A solution to our global ecological crisis from the Nag Hammadi Monastery in Egypt

The Gospel of Thomas found at that monastery speaks directly to our ecological crisis. It gives us the knowledge we will need as we face the challenges now confronting us.

Who among us would want a friend like Jeremiah? He was a determined truth-teller who had the nerve to stand at the entrance of the Temple and declare the fragility of what Judah considered inviolable. In the days of Hezekiah, the Assyrians who had eliminated the Kingdom of Israel failed in their siege of Jerusalem. After the reforms of Josiah, the sanctity of the Temple was considered even safer. Yet Jeremiah saw folly in an alliance of Josiah’s son with Egypt against Babylon and assumptions of Temple safety.

The 22nd chapter of Proverbs seems like a random list of statements that are right brain rather than left because they wander around a labyrinth rather than go straight to a clear point. Yet a message of compassion stands out that begins with how children are raised.

Imagine that you memorize a book of recipes.  You quote passages from the recipes, with breathless enthusiasm, to other people – whether they care to listen or not.  You follow each recipe to the letter.  You chop and mix and bake and cook according to the instructions.  You show off the finished product, proclaiming its absolute superiority to all others.

But you never bother to eat the food.

One of the most common arguments I hear against “social justice” is this:

Many Christians believe the Gospel calls us to get personally involved in doing charity. They argue that we shouldn’t work to improve economic and political systems because that would be outsourcing our Christian responsibilities to a third party, such as the government. For example, they would say Jesus calls us to personally feed the hungry (Matthew 25:31-46), not to pay taxes so that the government can do that for us.

Few Millennials or Centennials read books. Freshmen in my history classes prefer online assignments with video clips, diagrams, cartoons, and very short narratives. They like online textbooks with chapters that are short with links to interesting visuals. They read books only when they must. The Bible is something that hardly ever interests them at all. Having grown up a Protestant in the Old South’s Bible Belt, it’s hard to believe how knowledge of the Bible and Judeo-Christian history have declined since the mid-20th century.

There’s a definition of what it means to be a priest that has always daunted me. A priest it has been said is “a keeper of the mysteries; a keeper of the sacred mysteries of our faith. People often confuse the idea of mystery with the idea of secret. But I can assure you that as a keeper of the mysteries of the faith it is neither my job nor any other priest’s job to keep the mysteries of our faith a secret.

Want spiritual transformation, but turned off by dogmatic religion? Discover the original, mystical teachings of Jesus in the Gospel of Thomas, the most important book left out of the Bible.

Introducing Bishop Spong’s landmark series on the Origin of the Bible covering both Old and New Testaments.

His scholarly analysis and signature insights breakdown the past, present and future of these sacred texts.

  At Christmas we think of peace and talk about good will, but in the 2018 season we are focused on anger in our country. At a time of general prosperity, political processes in America and Europe …

My answer to this question is a complex one. On one hand, I believe there are tremendous riches in the Christian tradition. It’s a 4,000+ year theological lineage which contains endless metaphors, parables, and doctrines which have helped foster human evolution and have sparked some of the greatest social reform movements in history. That must be acknowledged and celebrated.

Reading over sermons I have preached about John the Baptist crying in the wilderness, I came across this “cry for the wilderness” that I preached six years ago. Sadly, the wilderness has an even greater need today for prophets who are willing to cry out on its behalf! I offer my plaintiff cry here to inspire my colleagues as they prepare to prepare the way on this coming Sunday.

Friend and frequent contributor to ProgressiveChristianity.org,  Rabbi Brian, has compiled conversations with 12 of his Biblically literate friends in a series of podcasts that both delight and educate.

Join Rabbi Brian as he talks to Reverend Jim Burklo, Dr. Tracy Hartman, Rev. Irene Monroe, Pastor John Pavlovitz and more as he seeks to find out what the bible is and how to use it to fight oppression.

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.

PATHWAYS Theological Education, Inc., is a Progressive Christian learning community seeking to empower transformative leadership for justice and peace within and beyond the church by engaging heart and mind to consider what it means to know, love and serve God in today’s changing world. 

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.

The anonymous gospel storyteller that we call Mark, provides us with the shortest of the four gospels — just 16 brief chapters. But don’t let that fool you. The writer of this account of the life and times of Jesus of Nazareth packs more action into his short gospel than any of the racy novels, spy thrillers, mystery novels or tell all biographies that you can find today on Amazon. Today’s reading occurs barely half way through our anonymous storyteller’s account of the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus and already Jesus has: been baptized in the river Jordan and been tempted in the wilderness by the evilest of villains, Satan himself.