Quotes & Sayings


We, and creation itself, actualize the possibilities of the God who sustains the world, towards becoming in the world in a fuller, more deeper way. - R.E. Slater

There is urgency in coming to see the world as a web of interrelated processes of which we are integral parts, so that all of our choices and actions have [consequential effects upon] the world around us. - Process Metaphysician Alfred North Whitehead

Kurt Gödel's Incompleteness Theorem says (i) all closed systems are unprovable within themselves and, that (ii) all open systems are rightly understood as incomplete. - R.E. Slater

The most true thing about you is what God has said to you in Christ, "You are My Beloved." - Tripp Fuller

The God among us is the God who refuses to be God without us, so great is God's Love. - Tripp Fuller

According to some Christian outlooks we were made for another world. Perhaps, rather, we were made for this world to recreate, reclaim, redeem, and renew unto God's future aspiration by the power of His Spirit. - R.E. Slater

Our eschatological ethos is to love. To stand with those who are oppressed. To stand against those who are oppressing. It is that simple. Love is our only calling and Christian Hope. - R.E. Slater

Secularization theory has been massively falsified. We don't live in an age of secularity. We live in an age of explosive, pervasive religiosity... an age of religious pluralism. - Peter L. Berger

Exploring the edge of life and faith in a post-everything world. - Todd Littleton

I don't need another reason to believe, your love is all around for me to see. – Anon

Thou art our need; and in giving us more of thyself thou givest us all. - Khalil Gibran, Prayer XXIII

Be careful what you pretend to be. You become what you pretend to be. - Kurt Vonnegut

Religious beliefs, far from being primary, are often shaped and adjusted by our social goals. - Jim Forest

We become who we are by what we believe and can justify. - R.E. Slater

People, even more than things, need to be restored, renewed, revived, reclaimed, and redeemed; never throw out anyone. – Anon

Certainly, God's love has made fools of us all. - R.E. Slater

An apocalyptic Christian faith doesn't wait for Jesus to come, but for Jesus to become in our midst. - R.E. Slater

Christian belief in God begins with the cross and resurrection of Jesus, not with rational apologetics. - Eberhard Jüngel, Jürgen Moltmann

Our knowledge of God is through the 'I-Thou' encounter, not in finding God at the end of a syllogism or argument. There is a grave danger in any Christian treatment of God as an object. The God of Jesus Christ and Scripture is irreducibly subject and never made as an object, a force, a power, or a principle that can be manipulated. - Emil Brunner

“Ehyeh Asher Ehyeh” means "I will be that who I have yet to become." - God (Ex 3.14) or, conversely, “I AM who I AM Becoming.”

Our job is to love others without stopping to inquire whether or not they are worthy. - Thomas Merton

The church is God's world-changing social experiment of bringing unlikes and differents to the Eucharist/Communion table to share life with one another as a new kind of family. When this happens, we show to the world what love, justice, peace, reconciliation, and life together is designed by God to be. The church is God's show-and-tell for the world to see how God wants us to live as a blended, global, polypluralistic family united with one will, by one Lord, and baptized by one Spirit. – Anon

The cross that is planted at the heart of the history of the world cannot be uprooted. - Jacques Ellul

The Unity in whose loving presence the universe unfolds is inside each person as a call to welcome the stranger, protect animals and the earth, respect the dignity of each person, think new thoughts, and help bring about ecological civilizations. - John Cobb & Farhan A. Shah

If you board the wrong train it is of no use running along the corridors of the train in the other direction. - Dietrich Bonhoeffer

God's justice is restorative rather than punitive; His discipline is merciful rather than punishing; His power is made perfect in weakness; and His grace is sufficient for all. – Anon

Our little [biblical] systems have their day; they have their day and cease to be. They are but broken lights of Thee, and Thou, O God art more than they. - Alfred Lord Tennyson

We can’t control God; God is uncontrollable. God can’t control us; God’s love is uncontrolling! - Thomas Jay Oord

Life in perspective but always in process... as we are relational beings in process to one another, so life events are in process in relation to each event... as God is to Self, is to world, is to us... like Father, like sons and daughters, like events... life in process yet always in perspective. - R.E. Slater

To promote societal transition to sustainable ways of living and a global society founded on a shared ethical framework which includes respect and care for the community of life, ecological integrity, universal human rights, respect for diversity, economic justice, democracy, and a culture of peace. - The Earth Charter Mission Statement

Christian humanism is the belief that human freedom, individual conscience, and unencumbered rational inquiry are compatible with the practice of Christianity or even intrinsic in its doctrine. It represents a philosophical union of Christian faith and classical humanist principles. - Scott Postma

It is never wise to have a self-appointed religious institution determine a nation's moral code. The opportunities for moral compromise and failure are high; the moral codes and creeds assuredly racist, discriminatory, or subjectively and religiously defined; and the pronouncement of inhumanitarian political objectives quite predictable. - R.E. Slater

God's love must both center and define the Christian faith and all religious or human faiths seeking human and ecological balance in worlds of subtraction, harm, tragedy, and evil. - R.E. Slater

In Whitehead’s process ontology, we can think of the experiential ground of reality as an eternal pulse whereby what is objectively public in one moment becomes subjectively prehended in the next, and whereby the subject that emerges from its feelings then perishes into public expression as an object (or “superject”) aiming for novelty. There is a rhythm of Being between object and subject, not an ontological division. This rhythm powers the creative growth of the universe from one occasion of experience to the next. This is the Whiteheadian mantra: “The many become one and are increased by one.” - Matthew Segall

Without Love there is no Truth. And True Truth is always Loving. There is no dichotomy between these terms but only seamless integration. This is the premier centering focus of a Processual Theology of Love. - R.E. Slater

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Note: Generally I do not respond to commentary. I may read the comments but wish to reserve my time to write (or write from the comments I read). Instead, I'd like to see our community help one another and in the helping encourage and exhort each of us towards Christian love in Christ Jesus our Lord and Savior. - re slater

Thursday, October 9, 2014

10 Things Your Childhood Pastor Didn’t Tell You (But Should Have)

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1. The flavor of Christianity you grew up with isn’t the only flavor out there.
There are around 40,000 different Christian denominations all with their own particular nuances and ways of expressing the Christian message. I fear too many of us grow up thinking that our group is the one group who “gets it”, but with 40,000 different expressions of Christianity out there, chances are slim that you grew up in the one faith tradition who had it all correct. Each expression of Christianity has inherent strengths and weaknesses, all of which should be considered on the individual merits.
2. Visiting and exploring other Christian traditions is beneficial to your journey, not detrimental.
One of the most valuable things I learned in seminary had nothing to do with biblical languages or theology, but rather diversity. We were assigned to attend a worship service at a church we’d never otherwise go to, so I picked the most charismatic church I could find. I had expected to find a long list of reasons to make fun of them, but what I actually found was a group of loving and sincere people who radically changed my impression of charismatics. We must encourage exploration among Christian traditions.
3. The Bible is notoriously difficult to read and understand.
Growing up I was often taught that the Bible was the “user manual for life”, but could never figure out who would write a user manual that was so complicated and difficult to understand. Understanding and interpreting scripture is anything but easy– this is why most Christian traditions require professional clergy to have a minimum of a 3 year advanced seminary degree that covers things like ancient languages, hermeneutics, etc. Even then, competent scholars will often disagree! Had I been taught the truth that the Bible is difficult to read and interpret, I would have had more grace on both myself and others.
4. There’s no such thing as a “plain” or “straight forward” way of reading the Bible.
As if the Bible were not difficult enough to understand, we also have the problem of reading our own cultural ideas and values into the scriptures when we read them. As a result, it’s simply not possible to plainly read the Bible and walk away with a pure understanding of what it’s actually saying. This doesn’t mean we give up, but that we hold what we think it to be saying in sincere humility, knowing that we have a tendency to infer our own world on the ancient world.
5. The Bible actually does contradict itself– but that’s okay.
I think as Christians we’re often afraid to admit that the Bible does contradict itself, and that as a result, it’s not without error from a historic/factual standpoint. We’re afraid that if we admit to some of these things about the Bible the house of cards will collapse– but that’s not the case. In fact, some contradictions actually make the Bible more true instead of less, such as the different accounts of the Resurrection. The differing accounts actually show that there wasn’t an attempt by the disciples to “get their story straight” but instead is an authentic eye witness testimony on each account. We need not fear reality.
6. Jesus didn’t always agree with the Hebrew Bible (Old Testament).
Have some parts of the Old Testament that really don’t sit well with you? You’re in good company– Jesus seems to have felt the same way. In Mark 10 when Jesus is asked about the law, he prefaces his comments with “Moses only gave that to you because your hearts were hard”, which shows that the OT law wasn’t something perfect, but the opposite– a concession to sinful humanity. In other parts Jesus completely rejects some things such as the permissiveness of violence. Jesus tells his listeners: “You have heard it said an eye for an eye, but I tell you do not resist an evil person”. What his listeners would have heard was, “I know the Bible says that when we use violence it should be fair and limited, but I’m telling you that’s wrong– don’t use violence at all.”
So don’t worry if stuff like stoning people in the OT turns your stomach– Jesus felt the same way.
7. Jesus valued compassion and empathy over rule following.
Truth be told, Jesus wasn’t an “anything goes” kind of person but he also wasn’t a rigid rule follower. Instead, Jesus valued empathy and compassion over man-made rule following. Jesus was a rule-breaker with things like being a friend of gluttons (instead of following the book of Proverbs), and did good works instead of resting on the Sabbath (one of the things that got him killed). The Jesus of the New Testament seems to be someone who chooses the side of compassion when there is tension between rule following and loving others.
8. The end-times stuff was all made up less than 200 years ago.
I was almost 33 years old before I found out that other Christians didn’t believe in the modern end-times rapture garbage. Doom-and-gloom rapture/end times theology is not part of historic Christianity– it came from a man named John Nelson Darby who was just born in 1800. Now, just because something is “new” doesn’t mean it is wrong, but pastors should probably give full disclosure on this: the end times madness is new, not part of historic Christianity, and is unique to evangelical fundamentalism.
9. Jesus doesn’t care what political party you belong to.
While the American version of Jesus has been married to right-wing politics for the last 30 years, the real Jesus could probably give two-hoots which political party you belong to. In fact, my best guess would be that Jesus would invite you to abandon the politics of the American Empire altogether so that you might completely devote yourself to living as a kingdom building exile whose citizenship is elsewhere.
10. Doubt can make your faith stronger.
If there’s one thing I’ve learned in the last seven years of being in seminary it’s this: I have serious doubts. As a child I was taught that doubt was the enemy of faith, but as an adult I am finding it is actually an ally. The more I doubt some aspects of our Christian tradition, the more I find myself clinging to the Jesus in the New Testament because I become more convinced that he is my only hope– both for this life, and the next.


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