PLAYbook for I Pray Anyway: Devotions for the Ambivalent is a creative, thought provoking guide/curriculum based on the book I PrayY Anyway: Devotions for the Ambivalent by Joyce Wilson-Sanford.

This suggested ‘southern hemisphere’ Lectionary (with a few Resources added) is being offered in parallel to, or even replacement of, the RCL which is in standard use by many. The idea behind it is it gives a choice on some days/Sundays of the year for the more ‘progressive’. But perhaps more than that, it is an attempt to be ‘landscape real’.

The Tao Te Ching was written 2,500 years ago, yet it speaks directly and powerfully to our contemporary lives. Why are our lives so difficult? How can we return to a place of harmony and balance? What is our true and essential nature? Who are we really? These are the kinds of questions the Tao Te Ching asks—and answers.

So your church website says you’re welcoming, a rainbow flag flies out front, worship uses gender-inclusive language, and you make sure you greet the stranger next to you on Sunday mornings. But is all of that really enough? And what if those welcoming gestures actually keep visitors from returning and exclude dozens of other groups or people in your community?

The stories of LGBT+ Christians are not untold, but have often been unheard by faith leaders and communities. While so much of the conversation about LGBT+ inclusion has focused on theology and ideology, few have actually interacted with the raw, real stories and experiences of LGBT+ Christians. In this volume, LGBT+ Christian activist and theologian Brandan Robertson has brought together stories of LGBT+ Christians from around the world combined with his theological insights to create a powerful book that will challenge, convict, and inspire readers from all theological backgrounds to examine their posture and message toward the LGBT+ community and embrace the revival that the Holy Spirit is igniting among queer Christians around the world.

Publications from “Progressive” Australian and New Zealand Authors

The struggle for distributive justice-compassion continues into the first quarter of the twenty-first century and beyond in what may become a post-democratic world order. Whether Jewish-Christian scriptures continue to be relevant to contemporary “spiritual not religious” folk may determine what becomes of “Christianity.” This second edition of The Year of Luke is a valuable, contemporary resource for progressive preaching, teaching, Bible study, and resistance, grounded in postmodern biblical scholarship of Karen Armstrong, the late Marcus J. Borg, John Dominic Crossan, and the Westar Institute’s Jesus Seminar, as well as the transforming work of Rev. Dr. Matthew Fox, whose theology of Creation Spirituality has reclaimed Catholic mysticism for postmodern cosmology.

Have you ever wanted to hang out with Mary and Joseph, or Jesus and the disciples? What would it have been like to be a fly on the wall, or hiding unnoticed in a corner as some of the most familiar and beloved scenes played out? In this intriguing collection of short stories (and one novella), John Mabry allows us to do just that. With vivid and often delightful prose, he brings these compact Gospel stories to expanded, breathing life. Teeming with conflict, emotion, and humor, these stories reveal the humanity behind the Bible’s characters like nothing you’ve read before.

College is a time to learn, explore, and grow, but what does faith have to do with it? In this collection of essays, gifted writers in their twenties and early thirties reflect on their college years by telling stories—some hilarious, some heart-wrenching—on the intersection of faith and college.

Hidden in His Own Story is an invitation to reconsider and re–imagine both the humanity and divinity of Jesus. It is an invitation to people who are not familiar with the Bible stories and have only heard them through other sources, also to many who have rejected traditional interpretations of the stories as religious dogma, and to many people who are so steeped in the stories that they have become cliché.

This enchanting Christmas story by beloved author and preacher Barbara Brown Taylor follows the three wise men on their world-changing journey to Bethlehem. In this beautiful retelling of their adventure, Taylor captures the power of one very special star and gives readers a new perspective on the three wise men and their encounters with King Herod, Mary, Joseph, and baby Jesus. Home by Another Way: A Christmas Story features breathtaking artwork from illustrator Melanie Cataldo and is perfect for gift-giving. Ideal for children ages 8-10.

These essays, drawn from around the world, reflect the many ways that women have reflected on and borne witness to the person, teaching, and praxis of Jesus Christ in light of their own varied contexts. These contexts include their struggles for life amidst wrenching poverty, racism, and violence; their experience of being female in male-dominated structures in the church and society; and their commitment to promote justice in view of the human dignity of women, all done in tandem with their faith relationship with the living God.

Rev. Dr. John R. Mabry can help. He has been a spiritual director for nearly twenty years, and is the director of the interfaith spiritual direction certificate program at the Chaplaincy Institute in Berkeley, California.

Starting Spiritual Direction is one of the first books on spiritual direction written for people who are receiving spiritual direction, rather than giving it. In a friendly, easy-to-read style, Dr. Mabry tells you everything you need to know to make your spiritual direction sessions a sacred and fruitful time.

Spong posits 12 theses to encourage a new reformation, a new re-formation of our spiritual lives. He begins with the theistic image of God, replacing the vision of God as a Supreme Being with God as Being itself. That first thesis challenges many fundamentals of creedal faith. Without a judgmental god to appease, there is no need of “God’s great rescue plan” for mankind, no need to limit our understanding of Jesus’ crucifixion as a sacrifice for the sins of all: “There can be no ‘substitutionary atonement’ in the Christianity of tomorrow.”

The Presidency is not merely an administrative office. That’s the least of it. It is more than an engineering job, efficient or inefficient. It is pre-eminently a place of moral leadership. All our great Presidents were leaders …

The Middle Way is the practical principle of avoiding both positive and negative absolutes, so as to develop provisional beliefs accessible to experience. Although inspired initially by the Buddha’s Middle Way, in Middle Way Philosophy Robert M. Ellis has developed it as a critical universalism: a way of separating the helpful from the unhelpful elements of any tradition.

Elfbert, Santa’s Reluctant Helper is a charming illustrated story told in rhyme about a devoted little elf who persuades Santa Claus to give children “qualities” for Christmas instead of toys with surprising and delightful results. The illustrations are rendered in an antique wood block style.

All good Christians know there are three aspects to the traditional belief in a Triune God—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. The one part of the Trinity I have paid little attention to is the Holy Spirit. Peter Gabel’s new book, The Desire for Mutual Recognition, makes that impossible. Although meeting the Holy Spirit is not the central focus of Gabel’s book, this manifestation of the Triune God jumps out at you with important implications for political theology.