tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1542473008446043232023-10-18T05:02:18.121-07:00Q&R: The Most Important Questions Ever AskedRowland Croucherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13473460918145751334noreply@blogger.comBlogger22125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-154247300844604323.post-88018026558286149962014-08-24T23:12:00.002-07:002014-08-27T14:05:05.127-07:00HAPPINESS vs JOY<div style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 13.333333969116211px; line-height: 19px;">
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<strong><br /></strong><u><strong></strong><strong>HAPPINESS AND JOY ARE NOT THE SAME</strong><strong> </strong></u></div>
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<strong><em>In a memorable Peanuts cartoon Lucy asks Charlie Brown ‘Did you ever know anyone who was really happy?’ Before she could finish the question Snoopy the dog comes dancing into the next frame. As only Snoopy can he dances his merry way across all frames while Lucy and Charlie watch in amazement. In the last frame Lucy finishes her question: ‘Did you ever know anyone who was really happy… and was still in their right mind?’</em></strong></div>
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<strong>Happiness, says the Oxford Dictionary, is the feeling of pleasure or contentment.</strong></div>
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<strong>How to be happy? It’s one of our most important-and-urgent questions. In the United States, one of their foundational documents, the <em>Preamble to the Declaration of Independence</em>, states that ‘we are endowed by our Creator with certain inalienable rights, life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.’</strong></div>
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<strong>My life’s vocation is an exploration of the notion of happiness: its theory and practice. I’m writing a book about it; I have a little counseling practice where I talk to others about it; I preach about it. I ask myself all the time: ‘How do the happiest people get to be like that?’</strong></div>
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<strong>One of them – Rita Backhouse - had a ‘rotten life’. Abused by an alcoholic husband, she never lost her joy. We visited her in Batehaven, NSW, and asked how she was getting on after her husband’s death a year or two beforehand. ‘Oh, when he died I lost my joy for a couple of weeks, but after that God gave me the gift of joy again!’</strong></div>
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<strong>The most-admired people on the planet – Nelson Mandela, the Dalai Lama, Mother Teresa, Gandhi, Dom Helder Camara, Dietrich Bonhoeffer – lived in close quarters with terrible suffering and evil. What was their secret?</strong></div>
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<strong>† Dietrich Bonhoeffer was locked up for months in a dark Nazi prison and just before the second World War ended, he was led out by the guards to be executed. His face was shining with joy which surprised his executioners.</strong></div>
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<strong>How do people get to be like that?</strong></div>
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<strong>It has something to do with the distinction between happiness and serenity or joy.</strong></div>
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<strong><u>FACEBOOK AND OTHER FEEDBACK</u></strong></div>
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<strong>I asked my Facebook friends to share their insights/secrets about the relationship between happiness and joy. Here’s some of this wisdom, together with snippets from my files:</strong></div>
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<strong>† Westminster Shorter Catechism: ‘Our chief end is to glorify God and enjoy him forever!’</strong></div>
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<strong>† Reality-check: as one pastor noted: ‘I look at the faces in the church; many of them are anything but joyful: some of them are set so grimly that to smile would cause permanent injury. The same careworn looks, the hard hostility, the dreadful anxieties crease their faces just as much when they leave worship as when they entered…As the Puritan Thomas Watson put it: “The two most difficult things to do: make the wicked sad and the godly joyful.” But in worship we are not mourning a defeat but celebrating a victory; the ‘eucharist’ is a thankful/joyful celebration.’</strong></div>
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<strong>† Haydn the composer, when asked why his church music was so cheerful, said ‘I cannot make it otherwise. When I think of God my heart is so full of joy that the notes dance and leap from my pen!’</strong></div>
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<strong>† ‘Happiness is what I feel when I’m close to my own soul, joy is what I feel when I’m close to God.’</strong></div>
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<strong>† Temperament: some may be born with ‘nice genes’ [1]. Joy and pain can exist side by side (but those of us whose lives are relatively pain-free mustn’t judge those for whom their pain is intolerable).</strong></div>
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<strong>† Be wary of cheap evangelism offers a trouble-free Christianity: ‘Come to Christ and all your problems will be solved’. Jesus rather offers <em>constant trouble, and his gift of constant joy, because of his constant presence…</em></strong></div>
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<strong>† Those who try hardest to be happy are often the most miserable. Real happiness is a by-product of doing worthwhile or enjoyable activities…</strong></div>
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<strong>† Joy is a gift: surrender, and receive it!</strong></div>
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<strong>† Think about who’s made his home in your life: ‘Joy is a flag flown high from the castle of my heart ‘cos the King is in residence there!’</strong></div>
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<strong>† ‘Happiness happens but joy abides, in the heart that is stayed on Jesus’.</strong></div>
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<strong>† Deep lasting joy is a by-product of a clean, selfless life; it’s not an end in itself. C S Lewis (<em>Surprised by Joy</em>) says a self-centred life which rotates around itself is evil at the core… The more you give yourself away the more you receive; only the one who dies will live. Joy is a corollary of devoting ourselves to others. Michel Quoist: ‘Your joy will begin at precisely the moment you abandon the search for your own personal happiness and seek the happiness of others’. Stop taking yourself so seriously! Get your ego out of the way and connect back to kindness. ‘Compassion is feeling what it is like to live inside somebody else’s skin. It’s the knowledge that there can never really be any peace and joy for me until there is peace and joy finally for you too.’ ~ Frederick Buechner.</strong></div>
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<strong>† George Bernard Shaw: ‘True joy in life is in being used for a purpose recognized as a mighty one… being a force for change instead of a feverish selfish little clod of grievances, complaining that the world will not devote itself to making you happy.’</strong></div>
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<strong>† Joyful people forgive everyone for everything: Anger and joy don’t mix.</strong></div>
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<strong>† ‘The darkest night has stars in it; and the Christian is someone who sees the stars rather than the darkness.’ </strong></div>
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<strong>† ‘Life is NOT “supposed to be fair” so accept life – all of it - with gratitude.’ George Matheson: ‘O joy that seekest me through pain’. Joy is not simply ‘pleasure’ or ‘fun’ or the absence of pain. </strong></div>
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<strong>† In Byron Katie’s <em>A Thousand Names for Joy</em>, she shares this mantra: “I am a lover of what is.”</strong></div>
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<strong>† Do you have someone who loves you, and listens both to you and to God at the same time?</strong></div>
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<strong>† A wise psychiatrist-friend: ‘Don’t let what describes you define you’</strong></div>
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<strong>† The sayings of joyful people? (Eg. ‘There are people worse off than I am’)</strong></div>
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<strong>† God has forgiven you – let no one accuse you, not even yourself!</strong></div>
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<strong>† A ‘disabled/differently abled’ child often brings real joy to a family: why is that?</strong></div>
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<strong>† Live serendipitously. Jesus encouraged us to ‘Look at the birds! God cares for them!’ (Matthew 6:26). Charles Hartshorne (a philosopher who offered 16 proofs for the existence of God, and was an ornithologist) reminds us that ‘Some birds, like some people, sing for the pure joy of it’. ‘God enjoys the happiness of all of his creatures!’ (Our little dog, Charlie, a ‘cavoodle’ - cavalier poodle - is a daily gift of joy to us. And this week, on a beautiful day while seated with a friend next to a forest trail near our home, a little three-year-old girl – Abbie - with her mum stopped to talk to us. Delightful!).</strong></div>
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<strong>† And many more…</strong><strong data-mce-style="font-size: 13px;" style="font-size: 13px;"> </strong></div>
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<strong>These concepts or ideas might be beautifully descriptive, but they don’t quite get to the basic <em>explanation</em> of the difference between happiness and joy.</strong></div>
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<strong>Here’s where the Christian saints and mystics, beginning with Jesus and Paul, help us:</strong></div>
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<strong>† Our notions of <em>happiness</em> are about collecting ‘stuff’ (money, accolades/ respect, experiences, power, health, answers to tough questions – you make up your own list for a talk with your spiritual advisor). It’s about ‘addition’ of ‘goodies’… Happiness is something we obtain for a price (holiday, what advertisers sell you, something in a bottle – liquid or pills, whatever’s in your bank account…)</strong></div>
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<strong>† But <em>joy</em> is what a true Christ-follower has when all the stuff is taken away… It’s about ‘subtraction’.</strong></div>
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<strong>† Jesus’ Beatitudes: Blessed (or as William Barclay translates it, ‘Oh the sheer joy of those who’) are the poor in spirit, those who mourn (really?), the meek… Can Jesus be serious? In the Upper Room (John 16:22) Jesus says to his friends: ‘These things have I spoken to you that my joy might be in you, and that your joy might be full. No one can take your joy from you’.</strong></div>
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<strong>The backdrop to this joy? In Job 38:7 the Creator speaks to Job about a time when ‘the morning stars sang together, and all the heavenly beings shouted for joy!’. The New Testament is one of the most joyous collections of writings in the world. It opens with joy at the birth of Jesus and ends with angels singing ‘Hallelujah!’ The notes of joy are everywhere - eg. in the jail at Philippi Paul is singing hymns! And later to the Christians in that city, he writes a letter about joy. Even though Paul had a serious temperament, sometimes didn’t enjoy good health, and endured beatings/stoning/ shipwrecks etc. he encourages his friends to ‘Rejoice, again I say, rejoice!’.</strong></div>
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<strong>In Philippians Paul bares his soul to his friends and offers the secret of his life and ministry, what motivated him. [2]</strong></div>
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<strong>Summary? <span data-mce-style="text-decoration: underline;" style="text-decoration: underline;">'TO ME TO LIVE IS CHRIST'</span>.</strong></div>
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<strong>Could you put your hand on your heart - without crossing your fingers - and say the same thing? 'For me to live is... ' What? Football? Bird-watching (!) ???</strong></div>
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<strong>Paul mentions Christ by name more than 50 times in this short letter.</strong></div>
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<strong>In this opening chapter he tells us about three severe tests he's been subjected to - but not one of them destroyed his faith in Christ.</strong></div>
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<strong>[1] <span data-mce-style="text-decoration: underline;" style="text-decoration: underline;">IMPRISONMENT: THE LOSS OF HIS FREEDOM</span>. It's probably in Rome, if you check Luke's story at the end of Acts. He's under house arrest this time, handcuffed - 'in chains' - to a Roman soldier on each side of him. He actually welcomed this imprisonment: it turned out to benefit his mission, to 'advance the gospel'. 'My imprisonment is for Christ' he says. In 1:12-14 he notes that successive shifts of the Imperial Guard are audiences for his evangelism! It's OK to lose his freedom if the Gospel - the Good News - is preached. </strong><br />
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<strong>Now most people incarcerated in prisons are preoccupied with the possibility of escape. Not Paul.</strong></div>
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<strong>[2] <span data-mce-style="text-decoration: underline;" style="text-decoration: underline;">SLANDER: THE LOSS OF HIS REPUTATION</span>. 1:15-18: Some fellow-preachers out there are motivated by goodwill; but others seek to humiliate Paul. These are not 'false teachers' - Paul mentions elsewhere his problem with them - but some who are preaching the true Christ, but from bad motives. They are jealous of Paul's apostolic authority and success, and wanted to recruit Paul's followers to follow them.</strong><strong></strong></div>
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<strong>Slander is a painful experience... How does Paul respond? He 'rejoiced'! 'Whether Christ is preached out of false motives or true, in that I rejoice!' (1:18). The most important factor here for Paul is that the Good News is still being proclaimed. He's willing to suffer the various humiliations that come his way if that's happening!</strong></div>
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<strong>[3] <span data-mce-style="text-decoration: underline;" style="text-decoration: underline;">EXECUTION/DEATH: THE LOSS OF HIS LIFE</span>. Paul was waiting in Rome for Nero to hear his case. Eventually he did stand before this cruel Emperor, who had no commitment to true justice. In 1:23 he says he's in a quandary: 'I have a desire to depart - to die - and be with Christ: that is far better; but on the other hand I want to live, to serve you all' [1:24]. How does one arrive at that amazing position? The secret is back in verse 20: 'I want Christ to be exalted/magnified/ honoured... whether I live or die'. Most people throughout history would do anything to get a reprieve from death.</strong></div>
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<strong>So: Freedom, Reputation, Life itself - Paul is in danger of losing all three. How do we cope with these possibilities? We who are basically self-centred enjoy our freedom; we cherish the praise of others; we want to live a long life... Perhaps our motto is: 'For me to live is ME!' But for this great saint, WHAT REALLY MATTERS is that for him to live is Christ. He's willing to suffer any deprivation, any humiliation, even a threat to life itself - even execution...</strong></div>
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<strong>What is your aim in life? 'To get to the top?' Why? How do you plan to do that?</strong><strong> </strong></div>
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<strong>In silent prayer, let us ask ourselves 'What am I living for?' </strong></div>
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<strong>May we ask for the commitment/grace to say every day 'For me to live is Christ!' </strong></div>
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<strong>[1] <a data-mce-href="http://jmm.org.au/articles/29912.htm" href="http://jmm.org.au/articles/29912.htm">http://jmm.org.au/articles/29912.htm</a> </strong></div>
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<strong>[2] Notes adapted from a sermon preached at All Souls Langham Place, London, by Rev. John Stott, 29/07/1990 (audio 904 <a data-mce-href="http://allsouls.org/" href="http://allsouls.org/">allsouls.org</a>)</strong></div>
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<strong>Rowland Croucher jmm.org.au</strong></div>
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<strong>August 2014</strong></div>
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Rowland Croucherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13473460918145751334noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-154247300844604323.post-87635651561445784782014-08-21T03:37:00.004-07:002014-08-21T03:37:31.648-07:00PARADIGM SHIFTS<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><u><span style="font-size: 20pt;">ELEPHANTS IN THE ROOM (PARADIGM SHIFTS)</span></u></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b><i><span style="font-size: 20pt;">Some people claim to see fern seeds yet fail to see the Elephant
standing right in front of them – C S Lewis.</span></i></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">Bishop Tom Frame, in his <a href="http://jmm.org.au/articles/24606.htm">provocative book</a> <i>A
House Divided? The Quest for Unity Within Anglicanism</i> wrote:</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b><i><span style="font-size: 20pt;">* ‘Synods, like all committees, are wary of radicals,
mavericks, prophets and reformers. They tend to prefer those… who will never
challenge the prevailing orthodoxy or suggest institutional risk-taking’.</span></i></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b><i><span style="font-size: 20pt;">* ‘In my view, the <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:placename w:st="on">Australian</st1:placename>
<st1:placetype w:st="on">Church</st1:placetype></st1:place> has too few
creative individuals and too many critical observers… The Church seems to
produce more renegades than revolutionaries, and more would-be iconoclasts
than<br />
innovators’.</span></i></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">I mark important bits in the books I read: I double-marked those.</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">From teenage years onwards I’ve been something of an iconoclastic
radical, asking provocative questions of traditionalists whose '<i>status is
the quo'</i>. If people take seriously something which is manifestly
ridiculous, I can’t ignore it. So it’s not surprising that I have rarely been
invited to occupy positions of leadership or speak at annual conferences in
conservative organizations (unless I’ve been given a highly circumscribed
subject to speak on… and yes, on those occasions, I have been respectful, and
only mildly provocative!). </span></b></div>
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<b><i><span style="font-size: 20pt;">Teenage sample</span></i></b><b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"> (to an elder in the Brethren ‘Assembly’ our family
attended):</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">‘So you take the Isaiah text (58:13) about not doing anything
pleasurable on the Lord’s Day literally. What do you do between church
services, on Sunday afternoons?’</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">Elder: ‘I take a nap.’</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">Moi: ‘Do you find that pleasurable?’</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">Elder (a little confused): ‘Well, yes, I suppose I do…’</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">Moi: (some months later): ‘What do you do these days on Sunday
afternoons?’</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">Elder: ‘I go for a walk.’</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">Moi: ‘Do you enjoy your walk?’</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">Elder (again confused): ‘Yes, I do, actually.’</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">Moi: ‘But you don’t go to Cronulla (the nearest surfing beach) for
a swim?’</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">Elder: ‘Certainly not!’</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">Moi: ‘So it’s OK to enjoy yourself on terra firma but not in the
H2O on the Lord’s Day?’</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">Elder was silent (and still confused)…</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">*****</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">I’ve experienced at least one paradigm shift in my thinking in
each decade of an interesting existence…. including these ‘Aha’ experiences:</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><i><span style="font-size: 20pt;">Late teens</span></i></b><b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">: No particular Christian group has a monopoly on the truth</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><i><span style="font-size: 20pt;">Twenties</span></i></b><b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">: The KJV will not be used widely in 20 years because God wants
his Word-in-Scripture to be understood – especially by young people, new Christians,
and those for whom English is a second or third language…</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">Fundamentalism has some strengths, but militant
Christian fundamentalism (of the John R Rice variety) doesn’t have much
to commend it’. Biblical Inerrancy is not a doctrine the Bible posits for itself, so it must be heretical…</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">In the first church I pastored (Narwee Baptist in <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Sydney</st1:place></st1:city>) we added a staff member (Dave
Kendall) when we couldn’t afford to. We simply found enough people who wanted
to strengthen the youth ministry in our church to increase their offerings for
a year to support this move. In the 1970s we did the same at Blackburn Baptist
Church when Robert Colman was added as the fourth pastor – again, when the
‘bean-counters’ would have advised against it. The corporate just shall live by
faith eh? The result: momentum was generated in those two churches, which grew
substantially over four and eight years respectively.</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><i><span style="font-size: 20pt;">Thirties</span></i></b><b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">: ‘All institutions are inherently degenerative’ (Robert
Merton). They tend to accrue power instead of giving it away and exist at
the mercy of petty bureaucrats. Thus clericalism in churches (all of them)
is evil: leaders are supposed to empower others for ministry but hardly
ever do that well’. When institutionalism infects a denomination, the
churches get the idea that they exist for HQ rather than the other way
around.</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">Also institutions tend toward exclusiveness. For example, the
‘closed membership’ stance of most Baptist churches in <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Australia</st1:place></st1:country-region>
(until recently) made a judgment that an ‘immersed’ teenager was more competent
to be a member than a godly ex-Methodist who’d been baptized by sprinkling!
When I broached this subject to the deacons at <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:placename w:st="on">Blackburn</st1:placename> <st1:placename w:st="on">Baptist</st1:placename>
<st1:placetype w:st="on">Church</st1:placetype></st1:place> in the early
1970s, one of them kyboshed discussion with an ‘over my dead body’ response…
See the <a href="http://jmm.org.au/articles/9660.htm">talk</a> I’ve
given to Baptists around <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Australia</st1:place></st1:country-region>
on this topic. The tide is turning on this one.</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">Social Justice and Love for God/others are the key Kingdom values
for Jesus but they don’t get a mention in the historic Christian creeds
or evangelical Doctrinal Statements. Why is that? Inherent Pharisaism
in conservative Christian culture… See my article<a href="http://jmm.org.au/articles/13113.htm"> ‘Pharisees Ancient and
Modern’</a> for more…</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">The truth embraces many dimensions: the temptation of tired minds
is to focus on just one aspect and thus imbibe a very
restricted spiritual diet. For example, ‘Worship’ has seven meanings in
Biblical and subsequent Christian history, but most churches embrace just
one mode, and are thus impoverished. <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Mission</st1:place></st1:city>
has three dimensions (justice, works of mercy, evangelism) but most
churches major on one, or at most two of these. Traditionalists,
conservatives, progressives and radicals all have a special insight into a
particular phenomenon’s worth because each group’s asking different
questions. A mature mind will not be locked into a bigoted ‘left or
right-wing’ position on this or that, but will strive to be ‘above the
fray’, wingless.</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><i><span style="font-size: 20pt;">Forties</span></i></b><b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">:
Paradox, ambiguity, is a beautiful thing. Men who spend more than 50 hours a
week pursuing their vocation will not make good fathers. Sons and daughters
especially between 11-14 need their dads. In our sick culture males especially
‘are what they do’: their worth is measured by how well they perform
compared to other males. The mid-life crisis is all about realizing that
this competitive instinct is sick and destructive.</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><i><span style="font-size: 20pt;">Fifties</span></i></b><b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">:
Clergy are a wounded lot. The number of ex-pastors equates with the number of
serving pastors in the Western world. Before commencing <st1:place w:st="on"><st1:placename w:st="on">John</st1:placename> <st1:placename w:st="on">Mark</st1:placename> <st1:placename w:st="on">Ministries</st1:placename></st1:place> we could find no
cross-denominational ministry to burned-out pastors anywhere. There are plenty
of them now. Each of us should identify our strengths and give ourselves
away to individuals and groups who are powerless (in my case Dawn Rowan –
look her up in Google – and ex-pastors and their spouses).</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><i><span style="font-size: 20pt;">Sixties</span></i></b><b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">:
Since the Old and New Testaments have nothing to say about homosexuality as an
orientation, nor about the possibility of a faithful committed
relationship between two Gay/Lesbian people, who am I who happened to be
born with a heterosexual orientation to deny my sisters and brothers the
rich benefits I’ve enjoyed in 51+ years of marriage? This is the major
paradigm shift the Church worldwide is wrestling with at present. Like all
other paradigm shifts (eg the emancipation of slaves and women) we’ll look
back in twenty years’ time and wonder what all the fuss was about…</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><i><span style="font-size: 20pt;">Seventies</span></i></b><b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">: The Lord has yet more light and truth to break forth from his
Word (who first said that?). Looking back, I’m grateful for these insights
which have moved from ‘ridiculous’ to ‘the norm’ within a decade or two,
when the tribes have caught up with them… The major one where the tribes
are still dragging their feet is the institutional/empowerment one…</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">Today’s Facebook quote: ‘Every truth passes through three stages
before it is recognized: First, it is ridiculed, second, it is
opposed, in the third it is regarded as self-evident’ (Schopenhauer).</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">But. in all this, there is a price to pay. ‘A prophet has no honor
in the prophet’s own country’ (John <st1:time hour="16" minute="44" w:st="on">4:44</st1:time>).</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<br />
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">Rowland Croucher<br /></span></b></div>
Rowland Croucherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13473460918145751334noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-154247300844604323.post-21698545586165300802014-08-21T02:58:00.002-07:002014-08-21T02:58:26.847-07:00THREE WAYS TO READ THE BIBLE<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">THREE WAYS TO READ THE BIBLE</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">The three books reviewed here are excellent examples of how one
branch of the Christian church reads its sacred book – the Bible – and may be
ignorant of other ways of approaching the Scriptures.</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">The Evangelical/Holiness method is practised during one’s daily
‘Quiet Time’ (in what Catholics have traditionally termed the ‘oratory’) where
one asks ‘What is the word of the Lord here for me today?’ The great
Evangelical missionary <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Hudson</st1:place></st1:city>
<st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Taylor</st1:place></st1:city> used to
read the Bible right through regularly to spot any command he was not obeying.</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">The ‘Signs and Wonders’ approach asks ‘How can a Word from the
Lord bring deliverance/ healing/insight to this ministry situation here/now?’</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">In the Academy/Seminary one of the key questions about the
biblical material has to do with ‘provenance’ (a term the other two groups
never use). They ask: how did the Bible get to be like it is?</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">So:</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">1. Oratory (locus: my life as an obedient servant of Christ: a
good NT example might be the author of the Epistle of James);</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">2. Ministry (within the Body of Christ and elsewhere – eg. Agabus
and the itinerant prophets, Acts 11:27ff.);</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">3. Academy/Seminary (focusses on the mind – eg. Apollos?).</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">Each has its own culture/language/cliches/ideas.</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">There is hardly any overlap between these approaches in many/most
churches. For example, if Agabus rocked up to an Evangelical or
Progressive/Mainline church and announced he had a ‘word from the Lord’ for
that congregation today, they generally wouldn’t know what to do with him. If a
theological teacher asked the Evangelicals or Pentecostals about understanding
the Torah in terms of the Documentary Hypothesis, they’d respond ‘Please
explain!’.</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">(My own view, for what it’s worth, is that each of these broad
approaches has value, and in fact describes the church’s historical transition
from a first/second generation charismatic era, through a ‘routinization of
charisma’ phase – where creeds and laws replace fervour and ‘life’ – to the
mostly intellectual stance of the Academy, and the predictability of mainline
churches’ worship rituals).</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">(Of course there are other ways to read the Bible, one of the best
being the <a href="http://jmm.org.au/articles/2278.htm">Lectio Divina</a> approach).</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">¬¬¬¬</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">1. Australian Baptist pastor Rex Hayward’s <i>Daily
Readings </i>(2010) are pure ‘Evangelical’. There’s a Bible
reading for each day of the year, a page of questions, brief paragraphs with
challenging ideas for prayerful thought, and everywhere a call to holiness and
serious commitment. There are no quotes (that I could find) from
biblical scholars, but quite a few from hymns and sacred choruses. The readings
are mostly from the Gospels and epistles (we journey right through Mark
and James), with a few Old Testament prophets tossed in, and, I think only a
couple of Psalms, and nothing that I recall from the Torah. The flavour is
hortatory: and the target for Rex’s homilies is an ‘open heart and a teachable
spirit’. Good for anyone, of any theological persuasion, who is willing to
humbly submit to the Word of God in Scripture and be challenged to live a life
of obedience to the will of Christ. You can order it from Wycliffe Bible
Translators (Kangaroo Ground, <st1:state w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Victoria</st1:place></st1:state>)
or from Rex himself (rexhayward [at] hotmail.com ).</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">¬¬¬¬</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">2. Rachel Hickson’s <i>Eat the Word Speak the Word:
Exercising a Bible-based prophetic ministry </i>(Monarch Books, Oxford UK,
2010) ‘takes us on a journey that will train you to respect and handle the word
of God correctly, and then equip the prophetic gift within you’ (says the
author on the back cover). Rachel Hickson and her husband Gordon run a ministry
called Heartcry, training local churches ‘in the area of prayer and the
prophetic’. They serve also as associate ministers at the respected St.
Aldate’s Church <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Oxford</st1:place></st1:city>
(where Canon Michael Green was rector for a decade 1975-86).</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">When one hears that phrase ‘<i>the</i> prophetic’ you can be
sure the flavour is Pentecostal – not ever, or hardly ever ‘liberationist’:
though, remarkably, there is actually one paragraph in this book about the
great biblical/ prophetic emphasis on social justice.</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">These chapters comprise the essence of Rachel’s teaching – which
she gives to churches and conferences around the world. She expects miracles,
and we have a couple of examples here which ‘blow your mind’: (1) In <st1:state w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">New York</st1:place></st1:state> she had a
‘word’ for someone in her conference about ‘two zebras’ which she hesitated to
deliver because it seemed so crazy. But the Spirit’s pressure persisted: and
lo, a mixed-race couple came up to her very excited about their desire to have
children, and they’d used this term to describe their future offspring. (You
guessed it: the mother conceived about that time and nine months later twins
were born). (2) A crippled beggar-man in <st1:country-region w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Malawi</st1:place></st1:country-region>, paralyzed from the hips
downwards, was prayed for, then anointed regularly to remove the dead
skin from his legs. Ten years later she met him again: ‘He told me how after
being massaged with warm oil, his legs had begun to move more and more until
all the dead, hardened skin was removed, and now he could walk perfectly’.</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">Have any of my rationalist readers got a decent explanation for
these?</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">Two of her mentor/heroes are the great Pentecostal giants-of-faith
Smith Wigglesworth and Reinhard Bonnke: two people I’d encourage anyone to get
to know. (I remember being a fellow-speaker at an Australian charismatic
conference in Adelaide with Bonnke: and I’ve never witnessed, before or since.
an auditorium filling up from the front backwards as early and as quickly as in
Bonnke’s healing meetings!).</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">This is a balanced book, so Evangelicals and ‘Mainliners’
won’t be confronted with too much Pentecostal craziness (!). Sample:
‘Never accuse people of not having enough faith if they are not healed. We may
not understand why people are not always instantly healed, but it is OK to
admit we don’t know why’ (p. 183). I like that.</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">Highly recommended (with the couple of caveats mentioned earlier).</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">¬¬¬¬</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">Linda M. MacCammon, <i>Liberating the Bible: A Guide for the
Curious and Perplexed</i> (Orbis, 2008).</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">Professor MacCammon teaches theology and ethics to College
students, and these chapters read like her lecture notes (and at the outset I
want to record my envy of her students!).</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">Her first sentence in Chapter 1: ‘The Bible is a dangerous book.
It is without question one of the most misinterpreted, misunderstood and
misapplied books on the planet. Over the centuries, it has been used as a
rationale for economic and social exploitation, the oppression of women and
minorities, slavery, war and genocide. It has fostered anti-Semitism, misogyny,
racial animus, homophobia… and every sort of crackpot cult imaginable. Yet the
Bible has also been the driving force behind numerous social and political
reform movements…’</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">More… ‘There is often a mistaken assumption that Biblical
teachings can be extracted and applied directly to contemporary situations…
[People cite] biblical texts on questions of divorce, homosexuality, stem-cell
research, the status of women… the validity of other religions, and other
complex issues…’</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">The old adage that ‘a little knowledge is a dangerous thing’ comes
to mind. As does this quote from Terry Eagleton: ‘If it is true that we need a
degree of certainty to get by, it is also true that too much of the stuff can
be lethal!’</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">So with a professional theologian and ethicist we proceed with
humility and a teachable spirit! But don’t let me discourage you: she inhabits
‘simplicity the other side of complexity’. And her mentors are the best of the
best – people like Paul Ricoeur, John Bright, E P Sanders, Leander Keck – and the
evangelical F F Bruce.</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">And she applies the Bible to life. Like this: in the reflection
questions at the end of the chapter on Genesis (and a discussion of the story
of Cain and Abel) she asks us to ‘recall the last time you were really angry.
Write down how you felt. Why were you angry? What did you want?’ Etc.
Beautiful!</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">And this: How would each of the three Isaiahs assess some
contemporary issues, such as global warming, the war in Iraq, HIV and AIDS, the
growing gap between rich and poor…?’ (etc.)</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">(I hope I’m whetting the appetites of any reading this who’ve not
yet had the privilege of studying theology with a good teacher! You can’t do
better than to take a year or more off to do that – with no other
distractions).</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">Three Isaiahs? Yes, and the validity of the documentary hypothesis
for understanding the authorship and provenance of the Torah etc. Some stories
in Genesis belonging to ‘sociology’ rather than ‘history’? Yes, maybe. But our
good professor has a lively faith, and her purpose in raising these questions –
which are everyday puzzles for professional biblical scholars – is to help us
tread carefully through hermeneutical minefields, and come through on the other
side with an ‘examined’ faith. In her Questions for Discussion and Reflection
she guides us gently into some complex issues.</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">Like this one on p. 205: ‘Matthew’s anti-Judaism is not unique to
the New Testament. How do you think anti-Jewish passages should be treated by
contemporary interpreters? What does this phenomenon suggest about other
biblical biases, such as sexism, homophobia, and intolerance of other faiths?’</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">The last paragraph is a comment by the Hindu sage Ramakrishna on
the wisdom that our grasp of the Sacred is always partial and limited:</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><i><span style="font-size: 20pt;">Mother, Mother, Mother! Everyone foolishly assumes that his clock
alone tells correct time. Christians claim to possess exclusive truth…
countless varieties of Hindus insist that their sect, no matter how small and
insignificant, expresses the ultimate position. Devout Muslims maintain that Koranic
revelation supersedes all others. The entire world is being driven insane by
the single phrase: “My religion alone is true.” O Mother, you have shown me
that no clock is entirely accurate. Only the transcendent sun of knowledge
remains on time. Who can make a system from Divine Mystery?</span></i></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><i><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></i></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">If it’s not too late, order this one as a Christmas gift and spend
a month dawdling through it on your annual holidays! It will open your eyes to
the wonders of a biblical faith.</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">Rowland Croucher</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;">December 2010</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<div style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<b><span style="font-size: 20pt;"><br />
~~</span></b><span style="font-size: 13.5pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
Rowland Croucherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13473460918145751334noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-154247300844604323.post-27703728596290208802014-08-19T02:11:00.000-07:002014-08-19T02:11:02.648-07:00LIVING WITH AMBIGUITY<div style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 13.333333969116211px; line-height: 19px;">
<strong>LIVING WITH AMBIGUITY</strong></div>
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 13.333333969116211px; line-height: 19px;">
<strong>My thoughts are not your thoughts and your ways are not my ways, declares Yahweh. For the heavens are as high above earth as my ways are above your ways, my thoughts above your thoughts.</strong></div>
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 13.333333969116211px; line-height: 19px;">
<strong>We know only imperfectly... When I was a child, I used to talk like a child, and see things as a child does, and think like a child; but now that I have become an adult, I have finished with childish ways. Now we see only reflections in a mirror, mere riddles... Now I can know only imperfectly.</strong></div>
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 13.333333969116211px; line-height: 19px;">
<strong>So, then, where does that leave the wise? or the scholars? or the skilful debaters of this world? God has shown that this world's wisdom is foolishness!</strong></div>
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 13.333333969116211px; line-height: 19px;">
<strong>How great are God's riches! How deep are his wisdom and knowledge! Who can explain his decisions?</strong></div>
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 13.333333969116211px; line-height: 19px;">
<strong>Who can understand his ways? As the scripture says, 'Who knows the mind of the Lord? Who is able to give him advice? Who has ever given him anything, so that he had to pay it back?'</strong></div>
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 13.333333969116211px; line-height: 19px;">
<strong>For all things were created by him, and all things exist through him and for him. To God be the glory for ever! Amen.</strong></div>
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 13.333333969116211px; line-height: 19px;">
<strong>[Isaiah 55: 8-9, JB; 1 Corinthians 13: 11-12, JB; 1 Corinthians 1: 20, GNB; Romans 11: 33-36, GNB]</strong></div>
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 13.333333969116211px; line-height: 19px;">
<strong>~~~</strong></div>
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 13.333333969116211px; line-height: 19px;">
<strong>God is mystery. We can never encompass God in thoughts or words. When we talk about God we are trying to describe the divine from the point of view of the human, the eternal from the standpoint of the temporal, the infinite in finite terms, the absolute from the severely limited perspective of the relative.</strong></div>
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 13.333333969116211px; line-height: 19px;">
<strong>Rudolf Otto describes the sacred as <em>'mysterium tremendum et fascinans</em>', the awe-inspiring mystery which fascinates us. We are tempted to hide from the fearful majesty of God, but also to gaze in wonder at his loveliness.</strong></div>
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 13.333333969116211px; line-height: 19px;">
<strong>We encounter mystery in the descriptions of the ways of God in the Bible, in the sacraments, liturgies and rites of the church, in nature, and in the events of history. Mystery pervades the whole of reality. Indeed, true knowledge and freedom are not possible without an experience of mystery.</strong></div>
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 13.333333969116211px; line-height: 19px;">
<strong>In the languages of literature, art, music, we touch the hem of God's garment and feel a little tingle of power, but God will always remain incomprehensible.</strong></div>
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 13.333333969116211px; line-height: 19px;">
<strong>Mystery also surrounds the human creatures who are both made in the image of a mysterious God and who have, by their sinning, marred that image. Pascal says this doctrine of the Fall offends us, but yet, without this mystery, the most incomprehensible of all, we are incom prehensible to ourselves.</strong></div>
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 13.333333969116211px; line-height: 19px;">
<strong>So Christianity, says Kierkegaard, is 'precisely the paradoxical'. (Paradox -- from the Greek <em>para</em> and <em>doxa</em>, 'against opinion'.) The idea of mystery invites us to think more deeply, not to abandon thinking; to reject the superficial, and the simplistic.</strong></div>
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 13.333333969116211px; line-height: 19px;">
<strong>Prejudice is, in essence, idolatry: the worship of my - or my group's - ideas, even ideas of God. If I know all the answers I would be God, and 'playing God' is the essence of idolatry.</strong></div>
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 13.333333969116211px; line-height: 19px;">
<strong>One of my greatest dangers is to relax my vigilance against the possibility of prejudice in my own life, or to suffer from the delusion that I can ever be really free from it. We human beings are more rationalising than rational. Thomas Merton said somewhere, 'No-one is so wrong as the one who knows all the answers.' Alfred North Whitehead: 'Religions commit suicide when they find their inspiration in their dogmas.' 'If you understand everything, you must be misinformed,' runs a Japanese proverb. People who are always right are always wrong. The dilemma is summed up by W.B. Yeats -- 'While the best lack conviction, the worst are full of certainty and passionate intensity.'</strong></div>
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 13.333333969116211px; line-height: 19px;">
<strong>The key lies in distinguishing between faithless doubt and creative doubt. Faithless doubt, as Kahlil Gibran put it, 'is a pain too lonely to realise that faith is his twin brother'. Or it is a cop-out to save us being committed to anything. Its accomplice, neutrality, is also evil: the apathy of 'good' persons results in the triumph of evil. The worst evils in the world are not committed by evil people, but by good people who do not know they are not doing good. The authentic Christian is willing to listen, as well as to save.</strong></div>
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 13.333333969116211px; line-height: 19px;">
<strong>Creative doubt, on the other hand, is 'believing with all your heart that your belief is true, so that it will work for you; but then facing the possibility that it is really false, so that you can accept the consequences of the belief.' (John Reseck).</strong></div>
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 13.333333969116211px; line-height: 19px;">
<strong>So faith is not about certainty (certainty makes faith invalid and unnecessary). Its core is the mystery -- and the reality -- of the Eternal coming into time: 'Our God contracted to a span, incomprehensibly made man' (Wesley).</strong></div>
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 13.333333969116211px; line-height: 19px;">
<strong>The essence of Christianity is not dogmatic systems of belief, but being apprehended by Christ. True faith holds onto Christ, and for all else is uncommitted. It is about a relationship with Christ (and all meaningful relationships involve risk). The true God does not give us an immutable belief-system, but himself. He became one of us to 'make his light shine in our hearts, to bring us the knowledge of God's glory shining in the face of Christ' (2 Corinthians 4: 6). Alleluia!</strong></div>
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 13.333333969116211px; line-height: 19px;">
<strong>~~~</strong></div>
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 13.333333969116211px; line-height: 19px;">
<strong>Here are some of the best quotes on this broad subject, from my files:</strong></div>
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 13.333333969116211px; line-height: 19px;">
<strong>The essential difference between orthodox Christianity and the various heretical systems is that orthodoxy is rooted in paradox. Heretics, as Irenaeus saw, reject paradox in favour of a false clarity and precision. But true faith can only grow and mature if it includes the elements of orthodoxy that God cannot be known by the mind, but is known in the obscurity of faith, in the way of ignorance, in the darkness. Such doubt is not the enemy of faith, but an essential element within it. For faith in God does not bring the false peace of answered questions and resolved paradoxes. Rather, it can be seen as a process of 'unceasing interrogation'. [Kenneth Leech, <em>True God</em>]</strong></div>
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 13.333333969116211px; line-height: 19px;">
<strong>'Stage 5' faith involves going beyond explicit ideological systems and clear boundaries of identity; accepting that truth is more multidimensional and organically independent than most theories or accounts of truth can grasp; symbols, stories, doctrines and liturgies are inevitably partial, limited to a particular experience of God and incomplete. This position (i.e. that an appreciation of mystery and ambiguity is the essence of maturity) implies no lack of commitment to one's own truth tradition. Nor does it mean a wishy-washy neutrality or mere fascination with the exotic features of alien cultures... Rather, each genuine perspective will augment and correct aspects of the other in a mutual movement toward the real and the true. </strong><strong>[James Fowler, <em>Stages of Faith</em>]</strong></div>
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 13.333333969116211px; line-height: 19px;">
<strong>I believe, because it is absurd... it is certain, because it is impossible. [Tertullian]</strong></div>
<div style="color: #333333; font-family: Georgia, 'Times New Roman', 'Bitstream Charter', Times, serif; font-size: 13.333333969116211px; line-height: 19px;">
<strong>Nicolas of Cusa expressed what the human heart had always surmised: all opposites coincide in God. This insight has weighty implications for any attempt to speak about divine realities. The closer we come to saying something worthwhile, the more likely that paradox will be the only way to express it. 'When I am weak, then I am strong' (2 Corinthians 12: 10). 'In losing one's life one will find it' (Matthew 10: 39). 'In spite of that, we call this Friday good' (T.S. Eliot, <em>Four Quartets</em>). </strong><strong>[David Steindl-Rast, <em>Gratefulness, the Heart of Prayer</em>]</strong></div>
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<strong>Most of us find it very easy to hurl an epithet or fashion a label. We like to smooth out wrinkles, sand down rough edges, simplify the mysteries that are threatening precisely because they defy categorisation. There is certainly enough confusion in our lives, we reason. Shouldn't it facilitate our day to day living if we are clear on what is good or bad, who is left or right, what is profound or drivel? The fact is that those who have attempted to nail down or write off mystery end up 'undone' by the very pride which leads them to play God in the first place... the Pharisees did not rest until they had nailed an upstart dissenter to a tree. [Donald J. Foran, <em>Living with Ambiguity</em>]</strong></div>
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<strong>If you want to attempt to travel through life without trouble, believe everything (be gullible) or believe nothing (be cynical), and don't be committed to anything (be 'neutral'). [Source Unknown]</strong></div>
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<strong>Whilst we might deplore a lack of openness to any new thing God is doing, nevertheless this is the psychology of the human creatures God has made. Those whose thinking is rooted in 'simplicity this side of complexity' must not be too harsh with others who enjoy 'complexity the other side of simplicity'. Ideally, we are all moving towards 'simplicity the other side of complexity', but we must be patient with one another on the way there. [Rowland Croucher, <em>Recent Trends Among Evangelicals</em>]</strong></div>
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<strong>There's a wideness in God's mercy, /Like the wideness of the sea: There's a kindness in his justice, /Which is more than liberty. For the love of God is broader /Than the measures of man's mind: And the heart of the Eternal /Is most wonderfully kind. But we make his love too narrow /By false limits of our own; And we magnify his strictness /With a zeal he will not own. [EW. Faber]</strong></div>
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<strong>The ultimate gift of conscious life is a sense of the mystery that encompasses it. [Lewis Mumford]</strong></div>
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<strong>The most beautiful experience we can have is the mysterious. It is the fundamental emotion which stands at the cradle of true art and true science. [Albert Einstein]</strong></div>
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<strong>If they [the ministers of the church] had no doubts, they would hardly be very good Christians, because the intellectual life is as ambiguous as the moral life... The element of doubt is an element of faith itself... What the church should do is to accept someone who says that the faith for which the church stands is a matter of one's ultimate concern... Dogma should not be abolished, but interpreted in such a way that it is no longer a suppressive power which produces dishonesty or flight. [Paul Tillich, <em>A History of Christian Thought</em>]</strong></div>
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<strong>At ebb tide I wrote</strong></div>
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<strong>A line upon the sand</strong></div>
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<strong>And gave it all my heart</strong></div>
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<strong>And all my soul.</strong></div>
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<strong>At flood tide I returned</strong></div>
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<strong>To read what I had inscribed</strong></div>
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<strong>And found my ignorance upon the shore. [Kahlil Gibran]</strong></div>
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<strong>And a prayer:</strong></div>
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<strong><em>Lord God, the God of security and the enemy of security too; I come to you, confused, needing the reassurance of your gracious acceptance; broken, needing your healing -- or else the promise of your presence; thirsting for reality, to the fountain of life; desolate, yearning for a loving touch as from a parent.</em></strong></div>
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<strong><em>Help me to love you above everything else; to trust your goodness when I do not understand your ways, to affirm your constancy in spite of my fickleness; my times are in your hands. Amen</em></strong></div>
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<strong><em>Eternal God, the light of the minds that know you, the joy of the hearts that love you, and the strength of the wills that serve you; grant that I may know you, that I may truly love you, and so to love you that I may fully serve you, whom to serve is perfect freedom, in Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.</em></strong><strong> [St Augustine of Hippo]</strong></div>
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<strong><em>In this day, may my thoughts, words and deeds betray a little more of your image in me, less of the influence of the world, the flesh and the devil, so that all I meet I shall treat as Christ and be as Christ to them. Amen.</em></strong></div>
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<strong>A Benediction:</strong></div>
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<strong>Knowing the love of Christ, which is beyond knowledge, [may] you be filled with the utter fullness of God (Ephesians 3: 19, JB). [Rowland Croucher, <em>High Mountains Deep Valleys</em>, Albatross/Lion, chapter 51]</strong></div>
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Rowland Croucherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13473460918145751334noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-154247300844604323.post-7802096336524888922014-08-19T02:09:00.004-07:002014-08-19T02:10:25.686-07:00ACCEPTING DIVERSITY<br />
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<a data-mce-href="http://i1.wp.com/jmm.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2003/01/diversity2.jpg" data-mce-style="font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit; color: #3a6999;" href="http://i1.wp.com/jmm.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2003/01/diversity2.jpg" style="color: #3a6999; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit;"><img alt="" class="aligncenter size-medium wp-image-29982" data-mce-src="http://i1.wp.com/jmm.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2003/01/diversity2.jpg?resize=230%2C300" data-mce-style="font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit;" src="http://i1.wp.com/jmm.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2003/01/diversity2.jpg?resize=230%2C300" height="300" style="display: block; font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" title="diversity" width="230" /></a></div>
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<strong>Those who depend on obeying the Law live under a curse… the Law has nothing to do with faith (Paul). If [faith] is alone and includes no actions, it is dead (James).</strong></div>
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<strong>We have many parts in the one body, and all these parts have different functions. In the same way, though we are many, we are one body in union with Christ, and we are all joined to each other as different parts of one body.</strong></div>
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<strong>Christ is like a single body, which has many parts; it is still one body, even though it is made up of different parts. God put every different part in the body just as he wanted it to be… There would not be a body if it were only one part! There are many parts, but one body.</strong></div>
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<strong>What we see now is like a dim image in a mirror… What I know now is only partial… Meanwhile these three remain: faith, hope and love; and the greatest of these is love.</strong></div>
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<strong>So, then, let us stop judging one another… aim at those things that bring peace and that help to strengthen one another.</strong></div>
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<strong>And now I give you a new commandment: love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. If you have love for one another, then everyone will know that you are my disciples.</strong></div>
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<strong>Accept one another, then, for the glory of God, as Christ has accepted you.</strong></div>
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<strong>Above all, keep your love for one another at full strength, because love cancels innumerable sins. Be hospitable to one another without complaining. Whatever gift each of you may have received, use it in service to one another, like good stewards dispensing the grace of God in its varied forms.</strong></div>
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<strong>(Galatians 3: 10, GNB; James 2: 17, GNB; Romans 12: 4-5, GNB; 1 Corinthians 12: 12-13, 18-20, GNB; 1 Corinthians 13: 12-13, GNB; Romans 14:13 and 19, GNB; John 13: 34-35, GNB; Romans 15: 7, GNB; 1 Peter 4: 8-10, NEB)</strong></div>
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<strong>Snoopy was typing a manuscript, up on his kennel. Charlie Brown: ‘What are you doing, Snoopy?’ Snoopy: ‘Writing a book about theology.’ Charlie Brown: ‘Good grief. What’s its title?’ Snoopy (thoughtfully): ‘Have You Ever Considered You Might Be Wrong?’</strong></div>
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<strong>This points up a central Christian dictum: God’s truth is very much bigger than our little systems.</strong></div>
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<strong>Our Lord often made the point that God’s fathering extended to all people everywhere. He bluntly targeted the narrow nationalism of his own people, particularly in stories like the good Samaritan. Here the ‘baddie’ is a hero. It’s a wonderful parable underlining the necessity to love God through loving your neighbour — and one’s neighbour is the person who needs help, whoever he or she may be. But note that love of neighbour is more than seeking their conversion, then adding a few acts of mercy to others in ‘our group’. Jesus’ other summary statements about the meaning of religion and life in Matthew 23:23 and Luke 11:42 involve justice too: attempting to right the wrongs my neighbour suffers.</strong></div>
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<strong>‘Ethnocentrism’ is the glorification of my group. What often happens in practice is a kind of spiritual apartheid: I’ll do my thing and you do yours — over there. Territoriality (‘my place — keep out!’) replaces hospitality (‘my place — you’re welcome!’). I like Paul’s commendation in Philippians 2:19-21 of Timothy ‘who really cares’ when everyone else was concerned with their own affairs.</strong></div>
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<strong>Sometimes our non-acceptance of others’ uniqueness has jealousy or feelings of inferiority at their root. You have probably heard the little doggerel, ‘I hate the guys/that criticise/and minimise/the other guys/whose enterprise/has made them rise/above the guys/that criticise/and minimise…’</strong></div>
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<strong>In our global village we cannot avoid relating to ‘different others’. Indeed, marriage is all about two different people forming a unity in spite of their differences. Those differences can of course be irritating — for example when a ‘lark’ marries an ‘owl’ (but the Creator made both to adorn his creation).</strong></div>
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<strong>Even within yourself there are diverse personalities. If you are a ‘right brain’ person, why not develop an interest in ‘left brain’ thinking?</strong></div>
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<strong>The Lord reveals different aspects of his truth to different branches of the church. What a pity, then, to make our part of the truth the whole truth. Martin Buber had the right idea when he said that the truth is not so much in human beings as between them. An author dedicated his book to ‘Stephen… who agrees with me in nothing, but is my friend in everything.’ Just as an orchestra needs every instrument, or a fruit salad is tastier with a great variety of fruits, so we are enriched through genuine fellowship with each other.</strong></div>
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<strong>A Christian group matures when it recognises it may have something to learn from other groups. The essence of immaturity is not knowing that one doesn’t know, and therefore being unteachable. No one denomination or church or group has a monopoly on the truth. How was God able to get along for 1500, 1600 or 1900 years without this or that church? Differences between denominations or congregations — or even within them — reflect the rich diversity and variety of the social, cultural and temperamental backgrounds from which those people come. But they also reflect the character of God whose grace is ‘multi-coloured’.</strong></div>
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<strong>If you belong to Christ and I belong to Christ, we belong to each other and we need each other. Nothing should divide us.</strong></div>
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<strong>*****</strong></div>
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<strong>Some wisdom from others:</strong></div>
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<strong>Diversity is a hallmark of life, an intrinsic feature of living systems in the natural world. The demonstration and celebration of this diversity is an endless rite. Look at the popularity of museums, zoos, aquariums and botanic gardens. The odder the exhibit, the more different it is from the common and familiar forms around us, the more successful it is likely to be. Nature does not tire of providing oddments for people who look for them. Biologists have already formally classified 1.7 million species. As many as 30 to 40 million more may remain to be classified. [</strong><strong>David Ehrenfeld, <em data-mce-style="font-weight: inherit;" style="font-weight: inherit;">‘Thirty million cheers for diversity’]</em></strong></div>
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<strong>We cannot easily forgive another for not being ourselves. [Emerson]</strong></div>
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<strong>I will buy with you, sell with you, talk with you, walk with you, and so following; but I will not eat with you, drink with you, nor pray with you. [</strong><strong>Shylock, <em data-mce-style="font-weight: inherit;" style="font-weight: inherit;">The Merchant of Venice]</em></strong></div>
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<strong>Truth is what people kill each other for. [</strong><strong>Herbert Read]</strong></div>
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<strong>After three days of discussion at Marburg, the Reformers agreed on fourteen articles, but could not be reconciled on the fifteenth concerning the Eucharist. This led to a division between the Lutheran and Reformed churches which continues to this day. It is reported that when Luther refused to shake hands with Zwingli in farewell, the Swiss reformer left with tears in his eyes. His attitude throughout had been most brotherly. [</strong><strong>Arthur Gum, <em data-mce-style="font-weight: inherit;" style="font-weight: inherit;">Ulrich Zwingli, the unknown reformer</em>]</strong></div>
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<strong>If Jesus ever came down to earth again, the Spaniards would dance with joy, the Italians would start singing, the French would discuss whether his visit was timely and the Germans? Well, they would present him with a schedule. [</strong><strong>Cardinal Sin, of Manila]</strong></div>
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<strong>Different groups within the Christian church are at odds with one another because their models of the Christian life, its beginnings and its fullness, are so diverse. One group of genuine believers can never remember a conscious conversion to faith in Christ; another insists that a datable experience of being ‘born again’ is essential; a third says that a second distinct experience of ‘baptism of the Holy Spirit’ is necessary for Christian maturity. When we ‘test the spirits’ in the lives of representatives among these groups, we often find an equal level of spiritual vitality — or deadness! — in each sector. The Christian life is being offered in diverse packages, but what is inside is the same — newness of life in Christ. Nonetheless, the different groups enjoying this life are readily offended by another’s packages. One person’s piety is often another’s poison. [</strong><strong>Richard Lovelace, <em data-mce-style="font-weight: inherit;" style="font-weight: inherit;">Dynamics of Spiritual Life</em>]</strong></div>
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<strong>Inevitably, law reduces things to a common denominator. Under grace, everything is completely different. Individual difference is encouraged.. Each Christian becomes an authentic witness, since each has their own experience of Christ, incommensurable with that of any other person, since all genuinely personal experiences are Individual and unique. Each has his or her own irreplaceable contribution to the life of the whole. Each has an instrument to play, a gift to offer to the harmony of the whole orchestra. [</strong><strong>Stephen Neill, <em data-mce-style="font-weight: inherit;" style="font-weight: inherit;">On the Ministry</em>]</strong></div>
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<strong>We can no longer doubt that there are many different expressions of Christianity within the New Testament. These patterns… did [not] always complement each other; on the contrary, they not infrequently clashed, sometimes fiercely… The language forms were different, often so different that the words of one believer could not serve as the vehicle of faith of another, or even for himself in different circumstances… So, if we have been convinced of the unity of first-century Christianity, we can hardly be less convinced of its diversity. [</strong><strong>James D.G. Dunn, <em data-mce-style="font-weight: inherit;" style="font-weight: inherit;">Unity and Diversity in the New Testament</em>]</strong></div>
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<strong>[The church of the next century must be] a church which allows considerable diversity of outlook and expression and does not insist on rigid uniformity. We should not be afraid of diversity within the church. The fact is that people have different temperaments, and these require a variety of expression of faith and worship. But there is another more profound reason for pluralism within the church. This is that no one of us and no one point of view can comprehend the fullness of the mystery of God. We know him only in part, and we can see him only from a perspective which is formed by our historical, cultural and sociological heritage as well as by our personal experience. The pluralism within the church is far from being a simply negative thing and need not be divisive. [</strong><strong>Archbishop Keith Raynor]</strong></div>
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<strong>‘The very idea of diversities compatible with communion. . . or of the sufficient minimum of doctrine to be held in common if unity is to be preserved… is the object of all my research.’ It should also be an object of vital interest to all Christians. The diversity which always has existed in the church is still, theoretically, valued and not merely tolerated. Where differences did not inhibit communication by leading to an isolated sectarianism, communion was not sundered; folk lived out, and died for, the one faith before it found uniform expression in creeds and conciliar definitions. If the same faith is being lived, varying formulations of it (which may have equally respectable apostolic origins) must be reconcilable. [</strong><strong>Yves Congar, <em data-mce-style="font-weight: inherit;" style="font-weight: inherit;">Diversity and Communion</em>]</strong></div>
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<strong>With regard to the question of a ‘minimal creed’, what might it affirm? Here’s a suggestion: We affirm: 1. One God: Father, Son and Holy Spirit; 2. Jesus Christ as my Saviour, my Lord and my God; 3. The Scriptures as authoritative for faith and conduct; 4. Love for, acceptance of and full fellowship with all who thus confess their allegiance to God through Christ; 5. Our commission to continue the holistic ministry of Christ in evangelism and social action to a lost world. [</strong><strong>Rowland Croucher,<em> Recent Trends Among Evangelicals</em>]</strong></div>
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<strong>Jacques Ellul, noting that in many of the conflicts of our time sincere Christians are to be found on both sides, welcomes this fact, for he claims that their Christianity can unite them across political and partisan divisions, so lessening the hostility of those divisions and preparing the way for eventual reconciliation. [</strong><strong>John Macquarrie, <em data-mce-style="font-weight: inherit;" style="font-weight: inherit;">The Humility of God</em>]</strong></div>
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<strong>Jesus brings together Jew and Gentile and from them both produces one new kind of person… It is not that Jesus makes all the Jews into Gentiles, or all the Gentiles into Jews; he produces a new kind of person out of both, although they remain Gentiles and Jews. Chrysostom, the famous preacher of the early church, says that it is as if one should melt down a statue of silver and a statue of lead, and the two should come out gold. The unity which Jesus achieves is not achieved by blotting out all racial and national characteristics; it is achieved by making all people of all nations into Christians… Christianity produces people who are friends with each other because they are friends with God.</strong></div>
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<strong>William Barclay, <em data-mce-style="font-weight: inherit;" style="font-weight: inherit;">Galatians and Ephesians</em></strong></div>
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<strong><em data-mce-style="font-weight: inherit;" style="font-weight: inherit;">Lord God our Creator, when you made all creatures great and small in their rich diversity you were so delighted. And when you made human beings (in your image) to be so diverse, they must represent somehow the rich diversity of the Godhead itself. Lord, our Redeemer, when Jesus Christ died to draw all unto him, it was in prospect of heaven being populated by people from every tribe, language, nation and race.</em></strong></div>
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<strong>Lord, help me to appreciate all this richness; may my theology not be too eccentric, peripheral to the central concern of the gospel which is to increase love for God and others. So teach me how to stay close to you, close to humankind, and make it the goal of my life to bring God and humankind together. Help me to move from law (with its tendency to reduce everything to a common denominator) to grace (where individual differences are celebrated).</strong></div>
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<strong>May my view of myself be conditioned more by my being bound up in life with others, rather than my separateness from them.</strong></div>
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<strong>Help me to be big enough to be all things to all people, to help in their saving to keep the bridges between me and others in good repair…</strong></div>
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<strong><em data-mce-style="font-weight: inherit;" style="font-weight: inherit;">Cure thy children’s warring madness<br />Bend our pride to thy control;<br />Shame our wanton selfish gladness,<br />Rich in things and poor in soul.<br />Grant us wisdom, grant us courage,<br />Lest we miss thy kingdom’s goal.</em></strong></div>
<div data-mce-style="font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit;" style="font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit;">
<strong>[H.E. Fosdick]</strong></div>
<div data-mce-style="font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit;" style="font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit;">
<strong><em data-mce-style="font-weight: inherit;" style="font-weight: inherit;">Gather us in, thou love that fillest all; Gather our rival faiths within thy fold. Rend each one’s temple-veil and bid it fall, That we may know that thou hast been of old; Gather us in. Gather us in: we worship only Thee; In varied names we stretch a common hand; In diverse forms a common soul we see; In many ships we seek one spirit-land; Gather us in. Each one sees one colour of thy rainbow-light, Each looks upon one tint and calls it heaven; Thou are the fullness of our partial sight; We are not perfect till we find the seven; Gather us in.</em></strong></div>
<div data-mce-style="font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit;" style="font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit;">
<strong>[G.E. Matheson]</strong></div>
<div data-mce-style="font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit;" style="font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit;">
<strong data-mce-style="font-style: inherit;" style="font-style: inherit;">A Benediction</strong></div>
<div data-mce-style="font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit;" style="font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit;">
<strong>May God be merciful to us, and bless us; look on us with kindness, so that the whole world may know your will; so that nations may know your salvation.</strong><br />
<strong>May the peoples praise you, O God; may all the peoples praise you! [</strong><strong>Psalm 67:1-2 (<em data-mce-style="font-weight: inherit;" style="font-weight: inherit;">GNB</em>)]</strong></div>
<div data-mce-style="font-weight: inherit; font-style: inherit;" style="font-style: inherit; font-weight: inherit;">
<strong>From Rowland Croucher, ed., <em data-mce-style="font-weight: inherit;" style="font-weight: inherit;">High Mountains Deep Valleys</em>, Albatross/Lion, chapter 13.</strong></div>
</div>
Rowland Croucherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13473460918145751334noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-154247300844604323.post-73202374673985680972014-08-14T22:37:00.001-07:002014-08-16T02:50:02.926-07:00FUNDAMENTALISM: Simplicity this Side of Complexity<br />
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<b><i><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">Mormon Teachers’ College student: ‘We Mormons believe
that God is physical, like a giant male.’<br />
<br />
Me: ‘Is that general Mormon teaching?’</span></i></b><b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><i><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">‘I think so. But I also believe we can measure the
size of God.’</span></i></b><b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><i><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">‘Really? How?’<br />
<br />
‘Well, one of the Hebrew prophets says God walks on the mountains. Figure out
where those mountains are, use a bit of trigonometry, and you can roughly tell
how big God is…’<br />
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‘So if you were to draw a picture of God, he’d have wings and feathers…?’<br />
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‘Oh no. He’s like a human male.’</span></i></b><b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><i><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">But Psalm 91:4 says ‘God </span></i></b><b><i><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">will cover you
with his feathers, and under his wings you will find refuge...’</span></i></b><b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><i><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">(Her face went white).</span></i></b><b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">~~~<br />
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</span></b><b><span lang="EN" style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. is reported to have said ‘<i>I
would not give a fig for simplicity this side of complexity, but I would give
my right arm for simplicity on the other side of complexity.’ And: ‘A mind
stretched by a new idea can never go back to its original dimensions.’</i></span></b><b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">Skip these two pages if this is not an issue for you. </span></b><b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">I
spent the first 19 years of my life attending two-to-four ‘meetings’ a week in
a Dispensationalist/Fundamentalist Brethren ‘Assembly’ in Sydney, </span></b><b><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">so writing this
summary has been a nostalgic experience for me. My boyhood Bible teachers loved
the Scofield Reference Bible (but one of them - a wise person - suggested I
stick to the material 'between Scofield's notes' – ie. the basic scriptural
text ).</span></b><b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">We believed in the Rapture: the r</span></b><b><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">eturn of Jesus to
set up a millennial kingdom and reign for a literal thousand years from
Jerusalem. (Though I don’t remember seeing a picture apparently popular in
Bible-belt American homes of a man cutting the grass outside his house, gazing
in astonishment as his born-again wife is raptured out of an upstairs window). The
world was going to hell and there wasn’t much we could do about that. There
were no ‘messages’ about social justice: God will fix the world's mess. </span></b><b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">By
16 I’d probably read a couple of hundred books within their theological
parameters, and filled several notebooks at their monthly Bible
conferences… [ </span></b><b><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><a href="http://www.jmm.org.au/articles/8211.htm"><span style="text-decoration: none; text-underline: none;">http://www.jmm.org.au/articles/8211.htm</span></a></span></b><b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"> ]</span></b><b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">The first few lines of 1,140,000 results if you Google
Fundamentalism Definition offer this:</span></b><b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"> ‘</span></b><b><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">A form of a
religion, especially Islam or Protestant Christianity, that upholds belief in
the strict, literal interpretation of scripture.’ That’s OK for starters, but
there’s also Roman Catholic, Jewish and other religious fundamentalisms. The
term also applies to a strict/literal interpretation of any ideology or set of
beliefs: political, economic, what-have-you. The common element is belief in
the inerrancy of the defining text.</span></b><b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">In a system committed to an ideology (eg. every religious group or
church), people will range left-to-right across a spectrum from radicals,
through progressives, conservatives, to traditionalists. Radicals want to
change everything, progressives many things, conservatives some things,
traditionalists nothing. Radicals are angry (concerned for justice as people-in-power
and their structures rip off the poor); traditionalists are fearful (with a
great emotional investment in the status quo, so ‘law and order’ may be their
catch-cry). <o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">Prophets (eg. Jesus with the Pharisees) are invariably radical. Priests
are traditionalist, passing on a tradition (cf. Jesus’ teaching about the law).
Incidentally, if religious leaders are perceived to be too prophetic <i>or</i>
traditionalist, they’ll have trouble with people at the other end! Leaders as
change-agents know that innovation cannot be commended by people two removes
away. For example, conservatives won’t listen to radicals, but may be persuaded
by a progressive. And if the whole population of the movement was surveyed, the
result would probably end up with people spread along a bell-curve if the group
is large and diverse enough. Not too many are radical: they’re noisy, but
bleeding isn’t very popular... Similarly only a minority will be
traditionalist: as time and ideas pass them by they are eventually very
uncomfortable in their ‘has been’ basket.</span></b><b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">Here I’ll tantalize with a few notes about modern Christian (Protestant),
Islamic and Catholic Fundamentalism:</span></b><b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"># Christian Fundamentalists are often accused of having as their
trinity ‘The Father, the Son and the Bible’. </span></b><b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">Karen
Armstrong’s memorable comment: ‘[Christian] Fundamentalism sees the Bible as a
kind of holy encyclopedia one may look up to find information about God’. </span></b><b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"># Fundamentalists tend to be inerrantists. That is, their Bible –
at least in its original form – was dictated to about 40 different authors by
God, and has no errors whatsoever in it. The Bible dictated from on high by
God-who-is-truth: writers are simply stenographers, reporters.<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">But yes, some sleepy scribes copying manuscripts by candle-light can
make an error or two: so it’s the ‘original documents’ which are inerrant.
Problem for those who hold this position: we have no access to any of these
original manuscripts, nor any inerrant interpreters.</span></b><b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">The Qur'an is considered by Muslims to be ‘The Word of Allah’ – a book
written directly by God, through the prophet Muhammad. [See here - <a href="http://islam.uga.edu/quran.html"><span style="text-decoration: none; text-underline: none;">http://islam.uga.edu/quran.html</span></a> - for
more]</span></b><b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"> [RC- note preferred spellings of Qur’an and Muhammad]</span></b><b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"># And yes, Fundamentalists also tend to be
literalists. But, as Professor James Barr notes in his book <i>Fundamentalism </i>(1977)
they are adept at abandoning a literal mode of interpretation when it becomes
an embarrassment to believe in the nonsense one has to subscribe to. </span></b><b><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">James Barr
regards Hal Lindsey's <i>The Late Great
Planet Earth</i> as a 'farrago of nonsense'.</span></b><b><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"> </span></b><b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">(In
my youth some liked quoting 1 Peter 3:8 ‘One day is like a thousand years’ to
bring a bit of flexibility into their creationist thinking).</span></b><b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"># Fundamentalism and Atheism: Christian
Fundamentalism tries to make Christianity an alternative to materialistic
atheism. It tries to make it an answer for everything. But it has to read the
Bible as badly as the atheists do to get there. It is no mistake that both
fundamentalism and atheism have grown as parallel movements - they have an
almost symbiotic relationship. Both exhibit (to use the American scholar R.
Scott Clark's term) a QIRC - a Quest for Illegitimate Religious Certainty. [<i>Rediscovering
the Reformed Confession: our Theology, Piety and Practice</i>, P&R,
Phillipsburg, 2008, p. 39. Cited in Michael Jensen, <i>Pieces of Eternity</i>,
Acorn, 2013, p. 161. Jensen concludes his interesting little book with this:</span></b><b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">‘Christian liberalism, for its part, pretends to be a
kind of believing unbelief, but it is really just a failure of nerve. It sits
somewhere in the middle, neither believing nor sufficiently doubting. There is
a kind of craven unbelief, or a persistent doubt-for-no-purpose, which revels
in its own posture of superior not-knowingness. It characterizes much of
English Anglicanism, in fact. It is smug, but without reason to be. </span></b><b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">‘Rather, truly biblical and orthodox Christianity
keeps nagging away at us, challenging our human pride and upsetting our
self-made securities. It turns us always to the twin wonders of a crucified
Messiah and an empty tomb. It speaks to us of the majesty and the steadfast
love of the God of Jesus Christ... and it offers us confidence, just enough, to
live in the turbulence of this difficulty world.' [pp. 161-2]]</span></b><b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"># Fundamentalists tend to follow a variety of
infallible teachers. </span></b><b><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">Protestant fundamentalists often teach that the
Catholic Church is the ‘whore of Babylon’, but they have their popes too (in
the U.S. for example, Bill Gothard, Hal Lindsay, James Dobson). Yes, </span></b><b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">traditional
Catholics believe the Pope is infallible </span></b><b><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">when he speaks <i>ex
cathedra</i><sup> </sup>(literally ‘from the chair’) eg. in 1950
when Pius XII defined the Assumption of Mary as being as an article of
faith. How can popes be infallible if some of them lived scandalously?
Catholics respond that we must not confuse infallibility and impeccability.
Further, a pope’s private theological opinions are not infallible. And note
this concomitant of a closed system: When Catholic Professor Hans Kung
questioned the somewhat modern notion of papal infallibility, the official
Vatican response was not to discuss the issue, but to condemn and remove the
one who raised the question.<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">There's also a brand of atheist fundamentalism: these people are
desperate that other people agree with them, so that they won't have to re-open
old questions. They shut God up in a box labelled 'Doesn't Exist', but God keeps
breaking out of it, as their own weight on the lid is not enough to keep God in
there.<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">***<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">More... </span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">Here's
a pot-pourri of quotes, comments, opinions etc from my files - emanating from
hundreds of conversations over nearly three-quarters of a century - on modern
variants of Christian fundamentalism... You decide!<br />
<!--[if !supportLineBreakNewLine]--><br />
<!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">Fundamentalists’ doctrine arises from a literal
interpretation of an inerrant text. Evangelical scholar Clark Pinnock says
he defended a strict view of inerrancy in his earlier years because he desperately
wanted it to be true. For the hard-line fundamentalist, the possibility of
being wrong carries with it awful consequences. They have a desperate need to
stuff the Bible into an ill-fitting hermeneutical suit. To acknowledge even the
smallest error would destroy the credibility of the entire biblical witness; if
the doctrine of inerrancy falls, the whole movement collapses. <o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">Contrary to fundamentalist claims the doctrine of
biblical inerrancy they have formulated is not a return to primitive
Christianity/orthodoxy. Rather, it was an innovation fashioned mainly in the American
South 100-200 years ago. The doctrine of biblical inerrancy with its appeal to
non-existent original autographs/ manuscripts did not exist in either Europe or
North America prior to the nineteenth century. </span></b><b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">They believe, in general:</span></b><b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">Everything was created in six days - or, at least,
quite recently (say about 10,000 years ago)... The better-educated tend to
place the act/process of creation earlier rather than later...</span></b><b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">The better-educated also reckon the waters of
Noah's flood did not cover Mt Everest (nor did Noah have a miraculous way of
getting Australian koalas across the world to the Middle East and then deliver
them back DownUnder, not to mention sloths from South America: sloths can't
swim). <o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">Only strict sectarian groups forbid women *ever* to teach
men. (In our Brethren Assembly a woman missionary - who in the African Sahel
area was the equivalent of a bishop - could bring a - sanitized - report of her
work, together with a Bible text-with-homily, but what she was doing was, of
course, not strictly 'preaching' or 'teaching'.)</span></b><b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<br /></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">Fewer these days are conscientious teetotalers (and
those who are have to stretch credulity by asserting that Jesus' wedding wine
was not intoxicating). </span></b><b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">Scripture provides a forecast of contemporary
history...<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">Fundamentalists have a frantic desire to fill the void with certainty:
they’re very anxious that you should agree with them: they need to convert you.
A common Pentecostal version loves the texts Hebrews 13:17: ‘Obey them that
have the rule over you, and submit yourselves... and/or 1 Chron. 16:22 'Touch not mine anointed, and
do my prophets no harm' (KJV). <o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">And Fundamentalism
is a fertile breeding-ground for Pharisaism/Separatism. ‘Liberals’ – or ‘Modernists’
- are pejorative terms for those who have too many ideas-about-ideas, and they
must be avoided (even excommunicated, if the group is sectarian). [See <a href="http://www.jmm.org.au/articles/13113.htm">http://www.jmm.org.au/articles/13113.htm</a>
] Bob Jones: </span></b><b><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">'Anybody who knows and believes the Scriptures will agree with me. If
you do not agree, you are an apostate.' <o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">Who
today do they ‘love to hate’? Well, Bishop </span></b><b><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">Spong would probably head
the list. In his <i>Rescuing the Bible from
Fundamentalism</i> he writes that their main problem is to define Christianity
so narrowly that only fundamentalists or conservatives can be included within
the definition of 'Christian'. Or, a</span></b><b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">s </span></b><b><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">Dr Peter Cameron points out [<i>Necessary
Heresies, Fundamentalism and Freedom</i>], fundamentalists have little
imagination or creativity. Or Tillich: they 'destroy the humble honesty of the
search for truth'.</span></b><b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<br /></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">And certainly they have problems with Paul’s 'the
letter kills, but the Spirit gives life'... </span></b><b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">Rowland Croucher</span></b><b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">August 2014</span></b><b><span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
<br />
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<br /></div>
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><span lang="EN-AU"><br />
<br /></span></b></div>
Rowland Croucherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13473460918145751334noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-154247300844604323.post-20361492242997208522014-08-14T22:08:00.000-07:002014-08-14T22:08:54.975-07:00VIGIL: MORNING PRAYERS <div class="MsoNormal">
<b><br /></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><i><span lang="EN-AU">Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living
God, have mercy on me, a sinner<o:p></o:p></span></i></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><i><span lang="EN-AU">Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living
God, have mercy on me, a sinner<o:p></o:p></span></i></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><i><span lang="EN-AU">Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living
God, have mercy on me, a sinner<o:p></o:p></span></i></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><i><span lang="EN-AU">Our Father in heaven,<br />
hallowed be Your name.<br />
Your kingdom come,<br />
Your will be done<br />
on earth as in heaven.<br />
Give us today our daily bread.<br />
And forgive us our sins,<br />
as we forgive those who sin against us.<br />
Save us from the time of trial<br />
and deliver us from evil.<br />
For the kingdom, the power and the glory are yours<br />
now and forever. Amen.<o:p></o:p></span></i></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>Venite (Psalm 95 NRSV)<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><sup> </sup>O come, let us sing to the Lord;<br />
let us make a joyful noise to the rock of our
salvation!<br />
<sup> </sup>Let us come into his presence with thanksgiving;<br />
let us make a joyful noise to him with songs of praise!<br />
<sup> </sup>For the Lord is a great God,<br />
and a great King above all gods.<br />
<sup> </sup>In his hand are the depths of the earth;<br />
the heights of the mountains are his also.<br />
<sup> </sup>The sea is his, for he made it,<br />
and the dry land, which his hands have formed.<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><sup> </sup>O come, let us worship and bow down,<br />
let us kneel before the Lord, our Maker!<br />
<sup> </sup>For he is our God,<br />
and we are the people of his pasture.<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><span lang="EN-AU">Te
Deum </span><span lang="EN-AU"><br />
<br />
We praise you, O God,<br />
we acclaim you as the Lord;<br />
<br />
all creation worships you,<br />
the Father everlasting.<br />
<br />
To you all angels, all the powers of heaven,<br />
the cherubim and seraphim, sing in endless praise:<br />
<br />
Holy, holy, holy Lord, God of power and might,<br />
heaven and earth are full of your glory.<br />
<br />
The glorious company of apostles praise you.<br />
The noble fellowship of prophets praise you.<br />
<br />
The white-robed army of martyrs praise you.<br />
Throughout the world the holy Church acclaims you:<br />
<br />
Father, of majesty unbounded,<br />
your true and only Son, worthy of all praise,<br />
the Holy Spirit, advocate and guide.<br />
<br />
You, Christ, are the King of glory,<br />
the eternal Son of the Father.<br />
<br />
When you took our flesh to set us free<br />
you humbly chose the Virgin’s womb.<br />
<br />
You overcame the sting of death<br />
and opened the kingdom of heaven to all believers.<br />
<br />
You are seated at God’s right hand in glory.<br />
We believe that you will come and be our judge.<br />
<br />
Come then, Lord, and help your people,<br />
bought with the price of your own blood,<br />
and bring us with your saints<br />
to glory everlasting. </span><o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><span lang="EN-AU">General
Confession<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>Almighty and most
merciful Father,<br />
we have erred and strayed from your ways like lost sheep.<br />
We have followed too much the devices and desires of our own hearts.<br />
We have offended against your holy laws.<br />
We have left undone what we ought to have done,<br />
and we have done what we ought not to have done,<br />
and there is no health in us.<br />
Yet, good Lord, have mercy on us:<br />
restore those who are penitent,<br />
according to your promises declared to us in Jesus Christ our Lord.<br />
And grant, merciful Father, for his sake,<br />
That we may live a godly, righteous, and obedient life,<br />
to the glory of your holy name. Amen. <o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><b>The Book of Common
Prayer (modified)<o:p></o:p></b></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-AU"><b>Almighty and everlasting God, you hate
nothing you have<br />
made and forgive the sins of all who are penitent: Create and<br />
make in us new and contrite hearts, that we, worthily<br />
lamenting our sins and acknowledging our wretchedness,<br />
may obtain of you, the God of all mercy, perfect remission<br />
and forgiveness; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives<br />
and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever<br />
and ever. <i>Amen.</i> (Collect
for Ash Wednesday). <o:p></o:p></b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>1 Jesus, the joy of
loving hearts,<br />
true source of life, our lives sustain;<br />
from the best bliss that earth imparts,<br />
we turn unfilled to you again.<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>2 Your truth unchanged
has ever stood;<br />
you rescue those who on you call:<br />
to those yet seeking, you are good;<br />
to those who find you, all in all.<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>3 We taste of you, the
living bread,<br />
and long to feast upon you still.<br />
We drink from you, the fountain-head,<br />
our thirsty souls from you we fill.<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>4 Our restless spirits
long for you,<br />
however may our lot be cast,<br />
glad when your gracious smile we view,<br />
blessed when our faith can hold you fast.<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>5 Jesus, forever with
us stay:<br />
make all our moments calm and bright;<br />
chase the dark night of sin away;<br />
shed through the world your holy light.<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-AU"><b>(<a href="http://www.hymnary.org/hymn/CPACC/71">http://www.hymnary.org/hymn/CPACC/71</a>)</b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>Psalm 27<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>(The Message)<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>Light, space, zest—<br />
that’s God!<br />
So, with him on my side I’m fearless,<br />
afraid of no one and nothing.<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>When vandal hordes
ride down<br />
ready to eat me alive,<br />
Those bullies and toughs<br />
fall flat on their faces.<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><sup> </sup>When besieged,<br />
I’m calm as a baby.<br />
When all hell breaks loose,<br />
I’m collected and cool.<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><sup> </sup>I’m asking God for one thing,<br />
only one thing:<br />
To live with him in his house<br />
my whole life long.<br />
I’ll contemplate his beauty;<br />
I’ll study at his feet.<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><sup> </sup>That’s the only quiet, secure place<br />
in a noisy world,<br />
The perfect getaway,<br />
far from the buzz of traffic.<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><sup> </sup>God holds me head and shoulders<br />
above all who try to pull me down.<br />
I’m headed for his place to offer anthems<br />
that will raise the roof!<br />
Already I’m singing God-songs;<br />
I’m making music to God.<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>Listen, God, I’m
calling at the top of my lungs:<br />
“Be good to me! Answer me!”<br />
When my heart whispered, “Seek God,”<br />
my whole being replied,<br />
“I’m seeking him!”<br />
Don’t hide from me now!<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>You’ve always been
right there for me;<br />
don’t turn your back on me now.<br />
Don’t throw me out, don’t abandon me;<br />
you’ve always kept the door open.<br />
My father and mother walked out and left me,<br />
but God took me in.<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>Point me down your
highway, God;<br />
direct me along a well-lighted street;<br />
show my enemies whose side you’re on.<br />
Don’t throw me to the dogs,<br />
those liars who are out to get me,<br />
filling the air with their threats.<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>I’m sure now I’ll see
God’s goodness<br />
in the exuberant earth.<br />
Stay with God!<br />
Take heart. Don’t quit.<br />
I’ll say it again:<br />
Stay with God. <o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><i><a href="http://www.biblegateway.com/versions/Message-MSG-Bible/">The Message</a> (MSG)</i><i><o:p></o:p></i></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><b>Copyright © 1993,
1994, 1995, 1996, 2000, 2001, 2002 by <a href="http://www.biblegateway.com/versions/?action=getVersionInfo&vid=65">Eugene
H. Peterson</a></b></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>When I survey the wondrous cross<br />
On which the Prince of glory died,<br />
My richest gain I count but loss,<br />
And pour contempt on all my pride.<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>Forbid it, Lord, that I should boast,<br />
Save in the death of Christ my God!<br />
All the vain things that charm me most,<br />
I sacrifice them to His blood.<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>See from His head, His hands, His feet,<br />
Sorrow and love flow mingled down!<br />
Did e’er such love and sorrow meet,<br />
Or thorns compose so rich a crown?<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>Were the whole realm of nature mine,<br />
That were a present far too small;<br />
Love so amazing, so divine,<br />
Demands my soul, my life, my all.<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>(Isaac Watts; Youtube: Treorchy Male Voice Choir<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Rpejn5Lwmw">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Rpejn5Lwmw</a><o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><span lang="EN-AU">O
Lord, my heavenly Father, almighty and everlasting God, who has safely brought
me to the beginning of this day; defend me in the same with your mighty power;
and grant that this day I fall into no sin, neither run into any kind of
danger; but that all my doings may be ordered by your governance, to do always
what is righteous in your sight; through Jesus Christ my Lord. Amen. <o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><span lang="EN-AU">(Collect
for Grace)<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>~~<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>More prayers for a Sleepless Hour - <a href="http://sleeplesshour.blogspot.com.au/">http://sleeplesshour.blogspot.com.au/</a>
<o:p></o:p></b></div>
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<br /></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
Rowland Croucherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13473460918145751334noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-154247300844604323.post-71521325113213773592014-08-14T21:53:00.001-07:002014-08-14T21:53:19.355-07:00LIFE-STYLE CHECK-LIST<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>(Draft for one of
the chapters in my forthcoming book <a href="http://www.jmm.org.au/articles/32643.htm" target="_blank">Q&R</a>)<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>Note: Diet and
other life-style issues ought to be modified to suit certain medical
conditions. <o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>Be guided by the
experts in tailoring the following to your special needs.<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>These are my
priorities. You'll have your own. Perhaps start with these, and give yourself a
score of 1 (terrible) to 5 (terrific) on each item:<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>[ ] At the
beginning of each day, sit quietly in God's presence, perhaps in a garden or in
some other place with birds and flowers etc. (more on this in the Spirituality
check-list)</b><b><o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>[ ] Enjoy
plenty of fresh air<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>[ ] Don't
over-eat: stop when you're no longer hungry rather than when you're too
'full'. Eat just enough to maintain muscle strength and a healthy
weight. At restaurants split meals with another rather than over-eat (or
else take uneaten portions home). Maybe fast from eating once or twice a week<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>[ ] Diet:
mostly fresh food (a mixture of fruit and vegetables of various colours, etc.)
Make juices from a few fruits regularly<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>[ ] Main
meal: breakfast: Grain (cereal) foods, mostly wholegrain and/or high
cereal fibre varieties such as breads, cereals, rice, pasta, noodles,
polenta, couscous, oats, quinoa and barley<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>[ ] Lean
meats and poultry, fish, eggs, tofu, nuts and seeds, and legumes/beans. Milk,
yoghurt, cheese and/or their alternatives, mostly reduced fat (reduced
fat milks are not suitable for children under the age of 2 years)<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>[ ] Limit
intake of foods containing saturated fat, added salt, added sugars and alcohol<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>[ ] Drink
plenty of water - more water each day than other liquids combined<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>[ ] If you
sit a lot, exercise at least five minutes each hour<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>[ ] Walk at
least 15 minutes a day; more vigorous exercise 3 or 4 times a week: preferably
with a mix of cardio and resistance exercise<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>[ ] Take in
some sunshine regularly - to receive healthy Vitamin D contact with skin, but
not so much as to suffer sunburn<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>[ ]
Cigarettes, or other harmful drugs? Give them all up. Now!<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>[ ] Alcohol:
only in moderation<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>[ ] Avoid
plastic containers for food and drink: store stuff in glass or stainless steel
containers<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>[ ] Enjoy
healthy fun with children or a pet<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>[ ] Avoid
meeting God sooner: don't use a phone while driving; avoid extreme sports;
don't be a hot-head - sleep on it before reacting<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>[ ]
Psycho-social factors - depression, anxiety, social isolation, work/
finance worries, stress are best managed with rest, relaxation, fun,
talking with friends (or a counselor if it's serious) <o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>[ ] Get
enough sleep to wake refreshed most days <o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>More: <a href="http://www.nhmrc.gov.au/_files_nhmrc/publications/attachments/n55_australian_dietary_guidelines_130530.pdf" target="_blank">http://www.nhmrc.gov.au/_files_nhmrc/publications/attachments/n55_australian_dietary_guidelines_130530.pdf</a><o:p></o:p></b></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
Rowland Croucherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13473460918145751334noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-154247300844604323.post-59796939613875722352014-08-13T16:37:00.001-07:002014-09-15T22:45:49.010-07:00MISFITS, <table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img alt="Photo" height="535" src="https://fbcdn-sphotos-h-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-xap1/t1.0-9/1743626_10152195285996020_874127710109446579_n.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" width="640" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">MISFITS</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
Rowland Croucherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13473460918145751334noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-154247300844604323.post-65189038101190798702014-08-13T16:29:00.002-07:002014-08-13T16:29:34.083-07:00HEAD TO TOE: MEN AND THEIR ROLES IN THE FIRST TWO GENERATIONS OF CHRISTIANITY<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>by Ross Saunders, </b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>Acorn Press, 2014<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>This is an
interesting book: its twin, published earlier, is <i>Outrageous Women, Outrageous God: Women in the First Two Generations of
Christianity</i>. In both books Ross Saunders unpacks the idea that Jesus
upended ancient Mediterranean notions of honour, authority, leadership, and
servanthood. He offers readable, well-researched word-pictures of Jesus'
first-century disciples as they work out in their personal and
communal/ecclesial lives what it means to be truly radical, eschewing privilege
and power. The struggles they faced in the first two generations of Christianity
are also still ours. <o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>Ross Saunders
(1926-2005) was a Sydney Anglican clergyman best known as a religious
broadcaster. But he was also an 'auto-didact' - a scholar in the fields of
Theology, Ancient History and Communications. <o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>Anthropologists tell
us that Mediterranean cultures were built around honour maintenance; women were
recognized only in relationship to some man: a father, an uncle, a grandfather,
a brother, a husband, a son. It was almost impossible to better the social
position into which you were born. And it’s important to note that only
men experienced dishonour, not women. </b><b><span lang="EN-AU">Women without
the benefit of male sponsorship found it almost impossible to survive.
Social security as we know it did not exist. The 'poor' helped by temple-funds
were usually asset-rich males who'd fallen on hard times. The beggars in the
streets were poor or disabled males. Women couldn't easily survive by begging,
because passers-by would favour males. Younger women often had no option but to
go into prostitution.</span></b><b><br />
<br />
Eldest sons invariably followed their father's craft (so Jesus was a
plough-maker, as Joseph was). Peter came from the household of an entrepreneur:
he had no status until his father died. Until then he was known as
Simon-son-of-Jonas. </b><b><span lang="EN-AU">Jesus had brought shame upon his
father's reputation by leaving the household after his father’s death. (Note
that at the cross Jesus hands over his mother to the care of the disciple John.
Note also that with Jesus' death, his brother James became next in line in the
household. 'But Jesus had changed that by entrusting his mother to John, not to
James'). <o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><span lang="EN-AU">And</span></b><b>
following Jesus came at a cost. If a junior member of a household became a
disciple there would be division in the household, often resulting in that
member being disowned. Should Jesus prove to be a fraud, they could not return
to their families as though nothing had happened. It was an irrevocable
decision.<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>Socio-cultural
result? In contrast to a situation where everybody has a place virtually fixed
at birth, in today's world we regard ourselves primarily as individuals.
Christianity changed the way its members found their identity and, in the
process, helped to break down the Mediterranean household as the basic unit of
society. </b><b><span lang="EN-AU">'When households are mentioned [in
the NT] in connection with conversions to Christianity, this was the exception
and not the norm. This was one of the things that set Christianity off from all
other religions at the time.’</span></b><b><o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>Ross Saunders’ main emphasis
is on the theme of leadership: Jesus in his life and teachings changed the model
of leader-as-director to leader-as-servant. </b><b><span lang="EN-AU">'Ultimately, this is
what Christian leadership is about: eliminating the chasm between the leader
and the led'. </span></b><b>Jesus called upon his
followers 'to relinquish their status... [so] women went up a step or two on
the social scale, [while] men went down a step or two'. </b><b><span lang="EN-AU">Adult males were to divest 'themselves of all their pretensions to
status, and became like a child - in that society completely without status
–[otherwise] they had no hope of membership [in the kingdom]'.</span></b><b><span lang="EN-AU"> </span></b><b><span lang="EN-AU">When he sent out his
disciples [in Mark 6:7-13] they were to wear sandals, the footwear of the
peasant. </span></b><b>But </b><b><span lang="EN-AU">'the concept that honour must be attached to leadership... was [still] strong,
and it was something that was to dog missionaries like Paul...' <o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>Saunders’ book does
not go beyond the end of the first century: then 'male bishops took over
Christianity, [reverting] to the normal household model for centralising church
structures, and lay ministry, both male and female, disappeared almost
totally.' <o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>This book is as
interesting in terms of scholarly style as it is thematically. I don't think he
cites one scholar, and there are no footnotes. However an excellent Select
Bibliography gives us a clue about his wider reading: here there are listed
authors like the Evangelicals F. F. Bruce, I. H. Marshall and E.A.Judge, to
scholars with a wider theological stance, like J. Jeremias and G. Theissen. He
has, for example, a fairly conservative view of who-wrote-what in the NT, but
he is not afraid to cite differences in the four Gospels' narrative-details -
without doing too much explaining about how they can be reconciled. They are
simply left, side-by-side, expressing differences in perspective between
Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>Australian
colloquialisms are sprinkled throughout:
'a dandy dressed up to the nines'; 'cop all the shame'; 'they tear
out in great consternation to find their leader'; 'whatever I have in mind for
John, even if it is to hang around until I return to earth’; Peter was ‘clapped
in irons in prison’… <o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>And twenty-to-thirty more…
<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>I marked the
following, to ponder: <o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<ul style="margin-top: 0in;" type="disc">
<li class="MsoNormal"><b>For
Israelites, prayer was always audible, never silent in the mind the way we
today tend to pray. The </b><b><span lang="EN-AU">Ethiopian eunuch was reading his
scroll aloud: 'Silent reading was certainly not the process of reading in
those days'.</span></b><b><o:p></o:p></b></li>
</ul>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<ul style="margin-top: 0in;" type="disc">
<li class="MsoNormal"><b>The
‘laying on of hands’ was never on heads. Human hair was not to be touched
by other people for fear of touching dust or sweat. The main greeting method:
'the two shoulders grasp'. <o:p></o:p></b></li>
</ul>
<div class="MsoListParagraph">
<br /></div>
<ul style="margin-top: 0in;" type="disc">
<li class="MsoNormal"><b><span lang="EN-AU">'Giving to the
poor was not counted as maintaining one's honour in the community. The
poor could not repay by having a benefactor's name written up in the
synagogue or temple.'</span></b><b><o:p></o:p></b></li>
</ul>
<div class="MsoListParagraph">
<br /></div>
<ul style="margin-top: 0in;" type="disc">
<li class="MsoNormal"><b><span lang="EN-AU">Paul was 'not a
consultative or democratic kind of team leader... We must be careful...
not to romanticise Paul and smooth over the sharp edges and directive
attitudes'.</span></b><b><o:p></o:p></b></li>
</ul>
<div class="MsoListParagraph">
<br /></div>
<ul style="margin-top: 0in;" type="disc">
<li class="MsoNormal"><b><span lang="EN-AU">'Whenever Paul
uses "head" with respect to Christ it is always associated with
his self-sacrificial love for the church. In other words
"headship" here derives from commitment and self-sacrifice and
does not entail privilege and the right to be obeyed.' </span></b><b><o:p></o:p></b></li>
</ul>
<div class="MsoListParagraph">
<br /></div>
<ul style="margin-top: 0in;" type="disc">
<li class="MsoNormal"><b><span lang="EN-AU">'I believe it
is abundantly clear that there were no orders, of deacons, priests or
bishops, during the first two generations of Christianity. In fact, there
were no clergy, in our sense, until the turn of the century.' </span></b><b><o:p></o:p></b></li>
</ul>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>If there had been a
list of discussion starters, this would have been a good one:<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>'Prayer and the
drawing of straws' (Acts1:15-26). Does your church elect leaders this way?</b><b><span lang="EN-AU"><br />
<br /><u>
Conclusion</u>: 'For men, neither ascribed nor acquired honour had any place in the
congregations. The usual games of challenge and response that occurred when men
greeted each other on the street had to stop'. 'We must have a great deal of
sympathy for those first two generations of men in the churches. They had to
lose just about everything they had been born with: honour, prestige, position,
authority and entitlement to dominion over women and children.'<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><span lang="EN-AU">Rowland Croucher<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><span lang="EN-AU">jmm.org.au<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><span lang="EN-AU">May 6, 2014 <o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
Rowland Croucherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13473460918145751334noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-154247300844604323.post-86060305161832870742014-08-13T16:23:00.000-07:002014-08-13T16:26:25.296-07:00MY ALL-TIME FAVOURITE PREACHER: JOHN CLAYPOOL<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><span lang="EN-AU">Once a month, while pastoring a busy
church in the 1970s/1980s, I’d receive John Claypool’s printed sermons in the
mail. Invariably the rest of the morning was spent devouring them. He was –
still is - the best ‘writing preacher’ I’ve ever read. If there is one spot on
this planet where I’d choose to spend a six-month study-sabbatical, it would be
in a quiet room at the </span></b><b>Southern
Baptist Historical Library and Archives, reading their collection of his
sermons. </b><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>John Claypool
didn’t fit easily into the conservative milieu of the Southern Baptist
Convention. He was regarded with some suspicion as one of those ‘Moderates’ or
‘Cooperatives’ who inhabited the cutting edge of theological enquiry and
socio-political issues – especially racism.<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>John Claypool was
ordained to the Baptist ministry in 1953 and pastored five Southern Baptist
churches - in Kentucky, Tennessee, Texas, and Mississippi. Ordained an
Episcopal priest in 1986, he served as Rector of St. Luke's Episcopal Church in
Birmingham, Alabama, for nearly fourteen years. He retired from full-time
parish ministry in 2000 and then served as Professor of Preaching at McAfee
School of Theology, Mercer University in Atlanta, Georgia…</b><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>Why ‘writing
preacher’? I’ve met John Claypool, and heard him preach. His preaching-style
was thoughtful, and his vocal presentation a bit ‘dreamy’. But his words and
ideas-about-ideas, if you ‘hung in there,’ were often mind-blowing.<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>But John Claypool
was not simply an intellectual. His brilliant book <i>The Preaching Event</i> (the
1979 Lyman Beecher Lectures at Yale Divinity School) discusses the what, why,
how and when of preaching. The preacher, he says, is a reconciler, who seeks to
re-establish trust at the deepest level. We are ‘gift-givers’: too often
preaching can fulfil our own needs for love and status. We are witnesses:
making available our own grapplings with woundedness to help others in their
pain and grief.<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>In a memorable
interview with Claypool conducted by The Wittenburg Door magazine (April/May
1978) he revealed the core issues which made him the person he turned out to
be. His spiritual awakening happened in College when he read C S Lewis, and
with a ‘real flash of insight saw that Jesus was the clue to ultimate reality’.
<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>Why did he enter
pastoral ministry? Among other reasons, to ‘earn the blessing of his mother’. When
this realization hit him later, he developed a ‘confessional’ preaching style –
which, he would tell students in his seminary classes, can be a subtle form of
exhibitionism if you’re not careful. <o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>He had a close
friendship with Martin Luther King Jr. (a ‘first-rate thinker’) and was active in
the civil rights movement. Once he was in a coffee shop with Dr. King, and a
journalist took a picture of the two of them. When that photo appeared in the
Louisville Courier, he and his family received hate calls and mail, crosses
were burned in their front yard, and his children were threatened. When he
championed the idea that a Nigerian seminary student (‘that our missionaries
had converted’) should be permitted to attend their church ‘a lot of people
left and the money dropped off’. <o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>Another significant event was his surprising
resignation – after only 5 ½ years - from a church of 5,000 and 11 staff, to go
to a much smaller pastorate. Why would a gifted preacher step down the rungs of
the ‘success ladder’ and do such a thing? Simple: he was tired, and for him
‘fatigue became a moral category’. He was challenged by Gayle Sheehey’s book
‘Passages’ about the dangers in mid-life of over-investment in work and
under-investment in relationships. Conducting hundreds of funerals of people he
didn’t know (and hoping he pronounced the names right) became wearing. ‘A major
mistake,’ he confessed later, was that I didn’t call in the community. I acted
in isolation: there were surely many options in any situation that address the
panicky fear of a tired person’. So he negotiated a paid month off before
starting in his new role to study at Yale Divinity School. Slowly he was
re-invigorated, and learned that ‘God is the God of fertilizer: God can take
dung and bring things of beauty out of it’. </b><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>But his most
‘wounding’ event was the death of their little eight-year-old girl, Laura Lue,
diagnosed with acute leukemia. She lived only eighteen months and ten days
after that first shocking news was given to her parents. <i>Tracks of a
Fellow Struggler, </i>his first and probably his best-known book,
comprises sermons he preached during that time, together with a final chapter
‘Learning to Handle Grief’, preached three and a half years later. It’s the
book I’ve shared with many parishioners who’ve had to journey ‘into the valley
of the shadow of death’ with a loved one.<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>He often told this
story about his way of handling grief: <o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>“We did not have a
washing machine during World War II and gas was rationed. It was going to be a
real challenge. At about that time one of my father’s younger business
associates was suddenly drafted into the service. My father offered to let them
store their furniture in our basement while he had to be away. Well it so
happened that they had an old grey Bendix washing machine. And as they were
moving in, my father suggested that maybe they would let us use their machine
in lieu of our giving them some storage space. <o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>“The next question
became, who is going to become the wash person in the family?<br />
<br />
“In that mysterious way that families assign roles, I became the wash person at
the grand old age of eleven! For the next four years, I had a ritual every
Tuesday and every Friday. I would come home from school, gather up the wash,
take it down into the basement, fill the old Bendix with water, put in the
clothes, add some soap, and then watch as the plunger would make all kinds of
configurations of suds. It had a hand roller to wring the washed clothes out
and I can remember as a child trying to stick my finger between those rollers to
see how far I could go without it cutting off circulation. In other words, I
became affectionately bonded to that old mechanism in those four years.<br />
<br />
“When the war was over my father’s friend came back. One day when I was at
school, a truck came to our basement, took out all of their things, including
the washing machine, and nobody had told me. It was a Tuesday. I came home and
gathered up the clothes, went down in the basement, and to this day I can
remember my sense of horror as I saw that empty space where the old Bendix had
been. I put down the clothes and rushed back upstairs and announced loudly, ‘We
have been robbed! Somebody stole our washing machine!’<br />
<br />
“My mother, who was not only a musician but also a wise human being, sat me
down and said, ‘John, you’ve obviously forgotten how that machine got to be in
our basement. It never did belong to us. That we ever got to use it was
incredibly good fortune.’ And then she said, ‘If something is a possession and
it’s taken away, you have a right to be angry. But if something is a gift and
it’s taken, you use that moment to give thanks that it was ever given at all.’<br />
<br />
“That was the memory that resurfaced for me the night Laura Lou died. [That
little girl] was in my life the way the old Bendix washing machine was in our
basement and I heard the voice of my mother say, ‘If it is a gift and it’s
taken, you use that occasion to give thanks that it was ever given at all.’ And
that memory helped me to decide that night to take the road of gratitude out of
the valley of sorrow. The Twenty-third Psalm speaks of walking through the
valley of the shadow of grief. I would suggest to you that the road of
gratitude is the best way I know not to get bogged down in our grief but to
make our way through it.<br />
<br />
“Life is gift, birth is windfall, and all, all is grace. And I give you the
gift that was given to me and I pray that somehow the sense of life as gift
will enable you to make a brave and hopeful journey, not just into the valley
of the shadow of bereavement, but through that valley to the light on the other
side. May your journey be a brave one. Amen."<br />
<!--[if !supportLineBreakNewLine]--><br />
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<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>~~<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>John Claypool wrote
eleven books, and in 2008 a new collection of his sermons on the twelve
disciples, entitled <i>The First to Follow,</i> edited by his widow
Ann Wilkinson Claypool, was published.</b><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>He died on September
3, 2005 aged 74. In a eulogy Kirby Godsey, President of Mercer University,
said, “John Claypool touched our souls. Amidst our wounds and our triumphs, his
voice became for us the voice of God - a special measure of grace and with
unfettered gentleness. John's presence in our lives and our histories is more
than mere death can ever take away. He will continue to walk among us, giving
light to our steps, wisdom for our hearts, and hope to our souls. John
Claypool's life and presence and teaching were profound and enduring gifts to
the entire Mercer University community."<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>Rowland Croucher<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>Many of John
Claypool’s sermons are available online: including a few on our John Mark
Ministries website (jmm.org.au). I have borrowed some ideas from his notable
homily on Ananias and Sapphira and adapted them here: <a href="http://www.jmm.org.au/articles/2400.htm">http://www.jmm.org.au/articles/2400.htm</a>
. <br />
<br />
Rowland Croucher<br />
<br />
<!--[if !supportLineBreakNewLine]--><br />
<!--[endif]--></b><o:p></o:p></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
Rowland Croucherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13473460918145751334noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-154247300844604323.post-83859358598453754562014-08-13T16:16:00.000-07:002014-08-13T16:26:01.163-07:00WHAT WOULD JESUS DO?<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"><br /><br />Book
Review: <i>The Songs of Jesse Adams</i>,
Peter McKinnon, Acorn 2014.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">‘WWJD?’
has been a very popular slogan in Evangelical Christianity since the days of
the Jesus People in the 60s/70s. Every Christian pastor has preached or
counseled asking “If Jesus came to [our town] what would he be doing? Who would
he be with (would he hang out with society’s riff-raff again?). What would he
say about the evils and self-interest embedded at all levels in our country?”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">Whilst
we preachers mightn’t be too specific about some things (unless we’re ready for
another <st1:place w:st="on">Golgotha</st1:place>: still happens), here’s a
novel - Peter’s first - which in 346 very readable pages tries to imagine Jesus
and his followers in the 1960s/early 70s <st1:city w:st="on"><st1:place w:st="on">Melbourne</st1:place></st1:city>
and its environs. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">Peter
McKinnon is an interesting man. He’s produced two musicals; is au fait with the
business-world; and he remembers ‘those days’ very well. (I knew him in the
1970s/early 80s: a multi-talented parishioner, working – if I recall - as a
psychologist with Trans Australian Airways screening wannabe hostesses (‘they mustn’t be
too pretty or too plain’). <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">We
who have ‘remember when’ conversations about Australian life and culture ‘back
then’ will resonate with authentic descriptions on every page: three or four
different brands of cigarettes (who recalls the Peter Stuyvesants?), Kingswoods,
the paper-boy on his Malvern Star, trams (their ‘ding ding ding’ provides the
music for a disciple’s betrayal), Flinders’ Street, Fitzroy, Carlton playing
the Demons, a country town’s chook races, bodgies and bolshies, Albert Langer,
Monash Maoists, Vietnam War protests, Kentucky Fried Chicken (the newest food
sensation)… There are words/phrases/clichés I’ve not heard for decades: ‘You’ve
been had’, </span><span style="font-size: 20pt;">galoots
(remember that word?) and many more… </span><span style="font-size: 20pt;"> </span><span style="font-size: 20pt;"> </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">And
if you went to Sunday School ‘back then’ (more of us did) you’ll enjoy spotting
the Gospels’ equivalents of about 30 or 40 characters and events: Mary
Magdalene, Jesus’ mother Mary, Peter, the rich young ruler (“it’s all or
nothing Jarret”), the cleansing of the temple (done by Jesse in a Melbourne city
church!), ‘lost and found’ stories, the ‘woman with five de factos, six
including the last dropkick’, the Good Samaritan, one of the lyrics an
interesting ‘take’ on the Lord’s Prayer, Judas, the Sadducees/politicians, the
Last Supper (in a pub, the ‘Doubtful’!), the mockery of a trial, the
Emmaus-event, and many more… <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">But
above all there are the constants in terms of human sinning (‘like a terminal
cancer’): an inordinate preoccupation with earning, amassing and stealing money,
institutional evil (police, government, church, media et al), widespread antipathy
towards society’s scapegoats – homosexuals, ‘communists’, criminal gangs (they’re
at the bottom and the top of our culture). <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">Peter’s
writing-style is quite brilliant. How about this: ‘wearing a grin that would
charm the stripes off a tiger’? He’s mostly restrained, sometimes oblique, until
you get to the gripping page-turning denouement events towards the end. The
build-up includes some dramatic events – as when Jesse hijacks a mayoral
men-only function and invites the women to join them; or interrupts a State
parliamentary sitting! Many of these scenarios are somewhat improbable.
Exactly!<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">So
here we have a bush-boy who becomes God-man, and whose message is clear: Love
is all you need. Love wins no matter what life throws up. Happy is good; free
is better. ‘I don’t want to own anything.’ And even ‘Peace for poofters’ (p.
238). <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">People
from everywhere came just to hear this ‘stirrer from nowhere’ talk (as well as
sing). ‘He was The Man’ (p.86), his era’s most charismatic pop-star, its
greatest celebrity - a sort-of cross between the Beatles and Jesus. (I know
someone born back then who says “If church can be as good as a U2 concert I’d
be there every week!”). But Jesse is humble: “As for who’s the best – it’s the
kid here. Big shots come last in my book” (p. 248). And like Jesus he needed to
slip away occasionally to enjoy some solitude (he liked hotel roof-tops and
similar places). <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">Ever
thought about this: ‘How can a body go missing from a modern city’s morgue?’
Good question. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">I
can imagine church youth groups and reading clubs having a wonderful time with
this book. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">Rowland
Croucher<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">jmm.org.au<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
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<span style="font-size: 20.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">July
2014<o:p></o:p></span></div>
Rowland Croucherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13473460918145751334noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-154247300844604323.post-64181324303537688482014-08-13T03:48:00.000-07:002014-09-10T17:14:45.090-07:00SAME-SEX MARRIAGE<div class="MsoNormal">
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<b><span style="font-size: 16.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"><br /></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 16.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">Some notes from a Progressive (Evangelical)
Christian Viewpoint.</span></b><br />
<b><span style="font-size: 16.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"><br /></span></b>
<b><span style="font-size: 16.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">by Rowland Croucher</span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">As I write, today (14/7/2014) the story of a gay man
who’s just come out of his painful closet – Australia’s most successful
Olympian Ian Thorpe – is everywhere in the public media. (ABC NewsMail’s
headline: “Ian Thorpe says he concealed sexuality out of fear”. The Melbourne
Age’s editorial: “The rate of self-harm and suicide for homosexual youth ranks
well above their peers and is a telling sign of an urgent problem that must be
confronted”). </span><span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">[1]</span><span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;"> Ian is now one of the three highest-profile
gay men in Australia – with Federal Greens politician Dr Bob Brown and the
Honourable Michael Kirby (former Justice of the High Court). </span><span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">[2]</span><span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;"> <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">And in the media, just this month, are many stories of
married lesbian and gay couples who have returned from celebrating their
nuptials in New Zealand or in a British consulate, or elsewhere, who now face
(temporarily, we hope) a complicated legal status in a country which hasn’t yet
caught up with the the UK, NZ, Canada and other similar Western progressive
nations on this issue… <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-AU" style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;"><br /></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-AU" style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Same-sex marriage</span><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt;"> (SSM) or ‘gay marriage’ is the legally
recognized union of two people with the
same biological sex and/or gender/identity. Advocates of SSM often
prefer the term ‘Marriage Equality’.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-AU" style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">As of 28 June 2014, 16 countries (Argentina,
Belgium, Brazil, Canada, Denmark, France, Iceland, Netherlands, New Zealand,
Norway, Portugal, Spain, South Africa, Sweden, the UK, Uruguay), and several states/sub-national
jurisdictions in the US and in Mexico allow same-sex couples to marry. </span><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt;">Coming
up: Scotland (late 2014?), and the European Court of Human Rights (as soon as
enough countries fall into line). </span><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt;">[3]</span><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt;"> Australia? The
process will almost certainly get under way when the conservative Coalition
parties allow a conscience vote. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-AU" style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt;"><br />
Around the world there is rising
support - a clear majority now in all Western nations, across every age
group, political ideology, gender, race and many religious denominations - for
legally recognizing same-sex marriage. Support for SSM is now (15/7/2014)
higher in Australia than in any other country, including NZ and the UK, when
they passed marriage equality laws. </span><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">[4]</span><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-AU" style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt;">The
recognition of SSM is a political, social, human rights, religious and civil
rights issue: as were the paradigm shifts associated with the slavery, race, </span><span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;"> </span><span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">[5]</span><span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">, </span><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt;">divorce, and gender
equality. Gays and lesbians are not going away: they pay taxes too, so they ask
“Why should we settle for a lesser status (eg. equivalence to ‘de facto’ or
civil unions) rather than be allowed full marriage, with all the relevant
social and legal protections?”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The doyen of English-speaking public theologians,
Martin Marty, endorses these judgments: “The gay rights movement has achieved
more swiftly than any other individual rights movement in history, not merely
the impossible but the unthinkable.”</span><span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">[6]</span><span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;"> And: “In the glacial scheme of
social change, attitudes about gay marriage are evolving at whitewater speed.” </span><span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">[7]</span><span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">.</span><span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;"> US Supreme Court decisions may
slow that speed, but “it seems certain that in the not too distant future, we
will look back on today’s opposition [on this subject] the way we now view opposition
to interracial marriage - as a blatant violation of basic constitutional
commitments to equality and human dignity.” </span><span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">[8]</span><span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;"> Indeed, “Issues connected with
[SSM are] the most church-dividing since the Council of Nicea or the Protestant
Reformation.” </span><span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">[9] </span><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-AU" style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt;">Conservative
politicians tend to argue that SSM is antithetical to civilization as we have
understood it: marriage is between a man and a woman. Christian and Jewish conservatives
include an appeal to tradition and/or biblical authority. The f</span><span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">all-back position for many Catholics and some Protestants: “Gay marriage
is against Natural Law, so it’s simply wrong.” But Marty opines: “[Natural law]
teachings, when invoked, tend to match what people have already decided,
on other grounds, is right or wrong.” </span><span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">[10]</span><span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;"> <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-AU" style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt;">Here
are three important professional bodies’ contributions to the discussion:<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt;">The UK Royal
College of Psychiatrists</span></b><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt;"> (April 2014): “</span><span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Homosexuality is not a psychiatric disorder… The College holds the view
that lesbian, gay and bisexual people are and should be regarded as valued
members of society, who have exactly similar rights and responsibilities as all
other citizens. This includes equal access to healthcare, the rights and
responsibilities involved in a civil partnership/marriage, the rights and
responsibilities involved in procreating and bringing up children, freedom
to practise a religion as a lay person or religious leader, freedom from
harassment or discrimination in any sphere and a right to protection from
therapies that are potentially damaging, particularly those that purport
to change sexual orientation.” </span><span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 11.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">[11] </span><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-AU" style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt;"><br />
</span><span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The <b>American
Anthropological Association</b> (2005) has stated that the results of more than
a century of research on households, kinship relationships, and families,
across cultures and through time, “provide no support whatsoever for the view
that either civilization or viable social orders depend upon marriage as an
exclusively heterosexual institution.” </span><span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">[12]</span><span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;"> <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-AU" style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt;">And
from t</span><span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">he <b>American
Academy of Pediatrics</b> (2006): “There is ample evidence to show that
children raised by same-gender parents fare as well as those raised by
heterosexual parents. More than 25 years of research have documented that there
is no relationship between parents' sexual orientation and any measure of a
child's emotional, psychosocial, and behavioral adjustment. These data have
demonstrated no risk to children as a result of growing up in a family with one
or more gay parents. Conscientious and nurturing adults, whether they are men
or women, heterosexual or homosexual, can be excellent parents. The rights,
benefits, and protections of civil marriage can further strengthen these
families.” </span><span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">[13]</span><span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;"> <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Pronouncements such as these have dramatically
influenced the thinking of anti-SSM advocates. As the theologically liberal <i>Christian Century</i> editorialized (to
coincide with the US Supreme Court’s initial consideration as to whether gays
have a constitutional right to marry, March 2013):<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">“It’s remarkable not only how much public opinion has
recently shifted toward endorsing gay marriage, but how thin are the legal
arguments now arrayed against it. Neither the brief offered by ProtectMarriage
on behalf of California’s Proposition 8 nor the one by House Republicans on
behalf of the Defense of Marriage Act attempts to argue that same-sex couples
are a threat to society or children. The House brief simply asserts that it is
“rational” to believe that children fare better when raised by biological
parents of both sexes — without marshaling much evidence for this view.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">“Both briefs introduce as part of their case against
same-sex marriage a curious new argument about the ‘social risks’ presented not
by homosexual couples but by heterosexual couples. The point is that reckless
sexual relations between unmarried heterosexuals can produce unintended
offspring, which are a potential burden to society, whereas reckless sex
between homosexual couples doesn’t pose this threat. Therefore, the briefs say,
society has reason to offer heterosexual couples, not gay and lesbian couples,
the distinct benefits of marriage.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">“One immediate objection to this inverted argument is
obvious: Why should gays and lesbians be denied the benefits of marriage
because they don’t present the same social risks that heterosexuals do? In any
case, denying gay couples the right to marry would not do anything to steer
reckless sexually active heterosexuals toward the responsibilities of marriage.”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Is procreation a defining element in defining a
legitimate marriage?<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">“Inside and outside the church, marriage has long been
defined as the lifelong commitment of two people to sharing all things in life —
children, property, money, joys, sorrows, poverty, prosperity. What Christians
have added to this general understanding is not an insistence on procreation
but rather an insistence that marriage mirrors in some way God’s fidelity to
creation and to God’s people. Because marriage reflects God’s faithfulness,
Christians believe that living out an unconditional lifelong commitment to
another person offers a way of living more deeply into God’s purposes for one’s
own life. Marriage offers a path leading one out of selfish desires into
greater concern for the welfare of others. That distinctively Christian
understanding of marriage would not be damaged by a legal endorsement of
same-sex marriage. It could even be enhanced.” </span><span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">[14]</span><span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;"> <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">A couple of interesting published comments followed
that statement: “Luther and Calvin both challenged the theological norm of
their day that marriage was first, for the procreation of children.
Rather, they posited, God had provided a way out of human loneliness via the
call to lifelong committed relationship.” <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">(Jesus’ and Paul’s recorded words never connected the
institution of marriage with procreation).<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">[Re Church and State]: “In Europe, marriage is first a
matter of state law. If a couple desires to have their marriage blessed by the
religious body of their choice, they may do so. With the blurring of the
separation of church and state comes the confusion between ‘rights’ and ‘rites.’
Let the state define people’s legal right to wed, but let religious bodies
define and exercise the rite of marriage that reflects their faith, tradition
and practice.” <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Conservative vs Progressive Hermeneutics<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Conservative ‘People of the Book’ (Jews, Christians,
Muslims) tend to offer early in their rationale on this issue, quotes from
their holy books, interpreted by authoritative teachers. For such traditionalists,
male-female union is an icon of creation: the two genders are complementary. And
same-sex liaisons get a mostly ‘negative press’ in all three religions’
traditions. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">But what to do with a law like this one? ‘If a man
lies with a male as with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination.’ (<i>Lev. 20:13</i>). Martin Marty again:
“Most quoters stop there, but it goes on: ‘They shall be put to death’.
Seriously, if the first half of that verse is divinely-inspired and authoritative,
who are we moderns to decide that the second half is not, and that it can be
shrugged off? The same goes for other scriptural death penalty cases.
As every smart… New Atheist reminds us, Leviticus and Deuteronomy command
capital punishment in numerous clear and specified instances: when
children curse their parents, when anyone blasphemes, and even when a son is
persistently disobedient. He should be put to death: that’s God’s law… No
Jews are Jews because God told their ancestors to commit omnicide against the
Amalekites. No Christians, whose book also includes Leviticus and
Deuteronomy, use it to punish men who have intercourse with a menstruating
wife. No Christians in our cultures use the Bible, which never
de-legitimizes slavery, to legitimize slavery.” </span><span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">[15]</span><span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;"> <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">And surely sins listed in Romans 1:26, 1 Corinthians
6:9 etc. do not refer to life-long loving unions between same sex couples. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Progressive Christians tend to reinforce their
worldview with assertions like these: <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">1. It’s not smart to conceptualize too many realities
as dualistic binary oppositions: we live in a world of ambiguity.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">2. The Sodom and Gomorrah story might still be important
for fundamentalists, but doesn’t feature so much these days in scholarly
discussions. It was a story about gang rape, not loving unions.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">3. Jesus (eg. Sabbath laws) and Paul have encouraged
us to view a legalistic interpretation of the Mosaic law as antithetical to
grace. Galatians states the underlying principle, and it's worth noticing
Paul's conjunctions. "There is neither Jew <i>nor</i> Greek,
there is neither slave <i>nor</i> free, there is no longer
'male <i>and</i> female': for you are all one in Christ Jesus" (<i>Gal. 3:28</i>). </span><span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">[16]<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Progressives tend to be guided by a higher commitment
to ‘grace’ rather than law/dogma, as they believe Jesus was with his ethic of
inclusion. Thus many erstwhile opponents of SSM have radically changed their
mind when a loved-one ‘came out’ as gay. (What’s new, many progressive
apologists ask: the same thing happened with the inter-racial and divorce
paradigms). <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">So progressive Christian theology is more dynamic than
static. ‘The Lord has yet more light and truth to break forth from his holy
Word.’ The apostle Peter learned this the hard way and in the encounter with
the gentile Cornelius changed his mind on who was/was not accepted by God. The Adam and Eve story is especially relevant
for singles: a man with a man is a lot closer to a man with a woman than a man
who chooses no partner at all. Gays and lesbians surely don’t have to be sentenced
to lives of terrible loneliness. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">An important question: how did humans learn to
discriminate against certain individuals/groups? Rene Girard has been most
helpful here with his notion of mimetic rivalry: humans learn bigotry from
parents/significant others. Society is believed to be at risk from ‘alien
others’, so they must be opposed/ humiliated/punished/exiled… even killed. In
other words, these alien individuals or outgroups become ‘scapegoats’ in a
society’s quest for purity, salvation, orthodoxy, whatever. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">But the supreme Judeo-Christian ethic is a commitment
to Love for God and neighbor. And re our conjugal partner, the marriage vows
affirm: "For better for worse, for richer for poorer, in sickness and in
health, till death do us part." <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">John Maynard Keynes used this provocation to effect:
“When the facts change, I change my mind. And you, sir?” History is littered
with conservative ideas which collided with the findings of science and stoked the
fear of cognitive dissonance. I for one would not like to be judged as being on
the wrong side of history this time around… </span><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Conclusion<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">So among Christians – at least in the West - there’s been
a significant migration from conservative to progressive thinking on this broad
issue </span><span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">[17]</span><span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;"> (I leave it to
more-knowledgeable others to generalize about Jewish and Islamic trends). A
significant factor: Conservative Evangelical Christians were the drivers of
world-wide mission in the last few centuries, but were slow to engage with some
serious human-rights issues, in deference to the host governments where they ministered.
But the times are a’changing: now they are partnering with Ecumenical/Liberal
Christians, Catholics, Jews, secularists, and feminists on many fronts,
reminding us of Alfred North Whitehead's dictum: "Great ideas enter into
reality with evil associates and with disgusting alliances. But the greatness
remains, nerving the race in its slow ascent." </span><span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">[18]</span><span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;"> <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The Last Word: US Bishop Gene Robinson<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">Gene Robinson is the world’s first openly gay bishop
elected to the historic episcopate (2003). He married Mark Andrew – his partner
for a total of 25 years - in 2008. They ended their union on May, 2014, about
which he writes: ‘My belief in marriage is undiminished by the reality of
divorcing someone I have loved for a very long time, and will continue to love
even as we separate. Love can endure, even if marriage cannot.’ </span><span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">[19]</span><span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;"> <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The thesis in his book <i>God Believes in Love: Straight
Talk about Gay Marriage</i>: ‘Marriage is a sacrament and nothing in Scripture
or orthodox theology precludes our opening the institution to same-gender
couples. The legal marriage of two same-gender people – like the rather recent
opening of legal marriage to interracial couples – retains the traditional
meaning of marriage while expanding the number of people whom it may benefit.’<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-AU" style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Here’s a summary of Gene’s ten theses: (1) It’s time
for gays to be treated with the same dignity as heterosexuals; (2) Jesus said
‘Do to others what you would have them do to you’; (3) ‘Civil Unions’ don’t
affirm a partner’s full rights; (4)
Nowhere in Scripture is there a wholesale condemnation of the loving
relationships of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people; (5) Jesus was
champion of the poor, the oppressed, and the marginalized; (6) Marriage is a
matter for the state, and historically is quite fluid: until relatively
recently interracial marriage (miscegenation) was forbidden in America, Nazi
Germany, South Africa and elsewhere; (7) There are plenty of reasons why
marriages are stressful and end in divorce. None of them relate to the idea of
gay marriage; (8) Religious opposition to same-gender marriage is an example of
the violation of the separation of church and state: the Church is trying to
meddle in the rightful business of the State; (9) Parenting? No research
supports the widely held conviction that the gender of parents matters for
child well-being; (10) It’s not about homophobia (“a word I don’t use; it’s a
conversation-stopper”) but justice. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-AU" style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“The opportunity to love one person and to have that
love sanctioned and supported by the culture in which we live is a right denied
gay and lesbian people for countless centuries. It’s time to open that
opportunity to all of us. Because in the end, God believes in love.’ </span><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">[20]</span><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<u><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt;">Footnotes. </span></u><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt;"> <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-AU" style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt;">[1]
</span><i><span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">The Age</span></i><span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;"> 15/7/2014 <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">[2] jmm.org.au/articles/29447.htm ;
jmm.org.au/articles/30819.htm <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US;">[3] </span><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt;">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Same-sex_marriage <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-AU" style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt;">[4]
Lisa Cox: ‘Support growing for same-sex
marriage’, <i>The Age</i>, 15/7/2014, p.8 <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-AU" style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">[5] </span><span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">But
it’s interesting that black churches in the US are divided over SSM: see Maza,
Carlos. “Three Things The Media Should Know About Rev. William Owens And His
Coalition Of African-American Pastors.” Equality Matters (blog), August 8,
2012. Accessed July 13, 2013. <a href="http://equalitymatters.org/blog/201208080002" target="_blank">http://equalitymatters.org/blog/201208080002</a></span><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;"> ; </span><span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">“Black
Pastors Condemn Supreme Court For Ruling on Gay Marriage.” <i>Atlanta
Daily World</i>, June 26, 2013. Accessed July 13, 2013. <a href="http://www.atlantadailyworld.com/201306267036/Original/black-pastors-condemn-supreme-court-for-ruling-on-gay-marriage" target="_blank">http://www.atlantadailyworld.com/201306267036/Original/black-pastors-condemn-supreme-court-for-ruling-on-gay-marriage</a>.
<br />
“The Black Church.” BlackDemographics.com. Accessed July 13, 2013. <a href="http://blackdemographics.com/culture/religion/" target="_blank">http://blackdemographics.com/culture/religion/</a></span><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;"> <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-AU" style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">[6] </span><span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">David Cole may have been the first to describe
the legalizing of same-sex marriage with this observation, “Getting Nearer and
Nearer’, <i>New York Review of Books</i>, January 10, 2013, reviewing
Michael J. Klarman’s <i>From the Closet to
the Altar: Courts, Backlash, and the Struggle for Same-Sex Marriage</i> (OUP) <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">[7] Citing Ellen Goodman<i> Sightings</i> 1/14/2013,
“Gay Marriage Tidewater”<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">[8] <i>Ibid.</i><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">[9] *Sightings* 3/1/10, “Biblical Literalism” <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">[10] Marty, <i>Sightings,</i> 1/14/2013<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">[11] http://www.jmm.org.au/articles/33500.htm <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">[12] American Anthropological Association (2005) <a href="http://www.aaanet.org/stmts/marriage.htm">"Statement on Marriage and
the Family from the American Anthropological Association"</a>, Retrieved 10 November 2010<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">[13] </span><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Pawelski,
J. G.; Perrin, E. C.; Foy, J. M.; Allen, C. E.; Crawford, J. E.; Del Monte, M.;
Kaufman, M.; Klein, J. D.; Smith, K.; Springer, S.; Tanner, J. L.; Vickers, D.
L. (2006). "The Effects of Marriage, Civil Union, and Domestic Partnership
Laws on the Health and Well-being of
Children". <i>Pediatrics</i> 118 (1): 349–364. Cited
here: <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-AU" style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;"><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Same-sex_marriage">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Same-sex_marriage</a>#cite_note-aaa-24</span><span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">[14] ‘<a href="http://www.christiancentury.org/politicssociety/editors" target="_blank">FROM
THE EDITORS</a>’, <i>Christian Century</i>,
‘Blessing Gay Marriage’, March 04, 2013<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">[15] <i>Sightings</i> 3/1/10, ‘Biblical
Literalism’ by Martin E. Marty<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">[16] More from a conservative Christian viewpoint:
Michael Bird, Gordon Preece, et. al. <i>Sexegesis: An Evangelical Response to
Five Uneasy Pieces </i>(Anglican Press, Australia, 2002). ‘Shows that the
traditional reading of Scripture, as against homosexual practice but for
homosexual people, still makes sense of the Bible text. This is contrary to the
more liberal revisionist reading of Scripture in <i>Five Uneasy Pieces</i>’<i> </i>[goodreads.com].
Robert Gagnon’s <i>The Bible and Homosexual
Practice: Texts and Hermeneutics </i>(2002) is still one of the most thorough
volumes – written by an outstanding scholar who is both theologically
conservative on this broad issue, but is also a non-inerrantist: his work is
commended by James Barr and many other highly acclaimed conservative Christian
theologians many of whom are also polemicists in their opposition to
Fundamentalism. [See Amazon’s impressive list of commendations]. See also Rev. Dr. Mark Durie’s views, here: <a href="http://stmarysvicar.blogspot.com.au/2013/06/four-research-issues-relating-to-same.html">http://stmarysvicar.blogspot.com.au/2013/06/four-research-issues-relating-to-same.html</a><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">[17] My first book: <i>Recent Trends Among Evangelicals</i>, <a href="http://www.jmm.org.au/articles/12125.htm">http://www.jmm.org.au/articles/12125.htm</a><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">[18] Martin E. Marty: Human Rights Bedfellows, <i>Sightings</i>,
October 4, 2004; Allen D. Hertzke. Rowman & Littlefield: <i>Freeing God's
Children: The Unlikely Alliance for Global Human Rights</i>; Johan D. Van Der
Vyver and John Witte, Jr. Martinus Nijhoff eds., <i>Religious Human Rights in
Global Perspectives: Legal Perspectives (Vol. I), Religious Perspectives (Vol.
II)</i><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">[19] thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/05/04<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">[20] </span><span lang="EN-AU" style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">] Bishop Gene Robinson, <i>God Believes in
Love: Straight Talk about Gay Marriage, 2012. </i>For a longer review/summary
visit <a href="http://www.jmm.org.au/articles/31311.htm">http://www.jmm.org.au/articles/31311.htm</a> <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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Rowland Croucherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13473460918145751334noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-154247300844604323.post-59028960395672111432014-08-12T14:49:00.000-07:002014-08-13T16:25:31.759-07:00PREACHING<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="MsoNormalTable" style="border-collapse: collapse; mso-padding-alt: 0in 0in 0in 0in; mso-yfti-tbllook: 1184; width: 0px;">
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<b><u><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">Preachers other preachers read (and
preach!)</span></u></b><b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">I talk to lots of clergy - in conferences and one to
one – and have a pretty good idea about their preaching styles, and the other preachers they read for inspiration.<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">An interesting thing happened on the way to writing
this chapter, on Mothers’ Day 2014. My wife has produced one of the two or
three most popular Mothers’ Day sermons online. (Google those words and you’ll
find hers in the top four – out of one million). In the week before every
(North American) Mothers’ Day up to 5,000 people daily read her sermon. And
many preach it – some without acknowledgement. (Jan still smiles when she
remembers the apologetic email she received from an American pastor who did
just that – and was caught out!).<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<span style="font-size: 14pt;"><b>Some people – I’m one of them – actually enjoy reading
others’ sermons. When John Claypool used to publish his each week, and sent
them out once a month, I often found myself dropping everything to read them.
I’ve done the same with other contemporary homiletical ‘greats’ like Richard
Rohr, Brian McLaren, Barbara Brown Taylor, Frederick Buechner, Tom Long, Eugene
Peterson, Fred Craddock and William Willimon. And, a generation ago, W.E.
Sangster, James Stewart, and Helmut Thielicke. Before that, F.W. Boreham and at
the turn of the 20</b><sup style="font-weight: bold;">th</sup><b> Century the often-circumloquacious but
erudite and orthodox Peter Taylor Forsyth [footnote Jason Goroncy review]. And
if you add the black preachers Martin Luther King and Gardner Taylor, (and,
if you want a Pentecostal, TD Jakes), that just about completes the list
of English-speaking/writing ‘greats’ in the 20th and early 21</b><sup style="font-weight: bold;">st</sup><b> centuries,
in my view. (Oh, and don’t forget William Barclay, who in his
commentaries and one-page reviews in the </b><i><b>Expository Times</b></i><b> provided
more preachable material than anyone else in the 20</b><sup style="font-weight: bold;">th</sup><b> century.)
[3]<o:p></o:p></b></span></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">So how would you select the best Christian sermons
ever written? A book was published a decade ago in the U.K. titled <i>Best
Sermons Ever</i> collected by – wait for it! – the assistant editor of the
British newspaper <i>Daily Telegraph</i>, Christopher Howse [1]. Here’s
Howse’s list: Peter the Apostle, John Chrysostom, St. Augustine, Aelfric, St.
Bernard, The Homilies, Lancelot Andrewes, John Donne, Jeremy Taylor, John
Bunyan, Jonathan Swift, Jonathan Edwards, John Wesley, Lawrence Sterne, Sydney
Smith, John Henry Newman, Charles Spurgeon, Martin Luther King, H.A. Williams,
and Pope John Paul II.<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">Now, class, what does that list suggest to you? We’ll
come back to that. In addition Howse offers excerpts from other sermons and
prayers from people ranging from St. Francis of Assisi, George Herbert, John
Keble… to moderns like Mother Teresa and Billy Graham.<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">First, a little introduction to the ‘practical
theology’ of preaching. What is preaching supposed to ‘do’, if I can put the
question into a utilitarian frame of reference? I’d suggest the best preaching
is didactic, prophetic, and dramatic. [2]<br />
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">Christopher Howse would, I think, prefer three other
adjectives – erudite, scholarly, and/or ‘literary’. In other words, he comes to
this exercise as a literateur, rather than as a homiletician. Notice the
absence of modern American mainline preachers in his list? Yes, perhaps
Jonathan Edwards, ML King and Billy Graham deserve a place, but what of the
others most theologically-sophisticated Americans are reading, like those
mentioned above? (The answer, from my experience of 8 – 10 trips to the U.K.
for pastors’ conferences: on that side of the Atlantic many have never
heard of them). And I’m surprised W E Sangster and James Stewart are missing.</span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">So, frankly, most of these sermons are of classical –
rather than devotional – interest only. Some of them are heavily impregnated
with Latin phrases and other obscurantisms. And some fit into the category of
‘Why use 10 words when 100 will suffice?’<br />
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">One of the best is a homiletical essay – Jonathan
Swift’s ‘Upon Sleeping in Church’ . The text, of course, is about Eutychus
falling out of the window, Acts 20:9: ‘The accident which happened to this
young man hath not been sufficient to discourage his successors’. But frankly,
I’d go to sleep in some of these sermons – especially Laurence Sterne’s on
‘Evil Speaking’.<br />
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">And some are both brilliant and scary. How about this,
from Jonathan Edwards’ 15-page sermon (without a title – but from one version
of his famous ‘Sinners In the Hands of an Angry God’:<br />
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">‘If you cry to God to pity you, he will be so far from
pitying you in your doleful case, or showing you the least regard or favour,
that instead of that, he will only tread you under foot. And though he
will know that you cannot bear the weight of omnipotence treading upon you, yet
he will not regard that, but he will crush you under his feet without
mercy; he will crush out your blood, and make it fly, and it shall be sprinkled
on his garments, so as to stain all his raiment. He will not only hate you, but
he will have you, in the utmost contempt: no place shall be thought fit for
you, but under his feet to be trodden down as the mire of the streets.’ [4]<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">No wonder ‘revival’ broke out when people heard this
sort of diatribe!<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">Some excerpts and notes (many of these are in the
category ‘they don’t produce them like this anymore!’) :<br />
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">* Wesley traveled on foot or horseback 225,000
miles and preached 40,000 sermons!<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">* Lancelot Andrewes mastered fifteen languages!<br />
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">* ‘In Lapland witches sell winds’ (John Donne)<br />
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">* ‘Celibate, like the fly in the heart of an apple,
dwells in a perpetual sweetness, but sits alone, and is confined and dies in
singularity; but marriage, like the useful bee, builds a house and gathers
sweetness from every flower… and feeds the world with delicacies’ (Jeremy
Taylor)<br />
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">* ‘It is my duty – it is my wish – it is the subject
of this day to point out those evils of the Catholic religion from which we
have escaped’ (from Sydney Smith’s ‘The Rules of Christian Charity’ !). Another
profundity from that sermon: ‘The evil of difference of opinion must exist – it
admits of no cure’.<br />
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">* ‘When people say that I acted charitably towards so
and so, what they generally mean is that in fact that I hate his guts but
managed to behave as though I didn’t’ (H. A. Williams)<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">An inspirational note from Martin Luther King: ‘Let us
not despair. Let us not lose faith in man and certainly not in God. We must
believe that a prejudiced mind can be changed, and that man, by the grace of
God, can be lifted from the valley of hate to the high mountain of love…
Let us have love, compassion and understanding goodwill for those against whom
we struggle, helping them to realize that… we are not seeking to defeat them
but to help them, as well as ourselves.’<br />
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">This book reminds me of the 9 November 1895 Punch
cartoon, which showed a timid curate having breakfast in his bishop’s home. The
bishop is saying “I’m afraid you’ve got a bad egg, Mr Jones”, to which the
curate replies, in a desperate attempt not to give offence: “Oh, no, my Lord, I
assure you that parts of it are excellent!”.<br />
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">If you are a theological or literary sophisticate who
reads sermons without wanting to be ‘spiritually challenged’ by them, this book
is for you…<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">~~<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">[1] You can sample his Blog here: <a href="http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/culture/christopherhowse/100073110/hang-me-its-the-coen-brothers-folk-club/">http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/culture/christopherhowse/100073110/hang-me-its-the-coen-brothers-folk-club/</a><br />
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">[2] See <a href="http://jmm.org.au/articles/8100.htm">http://jmm.org.au/articles/8100.htm</a> for
more<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">[3] <a href="http://www.jmm.org.au/articles/8527.htm">http://www.jmm.org.au/articles/8527.htm</a> .
This interesting list of the (twenty) ‘Greatest Preachers of the Twentieth
Century’ is regularly at the top of the 20,000+ ‘most-accessed’ articles on our
website – except in the week-and-a-half before Mothers’ Day (!). The Baylor
University list of ‘12 Most Effective Preachers’ actually listed a woman
– Barbara Brown Taylor (<a href="http://www.baylor.edu/mediacommunications/news.php?action=story&story=1036">http://www.baylor.edu/mediacommunications/news.php?action=story&story=1036</a> ).
Google her sermon at Riverside Church in New York on the Good Samaritan for an
excellent example of modern, lucid, challenging preaching: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wds3OxzHNAI">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wds3OxzHNAI</a>
The best list of outstanding modern preachers is the one comprising speakers at
Yale’s Lyman Beecher Lecture series - <a href="http://www.library.yale.edu/div/beecher.html">http://www.library.yale.edu/div/beecher.html</a><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">[4] <a href="http://www.jonathanedwards.com/sermons/Warnings/sinners.htm">http://www.jonathanedwards.com/sermons/Warnings/sinners.htm</a> <o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">~~<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">PTFORSYTH (Goroncy) - wordy, erudite, knew it
was acquiesce 'in'.<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">Goroncy: PTFORSYTH astonishingly circumloquacious, as
familiar with then-modern 'critical scholarship' as with English poets. Sermons
three times longer than they needed to be. Verbosity Petered out with Barth,
Tillich, THIELICKE .<o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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Rowland Croucherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13473460918145751334noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-154247300844604323.post-4887519167566440582014-08-12T13:55:00.001-07:002014-08-13T16:25:00.419-07:00MARRIAGE (FIND THE ACRONYM!)<h3 style="background-color: white; color: #666666; font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', Trebuchet, Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; line-height: 18.479999542236328px;">
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><br /></span></b>
<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">On the 15th April, 1995, the Rev. Jan Croucher (my
wife) and I 'celebrated' the marriage of our daughter Amanda, to John
Southwell. The beautiful service at the Heathmont Baptist Church in Melbourne,
Victoria, began with Amanda's four cousins - sisters who are all brilliant
musicians - playing Bach's Air on the G String. After the vows, a homily.
Here's what I said:</span></b><b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">~~~</span></b><b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">It is a privilege and joy to summarize the 'wisdom of
the ages' (and of 35* years of marriage) about 'how to be happy though
married'. Last year I spent three months writing a book about marriage and
family, and read all the 'experts'...</span></b><b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">I've delivered many of these homilies before, but only
once at the wedding of one of my children... John and Amanda, these thoughts
are a gift to you as you set out on one of life's greatest (and riskiest)
adventures.</span></b><b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">Actually, they're thoughts put together by both of us,
your parents, on a romantic outing to and from the opera <i>Turandot </i>last
Wednesday evening...</span></b><b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">Marriage, according to the experts, is about eight
things:</span></b><b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><u>1.</u></span></b><b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><u> HAPPINESS.</u><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">However, if you marry to find happiness you're
marrying for the wrong reason. Happiness is where you find it, not where you
seek it.</span></b><b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">Happiness is serendipitous - a by-product of doing
other worthwhile things. As you set some big goals for your life together,
you'll look back from time to time and say of this occasion or that, 'Wasn't it
great?'</span></b><b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">And by the way, your partner can't 'make you happy':
that's a decision you make for yourself. Indeed no other person on earth can
satisfy all your needs... Ultimately, as the Psalms and Proverbs reiterate
everywhere, 'Happy are those who fear the Lord.'</span></b><b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><u>2. ACCEPTANCE.</u></span></b><b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">This is the basic idea in the Christian concept of
'grace'. I am loved by God before I change, before I 'deserve' to be loved.
This love-before-worth is to characterize our relationships as well. Indeed,
people grow and change more profoundly once they are accepted as they are.</span></b><b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">So in marriage, don't impose a program of change on the
other: accept him or her as they are, and they'll be more likely to change
anyway. Every culture has a proverb which says something to the effect that
'the sun does not command the bud to become a flower, but simply provides a
climate of warmth so that the flower can become the beautiful creature it was
meant to be.'</span></b><b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">The Bible text for us here is Romans 15:7: 'Accept one
another for the glory of God, as Christ has accepted you.'</span></b><b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><u>3.</u></span></b><b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><u> ROMANCE.</u><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">In our culture we 'fall in love' then marry. Romance,
says Scott Peck (<i>The Road Less Traveled</i>) is a genetic trick that nature
plays on us to hook us into marriage. Romance is to marriage as the colour of a
car is to the car: beautiful, but not necessarily functional to any significant
degree. True 'love' is a matter of the will: I _choose_ to love my partner.
Romance is emotional and sexual.</span></b><b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">Now romance is important: every couple ought to do
romantic things together. Last Wednesday night Jan and I walked and talked
along the South Bank of the Yarra: it was a magical evening: the city lights
and the moon reflected on the water; the temperature was mild; we weren't in a
hurry to be anywhere else. Last week a woman said to me, 'He buys me flowers
and chocolates. I like that. But I'd rather do interesting or romantic things
with him...' The Song of Solomon is a celebration of romantic/sexual love...</span></b><b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><u>4.</u></span></b><b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><u> DEVOTION.</u><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">In the words of Genesis and Jesus, we leave father and
mother and cling to our married partner. In the vows you composed you said
you are dedicating your life to the well-being of your mate. Later, you will
have some difficult priorities to sort out. Like, 'Who comes first - my partner
or my children?' </span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">The classical Christian approach to this 'hierarchy of loving'
is: God first, spouse second, children third, everything else </span></b><b style="font-size: 13px;"><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">(church, job, others) follows. However, in a
well-integrated life, <i>these loves do not compete: they enrich each
other, and are inter-related.</i></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><u>5.</u></span></b><b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><u> WISDOM.</u><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">In the New Testament James invites us to ask for
wisdom, and God will give it to us. John, Amanda, you'll need lots of this
substance to survive a marriage. Males and females are not the same. Their
bodies, minds, emotions and logics are different! Gender-wise, and sexually,
they are different. Generally (but not invariably) women tend to have a more
finely-developed intuition; men tend to be linear-thinkers. Both are OK,
and complement one another: one is good for reading feelings, the other
for solving problems. Men need to work harder on figuring out the
agendas-behind-words. And I would encourage women to work harder at setting
goals...</span></b><b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><u>6.</u></span></b><b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><u> OPENNESS.</u><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">Should you 'tell everything' to your partner? My
answer is 'Almost everything'. You may decide that something is hurtful
and will not be received or understood: sometimes you will choose not to 'link
your mouth with your mind': some things are best left unsaid.</span></b><b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><u>7.</u></span></b><b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><u> RECREATION.</u><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">You are allowed to enjoy your life: you will never
come out of it alive! Plan a day off together each week (the coming of
children will complicate those plans, however). Look forward to enjoyable and
interesting pursuits you both enjoy. But don't live for 'pleasure'. 'Play' is
for 're-creation' - to strengthen you to go back into life to work. But you do
not live to work: you work to live. Many men, and some women, are bigamous -</span></b><b style="font-size: 13px;"><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">married to their jobs as well as their partners. Then,
in mid-life, they have a 'crisis' - moving from significance to security,
whereas the other might be moving the other way. That's a time for seeking the
help of a counsellor.</span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><u>8.</u></span></b><b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><u> KINDNESS.</u><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">The early Christian leader Paul had a brilliant
insight into husband/wife relationships when he exhorted husbands to <i>love</i> their
wives, and wives to <i>respect </i>their husbands. The worst fate for a
woman is to be raped and killed: self-respecting women feel awful when treated
as objects.</span></b><b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">The worst fate for a man is to be shamed before
significant others: men sometimes commit suicide if their shame is too great.
John and Amanda, if you give gifts of love and respect to each other, you're in
for a special marriage.</span></b><b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">Two final words: the opera <i>Turandot</i> is
about love and death (the words in Italian are similar). All true loving is a
kind of dying: 'dying to self' as the Scripture puts it, so that one can please
the other.</span></b><b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">And a thought from Richard Rohr, whose tapes you'll be
hearing on your honeymoon. (He's probably the best popularizer of classical
Christian spirituality in the English-speaking world: you'll enjoy him). He
quotes Meister Eckhart to the effect that all true spirituality is </span></b><b style="font-size: 13px;"><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">about <i>subtraction</i> whereas
our culture says your significance is measured by all the stuff - money,
material objects, degrees, status, power etc. - you <i>add</i> to
your life. Don't buy into this heresy.</span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">Marriage is all about being two good forgivers. And
that's hard work. Notice the acronym we made from the initial letters of these
key words?</span></b><b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">The Lord bless you each-and-both, and keep you in his
eternal love. Amen.</span></b><b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">Rowland Croucher</span></b><b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><u>DISCUSS.</u></span></b><b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<i><b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">1. What is happiness? Why is it serendipitous?</span></b><b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></i></div>
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<i><b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">2. Why is 'acceptance-before-worth' so difficult?
Someone prayed 'Lord, thank you that you love us before we change, as we
change, after we change, and whether we change or not' - and it was an 'aha'
experience for many at the Prayer Service. Why would that be?</span></b><b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></i></div>
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<i><b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">3. Do you agree with Scott Peck's somewhat dismissive
idea about romance? What are the relative advantages of the Western
approach - falling in love then marrying - versus the traditional way: marrying
the person arranged by parents and tribe, then 'falling in love'? What are the
real differences between romantic love and realistic love? Share some ideas
about romantic things married couples can enjoy...</span></b><b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></i></div>
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<i><b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">4. Talk about 'leaving and cleaving'. How can young
marrieds be better prepared for the exclusive, life-long commitment which a
good marriage requires? How can we learn to 'leave' the habits and bad modelling
about a marriage relationship many of us received during our childhood? (For
example: he comes from a family where mother rules, father is weak.
He therefore has serious trouble relating to the assertiveness of his
wife, and her expectations of him as a 'leader' in the marriage).</span></b><b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></i></div>
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<i><b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">5. Are males and females different - in the way they
think, solve problems etc.? As the title of a book by Allan and Barbara Peace
puts it: Why won't men listen and why can't women read maps?</span></b><b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></i></div>
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<i><b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">6. About half the Christian writers of
books-about-marriage say there should be no secrets at all between married
partners. The other half believe that occasionally something might more
appropriately be kept from the other for various reasons... What do you
think?</span></b><b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></i></div>
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<i><b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">7. Try this generalization: 'Males often seek
significance through their work, as they try to out-perform their peers. Women
mostly seek security rather than significance - and primarily through
relationships, and mothering. Then the mid-life crisis, when the situation is
often reversed. He comes to the point of asking "Is that all there
is?" and wants a relationship with his mate. But she has now made a
life of her own and seeks significance in other contexts.'</span></b><b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></i></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><i>8. Why do men need the gift of respect so badly? And
why are women so fearful of being 'used'? How can 'the dance of marriage'
resolve these needs?</i></span></b><b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">P.S. Did you find the acronym?<br />
<br />
* Now (2014) 54 years of very happy marriage!</span></b><b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">Rowland Croucher, </span></b><b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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<b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">Revised June 2014.</span></b><b><span style="font-size: 14.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></b></div>
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</h3>
Rowland Croucherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13473460918145751334noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-154247300844604323.post-12208525102385002102014-08-09T10:55:00.002-07:002014-08-13T16:24:44.025-07:00ABC'S CONTENTS<br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>(This is one option for chapter-headings. Another is the earlier CONTENTS list - see earlier post on this Blog).</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>(What's missing? Any suggestions for 'K'?)</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>CONTENTS</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
<b>FOREWORD</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
<b>INTRODUCTION</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
<b>1. AUTHORITY & CERTAINTY: WHO SAYS?</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
<b>2. BIBLE</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
<b>3. CHRISTIANITY AND ITS RETAIL OUTLETS (CHURCHES)</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
<b>4. DEATH & DYING</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
<b>5. ECOLOGY, ENVIRONMENT, EARTH</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
<b>6. FAMILY: CHOOSING YOUR PARENTS WELL</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
<b>7. GOD IS LOVE, GOOD & EVIL</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
<b>8. HAPPINESS VS. JOY</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
<b>9. ISLAM , INDIGENOUS/ABORIGINAL PEOPLES</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
<b>10. JESUS</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
<b>11. K????</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
<b>12. LEADERSHIP & EMPOWERMENT; LGBTI QUESTIONS & RESPONSES</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
<b>13. MARRIAGE & ROMANCE; MASTURBATION</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
<b>14. 'NOW' HAS GREAT POWER</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
<b>15. OTHERS: ‘WINNING FRIENDS AND INFLUENCING PEOPLE’</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
<b>16. POVERTY & JUSTICE; POLITICS & POWER; PARADIGM SHIFTS</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
<b>17. QUADRILATERAL (WESLEYAN)</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
<b>18. RELIGIONS</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
<b>19. SPIRITUALITY; SINS & MISDEMEANOURS</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
<b>20. TRUST / FAITH; TIME</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
<b>21. UNFINISHED BUSINESS: EMOTIONAL WELL-BEING MEANS DEALING WITH YOUR PAIN</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
<b>22. VOCATION: ON THE PLANET FOR A PURPOSE</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
<b>23. WOMEN & MEN; WAR & PEACE; WHAT WOULD JESUS DO? </b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
<b>24. X MARKS THE SPOT: THE CROSS OF CHRIST AS THE CENTRE OF HISTORY</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
<b>25. YOU: YES YOU, ARE AN UNREPEATABLE MIRACLE OF GOD’S CREATION</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
<b>26. ZERO-HOUR: ETERNITY, HEAVEN & HELL</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
<b>CHECK-LISTS</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
<b>APPENDIX</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
<b>ENDNOTES</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
<b>INDEX</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
<b>DISCUSSION QUESTIONS</b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b><br /></b>
<b>FURTHER READING</b>Rowland Croucherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13473460918145751334noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-154247300844604323.post-71747174733211850222014-05-11T02:55:00.003-07:002014-08-07T16:45:46.921-07:00INDIGENOUS/ABORIGINAL PEOPLES<i><span style="font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif;"><b>Q: What are aboriginal people asking us to do? </b></span></i><br />
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<div class="MsoNormal">
A few years ago I spent five
days on Flinders Island in the Bass Strait – an island of wild and rugged beauty. (Certainly wild: 65 known shipwrecks lie around these islands)<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We were there on a
‘pilgrimage of listening’ – twelve of us – to worship, pray, listen to aboriginal
people, think in silence, and to repent…<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I shared in some new
experiences, like eating muttonbird, seeing the milky way in all its glory, and
writing a poem. We concluded, Taize-style, kneeling
around a cross formed with candles in the shape of the Southern Cross…<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Were you taught Tasmanian aborigines died out with Truganini in 1876?<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The Anglican priest
appointed by his bishop to minister to aboriginals on Flinders Island told me
there are 7000 Tasmanian people who call themselves ‘aboriginal’…<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So what happened? </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<ul style="margin-top: 0in;" type="disc">
<li class="MsoNormal">Worldwide colonialism began in the 1500s.</li>
<li class="MsoNormal">Since then the world’s 300 million
indigenous and tribal peoples have suffered terribly from European
conquest of their ancestral lands, through diseases and alcoholism and
particularly through the loss of dignity, identity and self-respect.When the ‘first fleet’ arrived in 1788
there were an estimated 750,000 Aboriginals in Australia (7000 in
Tasmania). In 1920 that number had fallen to 60,000. In 1971 Aboriginals
were included in the national census for the first time.</li>
<li class="MsoNormal">For our purposes, here’s what you need to
know about what happened to the Tasmanian aboriginal people (I’ve culled
some of the following from Henry Reynolds’ new book <i>Fate of a Free People:
A Radical Re-examination of the Tasmanian Wars</i> Penguin, 1995).</li>
<li class="MsoNormal">British settlement began in Van Dieman’s
Land in 1803-4. Massacres began 3 May
1804 at Risdon when the 102 Regiment of the British Army shot dead 50 Oyster
Bay people, including women and children. The Tasmanians had approached without
spears and with green boughs in their hands, as a sign of peace. The commanding
officer said afterwards he didn’t think the Aborigines would be any use to the
British. </li>
<li class="MsoNormal">‘The Black War’ lasted seven years – 1824
to 1831. Atrocities were committed by both sides, but although black men
were castrated and black women raped, there wasn’t any record of rape
committed by Aboriginals against any white woman.<o:p></o:p></li>
<li class="MsoNormal">Governor George Arthur mobilized all
available settlers and convicts to form the infamous ‘black line’, with
2200 men moving across the island over a six-week period, to try in a
pincer movement to herd the remaining Aboriginals to the south east. They
captured an old man and a child.<o:p></o:p></li>
<li class="MsoNormal">By 1831, 175 Europeans had been killed,
200 wounded, 347 houses plundered or burnt. At least 700 Aboriginals were
killed in the war. Meanwhile the European population grew from 5000 in
1820 to 24,000 in 1830.<o:p></o:p></li>
<li class="MsoNormal">Many (most?) of the Europeans believed
Aboriginals were an inferior race; some that they were the missing link
between monkeys and humans; some that they were ‘savages’ who ought to be
exterminated…<o:p></o:p></li>
<li class="MsoNormal">In 1830, a builder and Methodist lay
preacher, George Augustus Robinson went on a ‘Friendly Mission’ to
negotiate a settlement. The Aboriginal remnant agreed to vacate Tasmania,
and moved to Flinders Island (1833-1847). There Robinson tried to make the
Aboriginals into Black Englishpeople, built East-London type terrace
cottages for them, and taught them a catechism (with graphic questions and
answers about heaven and hell). Eg. ‘What will God do to the world by and
by?’ Burn it. What sort of place is heaven? A fine place. What sort of
place is hell? A place of torment. But the exile was a disaster: over 200
Aboriginals died, and the 47 survivors were relocated back to Oyster Cove,
on mainland Tasmania. </li>
<li class="MsoNormal">Reynolds’ book centres around a petition
presented to Queen Victoria signed by eight Aboriginal men who described
themselves as a ‘free people’ who voluntarily gave up their country to the
Governor (and complained that though they’d kept their side of the deal,
the whites hadn’t)<o:p></o:p></li>
<li class="MsoNormal">In 1870 the last full-blood male
Aboriginal Tasmanian (William Lane) died; in 1876 Truganini, the last
full-blood female died.<o:p></o:p></li>
<li class="MsoNormal">But nine Aboriginal women had been
abducted by sealers, and two married sealers voluntarily, and their
descendents form the present Tasmanian Aboriginal population.<o:p></o:p></li>
<li class="MsoNormal">Flinders Island Hotel had a separate bar
for Aboriginals until the 1950s. They told us of a Chocolate Waltz won by
group of Aboriginal young people, and the MC had to be forced to give them
the prize!<o:p></o:p></li>
<li class="MsoNormal">At Wybelenna (which means ‘Black Man’s
Houses’) a few years ago, some aboriginal people put markers on the
aboriginal graves. They lasted two days: someone dug them all up and
destroyed them one night, but the white graves were left undisturbed…<o:p></o:p></li>
<li class="MsoNormal">The UN proclaimed the years 1990 to 2000
as the International Decade for the Eradication of Colonialism.<o:p></o:p></li>
<li class="MsoNormal">There has been remarkable progress since
1945 (then since 1989 in Eastern Europe) It’s one of history’s success
stories.<o:p></o:p></li>
<li class="MsoNormal">In the 1980s over 100 Aboriginal people
died in the custody of the Australian police and prison systems. Finally,
in 1987 the Australian Government formed a ‘Royal Commission into
Aboriginal Deaths in Custody’. Four years and $30 million later it
released a damning report. One of our retreatants
is a prison chaplain. He said, ‘Aboriginal people need each other. When they
are isolated in an institution – any institution – they die…’ </li>
<li class="MsoNormal">In the Mabo case (1992), the High Court of
Australia exploded the myth of ‘terra nullius’ (land belonging to no-one).<o:p></o:p></li>
<li class="MsoNormal">We have been talking recently about a
treaty between white and Aboriginal Australians. Mr Galarrwury Yunupingu
from Arnhem Land has said: ‘What we want from a treaty is the creation of
a just and mature society which black and white Australians can enjoy
together. A treaty which recognizes our rights and our status will provide
the basis for building a society in which people live in mutual respect.
To those people who say they support the concept of ‘One Australia’ I can
only say that I agree. There should be one Australia and we should be part
of it. But our part should be on our terms.’ </li>
<li class="MsoNormal">Realize, with Margaret Mead: ‘Never doubt
that a small group of thoughtful committed citizens can change the world,
indeed it’s the only thing that ever has’<o:p></o:p></li>
<li class="MsoNormal">And realize, sure, that we can’t turn back
the clock. But, whatever our political views (left-wing, right-wing, or
wingless) we can agree with Prime Minister Paul Keating when he launched
the International Year for the Indigenous 10 December 1992: ‘[We must]
recognize that the problem starts with us non-Aboriginal Australians. It
begins, I think, with that act of recognition. Recognition that it was we
who did the dispossessing. We took the traditional lands and smashed the
traditional way of life. We brought the diseases. The alcohol. We
committed the murders. We took the children from their mothers. As a
nation, we face the challenge of the consequences of dispossession,
conquest, brutal treatment and equally inhuman neglect of Aboriginal and
Torres Strait Islander people – the first Australians.’<o:p></o:p></li>
<li class="MsoNormal">Following two invitations in the 1980s to
speak to national Aboriginal Christian conferences, I wrote to 40
Aboriginal Christian leaders, asking them this question: 'If you had the opportunity, what would you like to say to Australian - especially Christian - leaders? Their views on
land rights varied across the political spectrum from very radical to
quite conservative but they were unanimous about one thing: ‘Please, we
would like white Australians to listen to our pain’<o:p></o:p></li>
<li class="MsoNormal">Then we can agree (and is this too big an
‘ask’?) that aboriginal people ought to be consulted about their present
and future. (‘White Australians have done so much to/against/for us but
forgot to ask us ‘Is it OK?’) </li>
</ul>
<br />
<ul style="margin-top: 0in;" type="disc">
</ul>
<div>
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~<br />
<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="text-align: center;">Australia is the most multi-cultural country in the world. One in three Australians were born overseas or their parents were born overseas</span></blockquote>
</div>
<div>
<span style="text-align: center;"><br /></span></div>
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Rowland Croucherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13473460918145751334noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-154247300844604323.post-48021218713753953902014-05-09T23:31:00.000-07:002014-08-09T11:12:46.061-07:00GOOD AND EVIL<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;">
<b>Every culture contains good and bad elements. </b><b>Every language has different concepts about what is right and wrong. </b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;">
<b><br /></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;">
<b>Consider: </b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><i>Cruelty and wrong are not the greatest forces in the world.
There is nothing eternal in them. Only love is eternal. </i><i>~~ Elizabeth Elliot</i></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><br /></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><b>The line separating good and evil passes not through states,
nor between classes nor between parties either - but right through the human
heart. ~~ Alexandr Solzhenitzyn<o:p></o:p></b></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><br /></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><i>I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will
have the final word in reality. This is why right, temporarily defeated, is
stronger than evil triumphant. </i><i>~~ Martin Luther King Jr</i></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><b><br /></b></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><i>There is no good and evil, there is only power and those too
weak to seek it. </i><i>~~J. K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s
Stone<o:p></o:p></i></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><b><br /></b></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><i>The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is that good people do nothing</i> ~~ <i>Edmund Burke</i></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><br /></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
~~<b><o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: .5in; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><b><span style="font-family: Wingdings;">è<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman';"> </span></span><!--[endif]--> Three of the best, most serene human beings
I've ever known were married - until death parted them - to very angry men. How
did those women get to be like that?<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: .5in; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><b><span style="font-family: Wingdings;">è<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman';"> </span></span><!--[endif]--> During the
last quarter-century Nelson Mandela was the world’s most admired human
being. How did he get to be like that? (Clue: 'Resentment is
like drinking poison and then hoping it will kill your enemies').</b><b> </b><b> </b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>~~<br />
</b></div>
<b><br />
One Monday morning a distressed and battered woman in her 30s came to see me.
She'd just been released - again - from hospital. </b><br />
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>'I
guess I can cope with being treated like this - even the broken bones,' she
said, 'but it's not fair for my two kids. They're becoming more and more
frightened...' <o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>'So
what do you want to do?' I asked. <o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>'I'm
leaving, but I have nowhere to go.' <o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>'Do
you want me to find a safe place?' <o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>One
phone call and it was arranged, to begin that night. The following week I heard
that her psychotic husband planned to come after me with a gun. Sometimes it's
not even safe being a pastor!<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>~~
<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><u>Born or made?</u><o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>Hitler,
Stalin, Pol Pot, pedophile priests… : were they born or made like that? (Stalin:
‘One death is a tragedy. A million deaths is a statistic’). <o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>What
drives the sniper/s in Syria to shoot women in the pelvic area one day, and the
left breast the next and the right breast the day after, according to a British
medical volunteer? (Today I read of
Egyptian snipers who aim at strangers’ eyes). <o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>I
grew up during the Second World War, when our world was mostly divided into
‘Allies’ and ‘Others’. We boys played ‘Aussies and Japs’, ‘goodies and baddies’,
‘cops and robbers’… At our primary school there were bullies and ‘sissies’, and
once a year Santa Claus sorted out who was naughty and nice. In our little
church we were ‘good’ (= ‘saved’); others might be good too but because they
were not ‘of us’ their eternal destiny was decidedly suspect. But then, I
wondered, why were there sometimes very heated arguments in our little Christian
‘Assembly’ over some issues? Two of our elders had a stand-up row in everyone’s
hearing about whether we should play a radio ‘in church’ (one of them argued
that as Satan was ‘the prince of the power of the air’ radio-waves were
contaminated with evil)…<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><span style="font-family: Wingdings;">à</span> Which – if
any – of these boxes would you tick? :<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>All
are born good (Confucius) [ ] <o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>We
are all contaminated with ‘original sin’; so sin corrupts the entire human
nature (Augustine) [ ] <o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>['Augustine
taught that Adam's guilt as transmitted to his descendants much enfeebles,
though does not destroy, the freedom of their will, Protestant reformers Martin
Luther and <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Calvin" title="John Calvin">John Calvin</a> affirmed that Original Sin completely
destroyed liberty’ (see Wikipedia <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Total_depravity" title="Total depravity">total
depravity</a>). <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Augustine_of_Hippo">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Augustine_of_Hippo</a> ]<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>People
are able to choose not to sin (Pelagius) [
]<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>Whoever
is without sin may cast the first stone (Jesus,
John 8:7). All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God (Paul, Romans
3:23) [ ]<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>‘In
spite of everything, I still believe that people are really good at heart’ (Anne
Frank, German-born diarist and Holocaust victim) [ ]<i>
</i><o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>‘The
sad truth is that most evil is done by people who never make up their minds to
be good or evil’ (Hannah Arendt, German-Jewish political philosopher) [ ]<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>‘The
line between good and evil is permeable and almost anyone can be induced to
cross it when pressured by situational forces’ (Philip Zimbardo). [ ]<i><o:p></o:p></i></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>World War II criminal Adolph Eichmann said he
was simply following instructions when he ordered the deaths of millions of
Jews. Yale University psychologist Stanley Milgram asked himself how common
that attitude might be? He devised a classic experiment where 40 participants were
asked/ordered to progressively increase electric shocks from 15 to 450 volts to
an unseen (but vocal) victim. How many went all the way? A sample of students
guessed '3%.' The actual number? 26 of the 40! Only 14 stopped earlier. Other
research on obedience has corroborated these results. Scary! [ <a href="http://psychology.about.com/od/historyofpsychology/a/milgram.htm">http://psychology.about.com/od/historyofpsychology/a/milgram.htm</a> ]<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .25in;">
<b>And God…?<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .25in;">
<b><i><span style="font-family: Wingdings;">à</span></i><i> Are you happy with any of these?<o:p></o:p></i></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .25in;">
<b>’God did not create evil. Just as
darkness is the absence of light, evil is the absence of God’ (Albert
Einstein) [ ]<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .25in;">
<b>The forces of light and darkness are
pitted against each other in a permanent stand-off, with humanity as the
battlefield (Manicheanism) [ ]<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .25in;">
<b>‘Zoroastrianism is about the
opposition of good and evil. For the triumph of good, we have to make a choice.
We can enlist on the side of good by prospering, making money and using our
wealth to help others’ (Rohinton Mistry)
[ ]<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>‘When
asked why, God being good, there was evil in the world, Sri Ramakrishna said,
"To thicken the plot.”’ (Unknown)
[ ]<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .25in;">
<u><b>What is good? What is evil?<o:p></o:p></b></u></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .25in;">
<b>Here's a Buddhist contribution:
'Goodness... moves us in the direction of harmonious coexistence, empathy and
solidarity with others. The nature of evil, on the other hand, is to divide:
people from people, humanity from the rest of nature...<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .25in;">
<b>Remaining silent in the face of
injustice is the same as supporting it.<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .25in;">
<b>[Buddhist Inspiration for daily
living ( http://www.ikedaquotes.org/good-evil )]<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .25in;">
<b>And a Jewish insight: 'A thimbleful
of light will therefore banish a roomful of darkness... Evil is not a
thing or force, but merely the absence or concealment of good. One need not
"defeat" the evil in the world; one need only bring to light its
inherent goodness.
[http://www.chabad.org/therebbe/article_cdo/aid/60857/jewish/Good-and-Evil.htm]<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .25in;">
<b>That may not always be easy. C S
Lewis in <i>The Problem of Pain</i> warns us: ’If God is wiser… his judgment
must differ from ours on many things, and not least on good and evil. What
seems to us good may therefore not be good in his eyes, and what seems to us
evil may not be evil’. <o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .25in;">
<b>And history teaches us that evil
lurks both in humanity’s dark corners and also its high places. (Wasn’t it Edgar
in Shakespeare’s <i>King Lear</i> who said ‘The
devil is a quite a gentleman’?). <o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .25in;">
<u><b>From theory to practice: what can I
do?<o:p></o:p></b></u></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .25in;">
<b>Altruism – a selfless concern for
the well-being of others - may be both culturally specific and a learned
approach to life. Charles Darwin suggested that we're all born with basic needs
and instincts to survive, but as social beings, we learn that by aiding others
we benefit ourselves. <o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .25in;">
<b>Random acts of kindness…<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .25in;">
<b>If someone needs your help, why not?
If something needs cleaning up, why not you? And re our words, remember the
famous Sai Baba quote: ‘Is it true? Is it kind? Is it necessary’?
And does it improve the silence?' <o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .25in;">
<b>A caveat: not every person or
situation needs my intervention to fix things. Thoreau warned, ‘If you see
someone coming towards you with the obvious intent of doing you good, run for
your life!’ (Elsewhere, cheekily: ‘As for Doing-good...I have tried it fairly,
and, strange as it may seem, am satisfied that it does not agree with my
constitution’). As one of the wisest pastors I knew used to say: ‘The best
thing you can do for some people is leave them alone.’ <o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .25in;">
<b>Here are four principles I’ve found
helpful:<u><o:p></o:p></u></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .25in;">
<u><b>1. You can do something (rather than
nothing).<o:p></o:p></b></u></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>It
is better to light a candle than to curse the darkness. </b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .25in;">
<b>The world is not dangerous because
of those who do harm, but because of those who look at it without doing
anything. ~~ <i>Albert Einstein</i><o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>‘We
shall have to repent in this generation not so much for the evil deeds of the
wicked people but for the appalling silence of the good people…’ ’Injustice
anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. To ignore evil is to become an
accomplice to it.’ ~~M L King.<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>All
that is necessary for evil to triumph is for good [people] to do nothing. </b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>In Germany they came first for the Communists, and I didn't
speak up because I wasn't a Communist. Then they came for the Jews, and I
didn't speak up because I wasn't a Jew. Then they came for the trade unionists,
and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a trade unionist. Then they came for the
Catholics, and I didn't speak up because I was a Protestant. Then they came for
me, and by that time no one was left to speak up. <i>~~ Martin Niemoeller</i><o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><u><br /></u></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><u>2. The Power of One</u>: You, yes you,
can make a difference. (Faith)<u><o:p></o:p></u></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>History
– and legend – is replete with stories about sometimes ordinary individuals who
were overwhelmed with a desire to rectify a wrong, and, against all odds,
defeated evil. (Sangster – did all England wake up? Wilberforce etc. See
articles Power of One). <o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .25in;">
<u><b>3. I’m not on my own: ‘I can do all
things, through Christ, who strengthens me’.<o:p></o:p></b></u></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .25in;">
<b>All things? Yes, even fail. There
are two things you can say about all the biblical leaders: they all seemed to
be failures, and they spent a lot of time alone in deserts. <o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .25in;">
<b>Jesus struggled with good and evil
for forty days in the desert; he confronted the sometimes subtle evils of
religious legalism as well as the more overt evils of ‘the powers’. <o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .25in;">
<b>‘Meditation – morning and evening –
is the best antidote known to humanity to keep us awake, clear-minded about the
illusions that lure us and the fears that control us. And to keep us attuned to
the beauty and freshness of reality as each day invites us to be more awake,
more real.’ (Laurence Freeman OSB’s weekly reading which arrived in my email
inbox today. <a href="http://www.wcom.org/">www.wcom.org</a>. )<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><u>4. So ‘Do Good’: It’s a
Good Choice…</u></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>By doing
good we become good ~~ Jean-Jacques
Rousseau<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>Do not be
overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good… We then that are strong ought to
bear the infirmities of the weak, and not to please ourselves. ~~ St. Paul<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>Do
all the good you can, <o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>By
all the means you can, <o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>In
all the ways you can, <o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>In
all the places you can, <o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>At
all the times you can, <o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>To
all the people you can, <o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>As
long as you ever can. </b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>~~John Wesley<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .25in;">
<b>Watch your thoughts, for they become
words. Watch your words, for they become actions. Watch your actions, for they
become habits. Watch your habits, for they become character. Watch your
character, for it becomes your destiny. </b><br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>~~ Unknown <o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .25in;">
<b><u>And Never Forget…</u><u><o:p></o:p></u></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>‘In
each of us, two natures are at war – the good and the evil. All our lives the
fight goes on between them, and one of them must conquer. But in our own hands
lies the power to choose – what we want most to be we are.’ ~~ Robert Louis
Stevenson<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>You’ve
heard this widely-quoted wisdom by a Native American elder: ‘Inside of me there
are two dogs. One of the dogs is mean and evil. The other dog is good. The mean
dog fights the good dog all the time.’ When asked which dog wins, he replied, ‘The
one I feed the most.’ <o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>Finally,
a daily prayer to help you conquer evil and be committed to goodness:<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; mso-outline-level: 2;">
<u><span style="line-height: 150%;"><b>John Stott's Morning Trinitarian
Prayer<o:p></o:p></b></span></u></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; mso-outline-level: 2;">
<u><span style="line-height: 150%;"><b><br /></b></span></u></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<i><span style="line-height: 150%;"><b>Good morning heavenly Father,</b></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="line-height: normal;"><b><i><span style="line-height: 24px;">Good morning Lord Jesus,</span></i><br /><i><span style="line-height: 24px;">Good morning Holy Spirit.</span></i><br /><i><span style="line-height: 24px;">Lord Jesus, I worship you, Saviour and Lord of the world.</span></i><br /><i><span style="line-height: 24px;">Holy Spirit, I worship you, sanctifier of the people of God.</span></i></b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<i><span style="line-height: 150%;"><b>Heavenly Father, I worship you as the creator and sustainer of the
universe.</b></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<i><span style="line-height: 150%;"><b>Glory to the Father, and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit.<o:p></o:p></b></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<i><span style="line-height: 150%;"><b>Heavenly Father, I pray that I may live this day in your presence and
please you more and more.<o:p></o:p></b></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<i><span style="line-height: 150%;"><b>Lord Jesus, I pray that this day I may take up my cross and follow you.<o:p></o:p></b></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<b><i><span style="line-height: 150%;">Holy Spirit, I pray that this day you will fill me with yourself and
cause your fruit to ripen in my life: </span></i><i>love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.</i></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<i><span style="line-height: 150%;"><b>Holy, blessed and glorious Trinity, three persons in one God, have mercy
upon me. Amen.<o:p></o:p></b></span></i></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<b style="line-height: 150%;"><i><span style="line-height: 150%;"><br /></span></i></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<b style="line-height: 150%;"><i><span style="line-height: 150%;">- </span></i><span style="line-height: 150%;">John Stott. There are variations of this prayer in books by and about
John Stott. This version is from <i>Basic Christian: The Inside Story of John
Stott</i>.</span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><br />
<!--[if !supportLineBreakNewLine]-->
<!--[endif]--><o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>~~</b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><br /></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><br /></b></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
Rowland Croucherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13473460918145751334noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-154247300844604323.post-6784837191036816122014-05-09T19:56:00.000-07:002014-08-09T11:16:02.082-07:00CONTENTS<div class="MsoNormal">
<u>QUESTIONS & RESPONSES: the ABC's of a good life. <o:p></o:p></u></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<u><span style="font-size: 48.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">CONTENTS<o:p></o:p></span></u></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<i><u>Note</u>: this list is provisional. It may vary in terms of numbers of chapters, titles etc. See http://questionsresponses.blogspot.com.au/2014/08/abcs-contents-of-questions-and.html for another idea about arrangeing these topics - in alphabetical order). </i><br />
<br />
~~<br />
<br />
Here's the first-draft of a list of Contents which formed part of the contract I had with Mosaic Press (which is now defunct). </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<u><b><br /></b></u></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<u><b>PART 1: THE BIG PICTURE…<o:p></o:p></b></u></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><br /></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>1. GOOD & EVIL: Why
be good; why fight evil? And are we born or made to be good or evil (either
or both)?</b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>2. GOD & SATAN:
What we are we postmoderns supposed to do with all that medieval stuff? </b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>3. AUTHORITY &
CERTAINTY: The eternal question: ‘What is Truth?’ Four sources of truth:
reason, (a sacred book e.g. the Bible), tradition, experience. </b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>4. JESUS & CHRISTIANITY:
‘An ancient Near Eastern carpenter claims to be God - do people still
believe that?’</b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>5. RELIGIONS, CHURCHES & SECTS: ‘They can’t all/any of
them be right can they?’ </b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>6. PRAYER & MEDITATION. </b><b>SPIRITUAL DISCIPLINES: lectio divina, prayer, meditation, solitude, silence, stillness: finding peace in the desert - every day </b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<u><b>PART 2: ME, MYSELF & MINE – OH, AND OTHERS… <o:p></o:p></b></u></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>7. LOVE & JUSTICE: ‘Why do we mistreat so many people –
defenceless children, religious and racial/ethnic minorities, the handicapped, sweat-shop
workers… the list goes on..’</b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>8. PRIDE & POWER: ‘Why do too many humans want to be
#1?’</b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>9. SEX, ROMANCE & MARRIAGE: ‘It can all be very nice or
very horrible… Why?’</b><br />
<b>ROMANCE/'FALLING IN LOVE': 'A genetic trick to hook us into marriage'? </b><b>SEXUAL ABUSE</b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>10. WOMEN & MEN: In many countries/subjects women are
doing better academically, but earn 5% less than men – where’s the
sense/justice in that? </b><b>Vive la difference? Mars/Venus and other theories... </b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>11. HOMOSEXUALITY & GENDER ISSUES: If blacks/gays/dwarfs/whoever had no choice… what are they asking of the rest of us? </b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>12. PARENTS & CHILDREN: How to enjoy your life - even if
you didn’t choose your parents well. </b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>13. ABORTION & EUTHANASIA etc. : Moral issues where good
(and bad) people differ.</b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<u><b>PART 3: YOU’VE GOT ONE LIFE: MAKE THE MOST OF IT…<o:p></o:p></b></u></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>14. EMOTIONAL & INTELLECTUAL INTELLIGENCE: </b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>15. LEADERS & FOLLOWERS:</b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>16. HAPPINESS & JOY: ‘No, they’re not the same, but why
am I mostly bereft of both of them?’</b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>17. BIRDS & FLOWERS: ‘How can I enjoy “all things bright
and beautiful” more? </b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>18. SUCCESS & FAILURE: </b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>19. STRESS & BURNOUT: </b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>20. WORK & PLAY:</b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><br /></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<u><b>PART 4: (MORE) VIRTUES, VICES & HUMAN ARRANGEMENTS <o:p></o:p></b></u></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><br /></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>WAR & PEACE:</b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>POVERTY & HUNGER: </b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>LAWS & POLITICS: Unfortunate necessities; mantras and
shibolleths </b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><br /></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><br /></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<u><b>PART 5: AND IN THE END…<o:p></o:p></b></u></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>APOCALYPSE CHECKLIST: Caring for the planet – for future
generations</b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>GROWING OLD: Towards
simplicity the <i>other </i>side of complexity.</b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>SICKNESS & HEALTH: If I reduced it to 10 ‘health
commandments’ what would my list look like?’</b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>DEATH & DYING: </b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>TIME & ETERNITY: Theories about nothingness,
reincarnation, heaven, & hell. </b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>31. YOUR CHECK-LIST FOR A VERY GOOD LIFE: What’s general and
universal; and what’s relative and personal. Including HEALTH checklist.<br /><br />~~~<br /><br />AND MAYBE THESE...</b><br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>FUNDAMENTALISM(S): source of most of the world's ideological-ethno-religious conflicts... Paradigm-shifts: 'You don't know you're wearing chains until you begin moving...'</b><b><o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>WHO AM I? And who gives me my grade/worth? Parents, mentors and heroes...</b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><br /></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>RELATIONSHIPS - LOVE/JUSTICE (Keys to all relationships). ‘Why do we mistreat so many people – defenceless children, religious and racial/ethnic minorities, the handicapped, sweat-shop workers… the list goes on…?’ </b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><br /></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<b><br />###################################################################</b><br />
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
</div>
Rowland Croucherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13473460918145751334noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-154247300844604323.post-17476632619747439382014-05-09T18:56:00.004-07:002014-08-07T16:40:29.086-07:00FOREWORD<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-AU"><br />
When someone makes an appointment to see me, a 'generalist' pastoral counselor,
what do we talk about? Short answer:
anything at all that's important for them.<br />
<br />
Within the first five minutes I invite my parishioner/client to 'give me a
headline or two'. And, then, mostly, we jump into the deep end. Some memorable
ones:<br />
<br />
# 'Rowland, I used to belong to a biker gang. Recently I've started going
to church and I heard about the need to 'confess your sins to one another'.
Well, I killed seven people during those wild years... And nobody else knows...
'<br />
<br />
# 'Pastor, I'm in my fifties now, and I've never had a close relationship with
a man. I'd love to have been a mother, but it's too late. I have a strong
sexual drive and my way of dealing with that is to pleasure myself. My pastor,
however, is a fundamentalist who reckons I'll go to hell for doing what I do.
I'm scared and often sleepless about it all. What do you think?'<br />
<br />
# To a 15/16-year-old: 'Jane, what do you want to do with your life?'
'Oh, that's easy: kill a couple of people.' 'Uh-huh... Anything else?' 'Yeah...
burn down the [social welfare organisation's] building: they should have been
protecting me...'<br />
<br />
# Undergrad student: 'We're doing philosophy, and recently studied the
so-called "proofs" for God's existence. My evangelical friend says
he's impressed by the "first cause" idea. I reckon there could have
been an infinite regression of causes...'<br />
<br />
Where do these conversations go from there? Read on. Here are my 40 -and-counting - 'big ones':
one for each day if you want to give yourself some quality-time
thinking about these issues and chasing up the footnotes... (This is the
first book I've written post-Google: love it!).<br />
<br />
At this point you may need to know just a little about me. General ideological
approach? 'Progressive Evangelical Christian'. Not theologically
'fundamentalist' or 'liberal' - I have strong issues with some of their
respective presuppositions. My Anglican friends say I'm 'broad church'. Father
Richard Rohr and popular Christian writer Brian McLaren are generally OK! Is
there truth in other religions? Of course, God's truth can be discovered in the
most unlikely places. Is it OK to doubt what authority-figures put into our
heads when we were impressionable? Again: of course. How much serious pastoral
counseling have I actually done? About 25,000 hours, starting when I was a Teachers' College Christian student leader in 1957, then within eleven full- and
part-time pastoral vocations, from 1964 until this week!<br />
<br />
Come and enjoy the ride my fellow-strugglers/learners...<br />
<br />
Rowland Croucher (<a href="mailto:rcroucher@gmail.com">rcroucher@gmail.com</a>)<br />
Melbourne, Australia<br />
May 2014</span></div>
Rowland Croucherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13473460918145751334noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-154247300844604323.post-85865721264973295272014-05-09T18:56:00.000-07:002014-08-07T16:36:57.189-07:00INTRODUCTION: More...<div class="MsoNormal">
<br />
Have you heard of the ‘Swan-song
phenomenon’? Psychologist Dean Keith Simonton of the University of California studied 1919 musical compositions written by 172 classical composers and compared how highly
the works were rated by musicologists with how close the creation of those
works came to the composers’ deaths. <br />
<br />
Main finding: compositions that were
written later in the artists’ lives – when, as Simonton wrote, ‘death
was raising a fist to knock on the door’ – tended to be briefer, with cleaner,
simpler melody lines, and yet scored high in aesthetic significance according
to the experts. (<i>Time</i>, ‘The Art of Living’, September 23, 2013, p. 42).</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I’m 77 this year, and it’s
about 20 years since my last book was published. This little contribution is my
best effort to say in a ‘cleaner, simpler’ fashion what I believe about the
most important questions facing humankind. Writers these days can put their
words together in a ‘cryptic teasing’ fashion: if the reader wants to know more
about something, they can simply check with everyone’s friend Google Search. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
As my Gmail
auto-signature says…<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Shalom! Salaam! Pax! eirene!<br />
Rowland Croucher<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
jmm.org.au<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<br />Rowland Croucherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13473460918145751334noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-154247300844604323.post-32080498483881855122013-09-12T03:39:00.001-07:002014-08-07T16:35:27.394-07:00Introduction<div class="MsoNormal">
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-AU"><b><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></b></span>
<span lang="EN-AU"><b><span style="font-family: inherit;">On 13 July 2013, a news
story ‘went viral’ around the world. </span></b></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<b><i><span style="font-family: inherit;">Joao Maria de Souza,
45, had been in bed with his wife Leni when a cow fell through the ceiling of
their home in Caratinga, southeast Brazil.</span></i></b><o:p><b><i><span style="font-family: inherit;"> </span></i></b></o:p></blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<b><i><span style="font-family: inherit;">The animal is believed
to have escaped from a nearby farm and climbed onto the roof of the couple's
house, which backs onto a steep hill. The corrugated roof gave way and the
one-and-a-half-ton creature fell eight feet onto Mr de Souza's side of the bed…</span></i></b></blockquote>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><span style="font-family: inherit;">Events like this have always prompted serious questions. <i><o:p></o:p></i></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><span style="font-family: inherit;">(When I was a high
school English teacher back in the 1960s the first essay my classes wrote
had the title: ‘Shut your windows, lock your doors, and disaster will fall from
the sky’). <i><o:p></o:p></i></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><i><span style="font-family: inherit;">* Why does a meteor fall on some people and not others – and most of
them on no one at all? </span></i></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><i><span style="font-family: inherit;">* Is this simply ‘chance’ or ‘luck’? <br />* Are the powers ‘up
there’ – gods or whatever – playing nasty games with us? <o:p></o:p></span></i></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b><span style="font-family: inherit;">This book hopefully
provides some answers to these questions, mainly from a Judeo-Christian
perspective.<br /><br />Shalom!<br /><br />Rowland Croucher</span></b><br />
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<b><span style="font-family: inherit;"><u>NOTE</u>: THIS BLOG IS A POT-POURRI OF ARTICLES, NOTES, IDEAS - MANY STILL TO BE FULLY FORMED. I'M DRIBBLING SOME ARTICLES ON TO THE jmm.org.au WEBSITE FROM TIME TO TIME...</span></b></h2>
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<b><span style="font-family: inherit;"><u>DEADLINE FOR FINISHED MSS.</u>: was to have been OCTOBER 2014, but Mosaic Press (with whom I had a contract) has gone into liquidation, so there's less of a rush to do a paper- or e-book. will keep you all posted... </span></b></h2>
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Rowland Croucherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13473460918145751334noreply@blogger.com1