Christianity still contains active resources that can fund violence, alongside other resources that can fund peacemaking. It becomes the responsibility of leaders and Christians in every time and place to draw from Christianity the ideas that bring peace rather than...
02571 – Make More Music!
This will be our reply to violence: To make music more intensely, More beautifully,More devotedly than ever before.
02541 – The Dominant Religion?
The dominant religion on the planet is not Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, or Judaism but the pervasive faith in violence.
02536 – It Happens to All of Us
It happens to all of us, I concluded that Easter Sunday morning. God simply keeps reaching down into the dirt of humanity and resurrecting us from the graves we dig for ourselves through our violence, our lies, our selfishness, our arrogance, and our addictions. And...
01847 – “Jane Eyre” Dialogue
“It is not violence that best overcomes hate — nor vengeance that most certainly heals injury." "What then?" "Read the New Testament, and observe what Christ says, and how He acts; make His word your rule, and His conduct your example." "What does He say?" "Love your...
01760 – God is Not Punisher-in-Chief
With the mistaken view of God as a Punisher-in-Chief that most Christians seem to hold, we think our own violence is necessary and even good. But there is no such thing as redemptive violence. Violence doesn’t save; it only destroys all parties in both the short and...
01730 – U.S. Church in Crisis
The crisis in the U.S. church has almost nothing to do with being liberal or conservative; it has everything to do with giving up on the faith and discipline of our Christian baptism and settling for a common, generic U.S. identity that is part patriotism, part...
01700 – Objecting to Violence
I object to violence because when it appears to do good, the good is only temporary; the evil it does is permanent.
01616 – You Coming?
I reject the version of Jesus who would have told the rich young ruler, “you are blessed” instead of, “give everything to the poor and follow me.” Who would have pushed women to the fringes of the narrative, instead of empowering Mary to be the first preacher of...
01592 – Scapegoating
The word “scapegoating” originated from an ingenious ritual described in Leviticus 16. According to Jewish law, on the Day of Atonement, the high priest laid hands on an “escaping” goat, placing all the sins of the Jewish people from the previous year onto the animal....