasized the need to find a voice that is non-partisan (“this is not partisan,” “not a partisan voice”). We all know why he needed to say this.
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.
The Bible has a political agenda. Even with all the different writers who contributed to different books, there is a clear biblical bias against the powerful using their places of authority to step on those who are already suffering. That’s political.
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.
The year 2020 has been a stressful one. With George Floyd’s death as an inflection point about race and racism in America, an unprecedented presidential election, and social unrest during an ongoing pandemic with a rising death toll, something is deeply broken in America’s body politic.