There. I said it. I know I’m not the first, and I surely won’t be the last. It’s time to embrace and promote. My way of proclaiming the good news of psychedelic plant medicines as part of our salvation and healing is writing.
Namasté: “The Divine in me honors the Divine in you.” In my way of seeing it, namasté includes the understanding that we all are one.
Progressive faith communities are rightfully skeptical of the language of “evangelism.” In modern history, the word has come to mean something like “forceful conversion” rather than a demonstration of and an invitation to the way of Jesus.
Christianity is the only major religion where many followers believe the death of their founder is more important than his life.
The Bible is replete with stories of various gender identities in God’s people. These biblical stories affirm that we all are wonderfully made and affirm our God-given right to live them out loud.
Strangely, this critique of the death of church as spawned by progressives is really another way of saying that we failed to remain intellectually dishonest about how we got the Bible, what it means to call it our flawed but irreplaceable Story of Origin, and what scholars have now shown us about the enormous gap between faith as developed doctrine and faith as discipleship–a commitment to being followers of Jesus, not worshippers of Christ. We may be a lot smaller, but like leaven in the loaf, we may also be more subversive.
Let me say that again for the people in the back. I’m tired of giving money to charities. I’ve served the church in development and parish life for over 20 years. I don’t believe giving is wrong. The Bible tells us God loves a cheerful giver and infers that we can’t out give God. So why do I say I’m tired of giving to charities?
Why is a Chenu Institute and a new book about him such good news for progressive Christians today? Because he was a progressive and courageous theologian throughout his life and was unafraid to break the glass in so many areas of culture and religion including theological education.
We began with a description of human nature and used that to try to understand who Jesus was and how he was able to impact people, an analysis that bypasses much of the traditional theology about who and what he was.
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.