It has been so hard to watch the events unfolding in Gaza and not fall into the ease of a hardline

So it was a great irony that some of the most homeful people in Palo Alto were the houseless.  And some of the most homeless people in Silicon Valley were the housed. 

Today, the NAACP has an LGBTQIA Committee Chairperson, Demar Roberts from S. C., who works to protect and advance the rights of the LGBTQ+ community.

Love is, of course, an answer. And while most people of faith can agree on the command to love our neighbors, we need to face the reality of this moment. What is happening among us — the transnational struggles with democracy and attacks on human rights — is far more than a failure to love our neighbors.

As International Women’s Day rolled around, that simmering sense of anger came to the surface. It flowed out, however, not in the murky waters of a pity pool, but in a torrent of stories of women all around the world and the challenges they face on a regular, often daily, basis. I set my own concerns aside and wrote for them, my own difficulties of little consequence in the face of what it is other women do every single day. In the light of their strength, our own can be renewed.

The Creation Spirituality Lineage Calling All Social and Environmental Activists, Mystic Explorers, Justice Makers, Cosmic Thinkers, Earth Keepers

It isn’t just Jesus’ birthday. The whole of creation is reborn.

Today there are Bethlehems all over the world as families are forced to leave home environments, travel to places unprepared for them, and find a way to survive on their own.

In this season of Advent, may we all be a little more perfected in love so that we may hear, perhaps for the first time, the message of Jesus and the angels, “Do not be afraid.”

What does a Modern Christianity look like to you? Will you help build it?

Jesus was out to reform society—to change the way humans treat one another during their earthly journey. 

I have lived long enough to see some patterns that I fear are being repeated.  I came of age in a time when my generation wanted to turn the world upside down – and for good reason.

Although we don’t often think about it, the Lord’s Prayer is a takedown of Roman economics and politics. Jesus teaches his followers to leave behind the whole system of indebtedness that obligates people to Caesar.

If Jesus were here, he would say it is all about economic justice. That is what so many of his teachings in the New Testament are all about. The prophets echo his plea.

So, if thoughts and prayers (of petition or intercession) cannot produce any salvific change when uttered to an imagined divine – who for anyone with eyes to see, or ears to hear is too deaf, indifferent or impotent to intercede — then with whom can we bargain, or utter any plea for help?

On June 12 was Boston Pop-Up Pride, to the surprise and joy of the throngs of revelers who gathered on Boston Common. When Boston Pride was dismantled last July, a coalition of LGBTQ+ community activists and groups stepped up and got busy.

Feedspot has published "The 20 Best Progressive Christian Blogs and Websites", curated from thousands of blogs on the web and ranked by traffic, social media followers, domain authority & freshness.

America is not a gun. We're a lot better than that. We prove it every day by loving our neighbors (even ones we don't particularly like), campaigning for sensible gun laws, taking care of people in need in our communities.

The notion that God sent Jesus from heaven to earth to save the lowly earthlings might be the theological root of colonialism and cultural supremacy.

Burklo’s book refocuses Christianity away from doctrine and belief to knowing God through mindful practice and the compassionate action that follows from an enlarged perspective.

We live in a world characterised as 'fragmented'. It isn't fragmented. It's diverse. If we ecologically pattern our thinking, we reframe it, and that applies to science and scientific thinking too.

If Jesus was right when he said, in his inaugural address (as found in Luke 4), that the Spirit of God’s agenda is to help the oppressed, the weak, the broken-hearted, those with (in Thurman’s words) their backs against the wall, then no wonder many people are struggling with their religious identity.

As I reflect on my journey with Jesus, My commitment to follow him has grown, but one particular teaching impressed upon me in my youth and perpetuated by the church ever since has restricted me.  I have come to the conviction that teaching that “the Bible is the Word of God and truthful in all its writings” has served as a roadblock to prevent the church from becoming the culture changing force which Jesus imagined.   

YOU ARE THE LIGHT! Experience Transformational Spirituality and Discover the Divine Within

If people can be helped to understand that the god they profess is not the God of Jesus, that no man is the messiah, and that God blesses all people, not just America, then perhaps WCN can be overcome. The church has a job to do, and that quite simply is to speak truth to perversion.

I have always believed the teachings of Jesus in the New Testament were quite clear. He calls for an inclusive society with a focus on nonviolent means for resolving conflict. He demonstrates a passionate concern for social and economic justice.

While it may look like there are individual trees in the above picture, quaking aspens grow in colonies of tens of thousands of trees, or stems, which are all connected by a single root system.

It’s not an exaggeration to say that the evangelical church saved me in every way a person can be saved. They introduced me to Jesus. They became the family my childhood family could not be. They loved and affirmed me. They educated me. They gave me a vocation. And they gave me exceptional opportunities of service. Although I left the evangelical church years ago for a more progressive expression of faith, I’ve always appreciated the gifts they gave me.

Jesus was best known for healing and exorcising. The crowds that came for medical help got more than they may have expected as they heard him speak about justice for everyone and love for neighbors and enemies. Spreading health and preaching compassion were at the heart of being the Prince of Peace.

Like Jesus, Paul was a radical egalitarian.  He was also, it turns out, a first century feminist.  In all the churches he helped found and nurture, he insisted on gender equality.