The Little Friar

One of those remaining questions in Bonhoefferian scholarship is what Bonhoeffer meant in his Letters and Papers from Prison , toward the end of his life, when he wrote that Barth was unable to address the concerns of modern people.  Theologians like Rudolf Bultmann, Paul Tillich, and even Bonhoeffer concerned themselves with the question of how we can proclaim the gospel in an age that cares less and less about God, the church, or theology.  They searched in vain for an answer to this in Barth's works -- or, rather, they were disappointed with the answers they found .  Some years later, Barth had written a letter to Bethge, after the publication of the latter's magisterial biography of Bonhoeffer, asking Bethge what Bethge thought Bonhoeffer had meant in accusing Barth of a "positivism of revelation". The problem Bonhoefferian scholars have in appreciating Barth is that, if we take some of Barth's earliest writings alone, we can be left with the same impressio...

Luc Olivier Merson's  Rest on the Flight into Egypt  (1879) is one of my favorite images of Advent and Christmastide.   First, the scene is haunting and full of fatigue.  Joseph is asleep on the desert floor.  One imagines his mental and physical exhaustion fleeing danger and trying to take his wife and baby across deserts to a foreign land.   And what awaits them at journey's end?  Will they find friends in Egypt?  Work?  And when will it be safe to go back home? Then there's Mary and Jesus.  Sitting on the Sphinx, in a striking juxtaposition and lending an exotic touch to the scene.  Jesus, the only source of light in the whole scene.  What I like about  Rest on the Flight into Egypt  is how it depicts, from the very beginning of his life, the homelessness of the Messiah.  God is a refugee, an immigrant, a stranger in a strange land, a person of exile.  I've always felt that  Rest on the Fli...

In the debates over Christianity vs. unbelief, I don't have much constructive to add.  All I can say for myself is that I find the stories about Jesus to be the most profound and captivating thing I have ever encountered.  This is not to say I understand everything in the gospels or that there aren't things I find troubling or perplexing in them, even things about Jesus.  But there are moments -- the teachings and actions of Jesus -- that defy my ability to describe how they affect me, in the vision they cast and inspire and provoke within me.  Having searched far and wide, I've encountered nothing like Jesus.  Nothing in the history of philosophy.  Nothing in the other world religions, admirable and profound as they are.  I experience Jesus as a singularity.  Unprecedented.  Unreplicated.  This man is, as the early Christians knew and remembered him, Emmanuel, God-with-us.  And I think they're right.  So I worship this man by ...

Greetings to you in the Name of the Lord! Welcome to the First Church of St I.  We Crucifiers meet every Sunday to lie about Jesus.  The sermon slides off our collective self-image      and into the common cup            to be consumed with the body and blood of our Victim, and so to pass through, changed by us, not us by him.  Greetings to us in the Name of the Lord! The peace of the Lord be with me.      (I'm not worried about with you.) A smile, a handshake       -- it's all a Judas kiss.  Pieces of silver we collect      for service to our Values -- nothing special, just nothing different.  We come to First Church of St I, after all, to be comfortable, above all.  The peace of the Lord be with me. Visitors welcome. Join with me and mine  sometime. 

Kendra and I recently began to discern God's calling to leave the church we have called "home" together for the past year.  While I await churches to whom I sent my pastoral profile to continue in their searches for pastor, we've begun visiting other local churches to figure out where God may be calling us in the short term.  That process has caused us to think on a particularly important question:   What is church? Maybe you've seen the Simpsons episode, "She of Little Faith".  Homer is responsible for accidentally burning down the church that he and his family attend.  The church community sells their collective soul to the nuclear power plant owner (who is the devil in disguise) to refinance and rebuild the sanctuary.  The result is a "faith-based emporium" with comfortable theater seating for religious consumers, a pulpit bearing a screen for advertisements, and a money-changing booth. That particular episode draws attention to the problem ...

I wrote recently that the psalms are the most significant part of my prayer life.  Which brings me to explore why Psalm 62.9 is why I still go to church (" The children of Adam are emptiness, /  the children of men are a fake; /  they are set on the scales together, /  and emptiness is their weight"). There are people who say that religion is a crutch, and I've never taken offence at that description.  There have been times when I've gone to church feeling the need for personal forgiveness or comfort or strength or whatever.  But the older I get -- I'm not very old of course, but I'm not quite as young as I used to be either -- the more I feel that my faith is not primarily a personal thing but a way of sharing the common lot with everybody else. I go to church sometimes not needing comfort for my own private griefs but seeking consolation for the slow unfolding trainwreck that is called human history.  I go to church sometimes hoping to find forgivene...

I've been mulling over some theological ideas about singing karaoke for over a week now.  After suffering through a bad case of cluster headaches for nearly 24 hours -- a round that has included some new, not cool symptoms -- I wanted to record where I'm going with this.  So ... At our wedding, we had karaoke, and I noticed a few things.  Karaoke is a practice of vulnerability and community.  You take a risk when you get up in front of strangers to sing a song.  And yet, the quality of your singing doesn't matter.  What matters is jumping in and taking a risk.  Being exposed and vulnerable is what is welcomed.  That's what gets you the embrace, just getting up there and participating.  Being an exposed and vulnerable human being.  That's what I'm calling "the gospel of karaoke".  Karaoke is a model of the Kingdom of God.  Church, I think, should look more like a Karaoke night at a bar.  We should be willing to be exposed a...

I've been articulating my vision of those practices without which Christianity becomes merely a metaphysical "head trip".  Thus far, I've explored: 1.  Nonviolence 2.  Charity 3.  Hospitality 4.  Simplicity 5.  Service 6.  Humility 7.  Mutual Submission 8.  Being Prophetic 9.  Struggling for Truth 10.  Reconciliation, composed of these four: 11.  Truthfulness 12.  Merciful 13.  Justice 14.  Peace I'm nearly finished -- just this post and one other -- with my list.  Right now, I want to add the practice of community.  From the beginning, Christianity was intended to be practiced in community.  Although seasons of solitude and prayer are practiced, the main locus of practice has been in community.  We call that community, church .  And the embodiment of this practice is most beautifully given in Acts 2.42-45:  " They devoted themselv...