God is all without being any thing
while being the all in every thing.

God is the perhaps at the edge
of every moment of choosing.

In So You Think You’re Not Religious, James Adams sets himself a formidable task: asserting the value of Christian faith and practice to skeptics, and overcoming their very reasonable objections. It’s perhaps in his favor that he’s an extremely reasonable man, and that many of these objections were his own, at other times in his life. A powerful and practical introduction to the church for newcomers and old-timers alike. Topics include belief, the creed, sacraments, prayer, and belonging.

O God, the source of our being
and the goal of all our longing,
we believe and trust in you.
The whole earth is alive with your glory,
and all that has life is sustained by you.
We commit ourselves to cherish your world,
and to seek your face.

I am a child of the Universe. Everyone is a child of the Universe. We are all one, no matter what our race, colour or creed,. The wondrous evolving Universe has created dust, stars, galaxies, sun, earth and all creatures upon it. We are from the earth; self-conscious creatures; the Universe experiencing and reflecting upon itself. The Universe Story is our primary story.

The early Church appears to have been satisfied with the simple affirmation ‘Jesus is Lord’, discovering the Spirit in the power of resurrection. Perhaps our task as progressive Christians is to reinterpret these concepts for our present time. I suspect that this will have more to do with discipleship than with the worship of a divine Christ (Matt 7:21).

I grew up reciting the Apostle’s Creed in church. We read it aloud so often that I memorized it without conscious effort, but by my early teen years I began to doubt many of its assertions. Now …

I believe in (trust in, not just intellectually assent to) a Power, Force, Rational Principle at the core of the Universe that is the Source of all that is. I believe it has a personal quality (i.e. “father/mother”). This Power is so much greater than anything we can imagine that, for all practical purposes, it is beyond measure and without limit (“all” powerful…at least in comparison with us).

I believe in God as my creator and as the creator of the world which God sets before me as a gift for my joy and use, for me to tend in gratitude and affection. I believe …

As progressive Christians in the 21st century, we are uncomfortable with rigid statements of belief, as we recognise our understandings are shaped by life experiences within cultural and environmental contexts. Yet, there are some common understandings which continue to shape our lives, both individually and in community with others. These we seek to affirm and celebrate

There is only one God who is at all times everywhere in creation. Every man, woman and child is a child of God: we all belong to his family. We therefore say God loves us as a parent loves the offspring.

If creeds and statements of faith turn into prisons for an Infinite Mystery, is there a way to express our current beliefs that does not end dialogue and the ability to change as our information changes?

We believe in God, the creative force that sustains and nurtures humanity in ways beyond our understanding. We believe that Jesus of Nazareth embodied the power of this force; extraordinarily able to grasp its meaning, he revealed …

I believe in God, The Universal Personal Spirit of unsurpassable love, who from nothing created this immense universe of both causal regularity and chance events, and with its emerging creatures possessing various capacities and freedoms to respond to God’s love and vision for their place and function in the universe.

We believe in one God:
Creator, Redeemer, and Sustainer.
Amen

Poetic words that will linger beneath each small start that now rests within the nursery.

In acceptance I learn change

One of the problems of being a professional academic is that generally when you have to write articles they have to be heavy, well-researched pieces that connect with the on-going academic debate in one’s field. Well I don’t really want to do that here. In this short piece I want to try and dream a little, to set out some ways of how we might imagine religious faith that represent an alternative to credal forms of Christianity.

I must admit, however, that I am truly excited about recommending John Shelby Spong’s newest book, The Fourth Gospel: Tales of a Jewish Mystic. At times this book feels more like a detective novel than a scholarly work. Spong starts with his desire to figure out how the unusual book came to be, who was the author and why was it written. Like a who done it mystery, it is almost impossible not to be drawn into his investigation as he sorts through the clues.