What the Hell Happened to Christianity!?

CNN asks Jay Bakker:

So when did the focus of Christianity shift from the unconditional love and acceptance preached by Christ to the hate and condemnation spewed forth by certain groups today? Some say it was during the rise of Conservative Christianity in the early 1980s with political action groups like the Moral Majority. Others say it goes way back to the 300s, when Rome's Christian Emperor Constantine initiated a set of laws limiting the rights of Roman non-Christians. Regardless of the origin, one thing is crystal clear: It's not what Jesus stood for.

His parables and lessons were focused on love and forgiveness, a message of "come as you are, not as you should be." The bulk of his time was spent preaching about helping the poor and those who are unable to help themselves. At the very least, Christians should be counted on to lend a helping hand to the poor and others in need. (article here)

Bakker does a great job in challenging the fundamentalism of his youth, and the values that ultimately ripped his family apart. But I was left wondering if he protests too much.

Maybe in the politically charged American church he needs to be louded, and even more in your face than he would if he were in, say, Toronto or Calgary, to heck, even Lethbridge. Canadian Christians, for the most part, simply don't carry the same political baggage as some of our American friends.

But I LOVE the fact that he's trying a new way to be the church, to let Jesus' teachings guide his ministry as he ministers in one of the toughest mission fields in the world.

via

Just When I'd Given Up on Pop Music

An Advent Thought

“We are all meant to be mothers of God,” wrote Meister Eckhart, a medieval mystic and theologian. “What is it to me if this eternal birth of the divine Son takes place unceasingly but does not take place within myself? And, what good is it to me if Mary is full of grace if I am not also full of grace? What good is it to me for the Creator to give birth to his Son if I do not also give birth to him in my time and culture? This, then, is the fullness of time: When the Son of God is begotten in us.” (quoted in Barbara Brown Taylor’s Mother’s of God)

Indeed.

Blow 'em away in the name of the Lord!

NEW YORK (AP) - Targeted largely at conservative Christians, it's a violent video game with a difference: Combatants on one side pause for prayer, and their favoured interjection is "Praise the Lord."

Critics say "Left Behind: Eternal Forces" glorifies religious violence against non-Christians...(whole thing here)

I'm speechless.

I was wondering why my pants fit looser.

It's because the tofu I eat is shrinking my nether regions and turning me gay. Or so say this guy. Yup, Tofu is a devil's food that shrinks the penis and turns men into homosexuals.

I eat tofu. Have eaten it for years. Yet I still find my wife hot. Go figure.

Also see here.

via.

Sermon: Advent 2 - Year C

Advent has been compared to the anticipation of a child’s birth. But I know from experience that such a wait is not all joy and hope, it’s also fear and trembling. Will the child be healthy? If she’s not, will I be able to deal with the challenges she will face? Will I be a good parent? What will the world be like that she will inherit? Or even more fundamentally, will she like me?

There are two sides to the Advent story. The first is, yes, a saviour is coming, and that’s good news. The flip side is that we need a saviour in the first place, and that’s the bad news.

I think that’s what the prophet Malachi was trying to get at. He sounds angry in today’s passage, doesn’t he? You almost need to dodge the fire spitting from his mouth. It’s the kind of stuff you expect an old time prophet to say. And you can certainly hear where John the Baptist drew his inspiration from.

It was the same old story with the prophet preaching the same old message. God’s people have broken their agreement with the Almighty. They’ve done awful things to each other. They’ve forgotten their God.

So, there’s a sobering side to this season of getting ready. In just two weeks we will....(The whole thing here)

"People"

The other day I was parked in front of the Office Depot, when some jerk in a half-ton pulled in front of the store and parked in not one, not two, not three, but FOUR Handicapped parking spots. He parked right on top of where all four parking spots met. It’s worth noting that this “person” didn’t have a handicapped parking sticker on his truck.

Maybe it’s me, or have people gotten more selfish and lazy?

Sermon: Advent 1 - Year C

When you hear the word “gospel” what pops into your head?

In my final year of seminary we were asked to define the word “gospel” in one sentence, for our respective theses. Being little too full of both myself and Jurgen Moltmann’s major theological writings, I made 8 revisions. But when I thought I finally had it down in perfect theological prose, my thesis advisor, usually a cross between a teddy bear and Santa Claus, pulled out his red marker, scratched out my wonderful words, and bellowed, “Make is simpler!”

The assignment was harder then you might think. After all, the word “gospel” has become to mean anything that people want it to mean. It’s become...(read the whole thing here)

Mercer on Dion

Rick Mercer sums up the Liberal Leadership Convention:

At the end of the day though, watching Dion on stage, I couldn’t help but be amazed at his physical presence. The Liberals went into this convention with a host of choices. They could have gone with a battle-tested politician, a former athlete, a world famous academic or a food bank founder from the West; at the end of the day they choose the nerd.

That’s pretty Canadian.

via

NT Wright podcast

How many times have you heard an internationally recognized New Testament scholar sing a Bob Dylan tune?

On top of that, there is some excellent theology going on here. You gotta check it out.

via

Sermon: Reign of Christ the King - Year B

It’s no wonder Pilate could ignore him. It’s no wonder why we find it easier to follow Caesar’s view of the world rather than God’s.

It’s easier to buy expensive technological equipment to be “relevant” rather than engaging real, insufferably human, flesh-and-blood people.

It’s easier to demand that Hollywood tell our story rather than go face-to-face with someone who might reject us.

It’s easier to cozy up to power, demanding that the government adopt our agenda, rather than to do the real work of the church: loving unlovable people, and bringing Jesus’ message of new life and salvation to a broken, hurting, and sin-stained world.

But who ever said that...(whole thing here)

A mega-church downsizes...

...by sending a nasty letter.

WINSTON-SALEM — Julie and Bob Clark were stunned to receive a letter from their church in July asking them to "participate in the life of the church" — or worship elsewhere.

"They basically called us freeloaders," says Julie.
"We were freeloaders," says Bob.

In a trend that may signal rough times for wallflower Christians, bellwether mega-church Faith Community of Winston-Salem has asked "non-participating members" to stop attending.

"No more Mr. Nice Church," says the executive pastor, newly hired from Cingular Wireless. "Bigger is not always better. Providing free services indefinitely to complacent Christians is not our mission."

"Freeloading" Christians were straining the church's nursery and facility resources and harming the church's ability to reach the lost, says the pastor.

"When your bottom line is saving souls, you get
impatient with people who interfere with that goal," he says.

Faith Community sent polite but firm letters to families who attend church services and "freebie events" but never volunteer, never tithe and do not belong to a small group or other ministry. The church estimates that of its 8,000 regular attendees, only half have volunteered in the past 3 years, and a third have never given to the church.

"Before now, we made people feel comfortable and welcome, and tried to coax them to give a little something in return," says a staff member. "That's changed. We're done being the community nanny."
Surprisingly, the move to dis-invite people has drawn positive response from men in the community who like the idea of an in-your-face church.

"I thought, 'A church that doesn't allow wussies — that rocks,'" says Bob Clark, who admires the church more since they told him to get lost.

He and Julie are now tithing and volunteering. "We've taken our place in church life," he says. •

Hmmm....

via Chapel Chatter

UPDATE: it turns out that the news source of this is a parody. Too funny because it is too plausible.