Welcome to the Fall 2007 issue of "insight"

In his new book Cause for Hope: Humanity at the Crossroads, Bill Phipps insists that it is time for us to recognize where we are as a species within creation. He writes, “Global society stands at a crossroads, one of those critical moments in the history of humankind.” Phipps takes great care in presenting the nature of the crisis we face together as a global human community. If you are even minimally tuned into the media, you will be familiar with many of the issues of concern he presents, from all areas of our global living.

By placing us at a crossroads, Phipps implicitly challenges us to face up to the nature of the choice we have to make, both personally and politically. He is under no illusion about what it means for us to stand there and face the truth of our predicament:

The crossroads we face is daunting indeed. Wendell Berry, American farmer, philosopher, and environmentalist, puts this challenge to us: “We have lived by the assumption that what was good for us was good for the world. We have been wrong. We must change our lives so that it will be possible to live by the contrary assumption that what is good for the world will be good for us.”

Like all prophets who are worth their salt and who live their light, Bill Phipps is not overwhelmed by the bad news he brings to those at the crossroads. He offers a bold and courageous mix of “telling it like it is” and “inspiring hope for the journey”:

These are exciting days because we can make choices. These are days of privilege, because we can rise to the challenge and declare our true beliefs; we can understand our deep spiritual yearnings, and connect the dots of what we say we believe to the dots of how we actually live. If we are open to the Spirit hovering over and within our lives, we can experience the current crossroads as a moment of grace, gently nudging us to a “great transformation.”

The other writers featured in this edition of CHRISTIAN BOOKS i n s i g h t all stand clearly with Bill Phipps at the crossroads, speaking their truth, facing into the real challenges, and articulating visions of a way ahead that, as Phipps says, “present us with opportunities to learn who we are in this great planetary enterprise, where we belong in the vast web of life that shares our Earthly home, and how we can express the very best in human nature.”

However, what most clearly connects those who offer their perspectives in this newsletter and most of you who are reading it is the conviction that we need to see our humanity in relation to a great and sacred mystery, which pervades all of life and in which all our living is immersed. Something more than our human nature and human ingenuity will determine the choices we make here at the crossroads. There is a Spirit hovering over and within our lives and we are here not only for good choices, but also for transformation.

I intend, with this newsletter, to provide a forum for Christ-centered exploration in a time of transformation. The voices you will hear speak from a powerful combination of sacred certainty and holy anticipation.

The first voice speaks powerfully and convincingly about adult theological re-education. Marcus J. Borg, Hundere Distinguished Professor of Religion and Culture at Oregon State University, coined this term to highlight and describe what he sees as a critical priority in all mainline denominations. How can we expect people to be captivated by a biblical vision when they experience Christianity as unpersuasive and irrelevant? Wood Lake Publishing’s new series, Experience! Faith Formation for Adults, grows out of Borg’s call to create small group settings in which persuasive theological education can take place. But more on that later. First, listen to Borg’s own very persuasive perspective:

Marcus J. Borg: Why Adult Theological Re-education Is So Critical

Adult theological re-education within local congregations is one of the most important Christian tasks today. The primary reason is that a common understanding of Christianity a generation or two ago has become unpersuasive to millions of people in North America, both within the church and among those who have left the church or who have never been part of it.

A second reason is that the most visible form of Christianity today, dominating Christian television, radio and most mega-churches, strongly and stridently affirms this earlier understanding. The most public face of Christianity makes it unattractive to many. A third reason: congregations that have embarked on a program of adult Christian re-education often report that people from outside the congregation take part in it. Some who are not ready to attend worship, or who hear Christian language in a conventional way that makes little sense to them, are eager to be part of an educational group in which free inquiry and discussion are valued.

But the third reason should not eclipse the primary reason. Many Christians, almost certainly a majority, need theological re-education. Most of us over 50, and many under 50, grew up with a form of Christianity that worked reasonably well for our parents, grandparents, and more distant ancestors. It stressed believing in the central claims of Christianity for the sake of post-death salvation. Of course, it also concerned life before death. It spoke about the importance of living in accord with Christian teachings about behaviour – ideally, but not always, the central Christian virtues of love, compassion, and doing justice.

But its emphasis was on believing now for the sake of heaven later. And it commonly saw Christianity as the only way to heaven – a belief not too difficult in a world in which everybody one knew was Christian. Times have changed.

Christian theological re-education needs to be about the big topics: God, Jesus, the Bible, faith, and practice. Common understandings of all of these have become problematic for many thoughtful Christians.

• God. Most of us learned to think that the word “God” refers to a supernatural, person-like being “out there” who from time to time intervenes in the spectacular events reported in the Bible, and in response to prayers for help. But this understanding of God has become problematic for millions.
  
• Jesus. Most of us also learned that Christians believe that Jesus was the unique Son of God, born of a virgin, endowed with powers and knowledge not possible for a “mere” human being; that his primary purpose was to die for the sins of the world, and that God required this sacrifice in order for forgiveness to be possible. But, for millions, this package understanding of Jesus has become incredible. Is that who Jesus was? And is God really like that? Does God require blood sacrifice?
  
• The Bible. Many have great difficulty with a literal interpretation of the Bible as God’s inerrant and infallible revelation. But relatively few are aware of a compelling alternative that takes the Bible seriously without taking it literally.
  
• Faith. For many, faith means believing in spite of uncertainty or skepticism. But this is not the pre-modern understanding of Christian faith. Until a few centuries ago, it meant centring in God as known in Jesus, and was marked primarily by deepening trust and loyalty, not by “belief.”
  
• Practice. Because much of Western Christianity for the last few centuries has emphasized “believing,” many people are unaware that Christianity is a “way” with practice at its centre. We need to recover the treasures of traditional Christian practices, including education about prayer as practice, and the value of a daily discipline.

Importantly, theological re-education does not require theological “experts” in local congregations. Rather, study groups can use books and video courses. The Internet is also a resource, especially Beliefnet and Explorefaith websites. Study groups do not require leaders with professional theological training, but leaders adept at facilitating discussion. If a book is being used, the group should read it together, a chapter or section per session.

Among video courses, the one that I hear the most positive comments about is “Living the Questions.” Among books, I especially recommend the following, listed alphabetically by author:

Diana Butler Bass: Christianity for the Rest of Us. An exciting account of mainline congregations that are thriving, highlighting their features and practices.

Roberta Bondi: Memories of God. Encourages us to get in touch with our memories of growing up in the church and moving beyond to a mature faith.

Marcus Borg: I take the liberty of recommending some of my own books, as Christian adult re-education is their purpose. From shorter to longer, I suggest Meeting Jesus Again for the First Time, The God We Never Knew, The Heart of Christianity, Experiencing the Heart of Christianity, Reading the Bible Again for the First Time, and Experiencing the Bible Again for the First Time.

John Dominic Crossan: Who Was Jesus? The most accessible of his books. Also recommended is The Last Week, co-authored by Crossan and me.

Brian McLaren: A Generous Orthodoxy. A superb introduction to Christianity by today’s most visible evangelical advocate of “emergent Christianity.”

Huston Smith: Why Religion Matters. Also a superb introduction, this time to the thought and passion of today’s best-known religious scholar.

Michael Schwartzentruber, ed.: The Emerging Christian Way. A collection of essays featuring major figures and themes of emerging Christianity.

Barbara Brown Taylor: The Luminous Web. A short and wonderfully readable account of the relationship between Christianity and science.

Jim Wallis: God’s Politics. The subtitle states its thesis: Why the Right Gets It Wrong and the Left Doesn’t Get It.

Walter Wink: Jesus and Non-Violence. Brief, exciting and challenging, it treats Jesus’ affirmation of non-violent resistance and compelling examples of where it has worked.

Announcing the series: Experience! Faith Formation for Adults

Created in response to Marcus Borg’s call for “adult theological re-education,” a transformative curriculum for adults from Wood Lake Publishing, founded on experiences that will affirm a spirit-centre from which to live.

• Experiencing Jesus based on Marcus Borg’s Jesus: Uncovering the Life, Teachings and Relevance of a Religious Revolutionary, available January 2008
  
  
• Experiencing An Ecological Christianity based on Darwin, Divinity and the Dance of the Cosmos by Bruce Sanguin, available August 2008
  
  
• Experiencing God based on God and Empire: Jesus Against Rome, Then and Now by John Dominic Crossan,
  available December 2008
  

Experiencing God and Empire

In this edition of CHRISTIAN BOOKS i n s i g h t I want to introduce an author and scholar whose latest book will be the source text in the series Experience! Faith Formation for Adults, at the end of 2008. This essay from that book, God and Empire: Jesus Against Rome, Then and Now, introduces elements of John Dominic Crossan’s work appreciated by many Christians, both scholars and laypeople alike.

John Dominic Crossan, professor emeritus at De Paul University in Chicago, is widely regarded as the foremost historical Jesus scholar of our time. He is the author of several bestselling books, including The Historical Jesus and Jesus: A Revolutionary Biography.

In his latest book, God and Empire: Jesus Against Rome, Then and Now, Crossan presents the moral and ethical call at the heart of the Bible to fight unjust superpowers, whether they be Babylon, Rome, or perhaps even America. Through the revolutionary messages of Jesus and Paul, John Dominic Crossan reveals what the Bible has to say about land and economy, violence and retribution, justice and peace, and ultimately, redemption. He examines the meaning of the “kingdom of God” prophesized by Jesus, and the equality recommended by Paul to his churches. Crossan contrasts these messages of peace with the misinterpreted apocalyptic vision from the book of Revelation, which has been co-opted by modern right-wing theologians and televangelists to justify the United State’s military actions in the Middle East.

Find out more about John Dominic Crossan online at www.johndcrossan.com, but first read about the significance he sees in the ruins of a wooden boat that was revealed by the receding waters of the Sea of Galilee.

John Dominic Crossan: Thinking about a Boat*

“Try to love the questions themselves,” Rainer Maria Rilke advised a young poet at the start of the last century. Here, then, are some questions to love.

At the start of our co-authored 2001 book Excavating Jesus: Beneath the Stones, Behind the Texts, Jonathan Reed and I asked these two questions in the Prologue: “Why did Jesus happen when he happened? Why then? Why there? Sharpen the question a little. Why did two popular movements, the Baptism movement of John and the Kingdom movement of Jesus happen in territories ruled by Herod Antipas in the 20s of that first common-era century? Why not at another time? Why not in another place?”

I now add another and more specific question: Why is Jesus so often found around the Sea of Galilee, the Lake of Tiberias, the harp-shaped Lake Kinneret? In the concluding paragraph of his magnificent 1906 book, The Quest of the Historical Jesus, Albert Schweitzer said of Jesus that, “He comes to us as one unknown, without a name, as of old, by the lakeside, he came to those men who did not know who he was.” It is almost discourteous to interrupt that soaring peroration and ask: what was Jesus doing “of old, by the lakeside”? Why precisely there? Why precisely then?

Since Nazareth was Jesus’ native village and he was always called “Jesus of Nazareth,” why this relocation in Matthew 4:13: “He left Nazareth and made his home in Capernaum by the sea,” that is, by the inland Sea or Lake of Galilee? He moved not just from a very tiny village to a somewhat larger one, but he moved from a hillside village to a lakeside one.

Or again: Jesus’ two most famous disciples closely connected with lakeside fishing villages. First, Mary. She is of Magdala, the most important town on the lake before Herod Antipas built Tiberias around 19 C.E. That town’s Hebrew name comes from migdal, a tower, presumably a lighthouse. Its Greek name, Tarichaeae, means salted fish. Next, Peter. He came from a fishing village, Bethsaida, and so did Philip and Andrew, according to John 1:14. Peter seems to have moved to his wife’s house in Capernaum, that is, from one fishing village to another, because it is his mother-in-law who ministers to Jesus at that house in Mark 1:31.

Furthermore, the first and most important members of the Twelve, those brothers Peter and Andrew as well as the brothers, James and John, the sons of Zebedee, are all called by Jesus to join him as he “passed along the Sea of Galilee” in Mark 1:16. All four are called from their boats and their nets by Jesus’ command to “Follow me and I will make you fish for people.” For Mark’s gospel, in summary, Jesus in Galilee is seldom far from lake and boat and net and fish. Why?

To answer those questions for yourself, I ask you to think about one image, one pathetically broken artifact from that time and place, a first-century boat from the Lake of Tiberias in the time of Antipas the tetrarch, John the Baptizer, and Jesus the Christ.

In the summer of 1985, a severe drought had lowered the water level in the Sea of Galilee and exposed beach all along its shoreline. In late January of 1986, two brothers, Moshe and Yuval Lufan of Kibbutz Ginosar on the lake’s north-west corner, discovered a large boat sunk in the mud opposite Migdal or Magdala just south of their home.

In his 1995 book The Sea of Galilee Boat: An Extraordinary 2000 Year Old Discovery, Shelley Wachsmann records in fascinating detail the painstaking restoration work of Orna Cohen from the Conservation Laboratory of the Hebrew University’s Institute of Archaeology. The boat’s timbers were the consistency of wet cardboard or soft cheese and it is no wonder that Wachsmann called it “the excavation from hell” (p. 59). It took a decade of restoration work until the boat could be put on public display at Kibbutz Ginnosar in the Yigal Allon Museum, named to honor the Israeli soldier-statesman who had once lived at the kibbutz.

The original boat was about 27 feet long by about 7½ feet wide, had mast and sail, had two large oars on either side, and a large double-oared rudder in the stern. It is certainly the type of workhorse-boat imagined in those stories about Jesus and the Twelve on the lake. Wachsmann gives it this date: “the boat lived her life from about 100 BC to AD 67. At present I do not believe that it is possible to be more accurate than that” (p. 349). I cite it here not as proof or even argument for what was happening on the lake at the time of Jesus but I use it as a symbol or emblem of the difficulties raised by Herod Antipas’ commercialization of the lake at the time of Jesus’ public life.

First, the boat’s construction involved cannibalization from older boats. Next, its keel was half of quite adequate—but reused—cedar wood and half of rather inadequate jujube wood. Furthermore, its planking had been replaced not with new ones but with bits and pieces patched together. “The craft contained a total of at least seven different types of timber,” wrote Wachsmann. “Whoever built this boat had indeed scraped the bottom of the barrel for timber… (p. 252). Why? “The Galilee at this time was economically depressed…[and] the timbers used in the boat’s construction are perhaps a physical expression of this overall economic situation” (p. 358). Finally, one day it was no longer seaworthy. Its mast, sail, oars, stempost and sternpost were removed for further use in other boats. And every single iron nail was removed from the wood for future use. It was then pushed out from the Magdala boatyard and sunk in a graveyard for boats no longer suitable even for cannibalization.

The boat is a sad emblem of what the life of peasant fishers was like as Antipas promoted the imperial program of Romanization by urbanization for commercialization on the Lake of Tiberias. It is a symbolic answer to the three opening questions above. Jesus spent his time on and beside the lake because it was precisely and specifically by the shores of the Sea of Galilee that the radical distributive justice of Israel’s God confronted the unjust imperial domination of Rome as promoted by Herod Antipas in the 20s of the first century C.E. All politics is local; all incarnation is very local.

*24. This article is adapted from God & Empire. Jesus against Rome Then and Now. San Francisco, CA: HarperSanFrancisco, 2007.

Enough of Scenic Christianity!

I spend a couple of days each month in Victoria, British Columbia, where I facilitate small groups and lead a program in lay leadership formation. One of the ongoing groups is called “Salt and Light” – an opportunity to develop and deepen spiritual practice as the foundation of Christian discipleship. When the group resumed in mid-September after the summer break, I was delighted by the arrival of seven new members, four of them in their 30s and a couple more in their 40s. Suddenly, a group that had been decidedly “boomer and beyond” received an injection of generation-X energy. It felt like a spiritual seismic shift. I could best summarize the nature of that shift in a line spoken by one of the newcomers to the sessions: “I’ve had enough of scenic Christianity.”

Quite apart from expressing where some of the younger members of the group were coming from, that phrase echoed a growing feeling I’ve encountered in many parts of the church over the last few years. Many lay people I meet are tired of living the trappings of Christianity without ever getting to the heart of it all. They acknowledge again and again how brilliant we are in mainline Christianity at distracting and diverting ourselves from what we are really called to be about. They despair at the absence of “the real,” and of the likelihood of ever recovering what they know Jesus would have asked them to be about.

I knew I wanted to hear more of this energy from the all new “Salt and Light” group, so I asked two of the new Gen-X members to say more for this newsletter. Here’s the more…

I was baptized as a 16-year-old who had chosen to return to church when no one else in my family did. I didn’t know if God had a specific plan for my life, but I did know that being baptized and claiming my identity as Christian should be really important. It should mean that life would never be the same.
Suddenly it feels like the bar has been raised quite a few notches in the “Salt and Light” group! In October, when we return to talk about the difference that prayer has made for us in the intervening month and what it has been like to live a practice of “Bearing Witness,” I know that our circle of conversation will be less scenic than it might have been without the arrival of new friends seeking risk and sacrifice of the kind Jesus seems to have had in mind.

As a young adult, I fell into a pattern of running from faith, then returning to it. Part of me still strenuously objects to having demands placed upon me; paradoxically, I also feel a deep need to be challenged. I want my life to matter, for my choices to matter. And not just to me, or even to God, but to a community of believers. I want to know that I will be held accountable for my decisions. I want to stop feeling like an imposter, someone who appears to be walking in God’s way, but who is failing miserably, albeit privately. I want to be held up to a higher standard, to do something hard, and to know that the struggle is not mine alone, but the struggle of everyone who has felt compelled to follow Jesus.

It has been 20 years since my baptism and I’m back where I started. I’m either going to be fully invested in this Christian enterprise, or I’m giving it up for good. I am not interested in a Christianity that asks nothing, demands nothing, changes nothing. I am not interested in simply being “affirmed” and then left to my own devices. What I seek now is a community, big or small, of people ready to make sacrifices for their faith. Or as it says in that great book – to risk losing our lives for Christ’s sake, and the sake of the gospel, that we may find that life abundant that God promises.

Anonymous

When I sigh with frustration that “I am tired of scenic Christianity,” I mean that I am tired of watching, hearing, and studying theology, church history, church structure, and admirable role models. I am grateful for the foundation, and could not proceed without it, but I believe Jesus calls us to walk his path, not just look at it. I would like to find in church a community of support to live as a Christian. Support to me does not mean funding or a cheering section – support means people to walk the path with. The path I see from the life of Jesus has its internal components, but it also has its external components. Jesus stuck out – his followers lived differently. In fact, they astonished and sometimes offended those around them.

Right now, when I feel the joy and fire of the path I am on, I also feel piercing loneliness. Who walks beside me in trying to keep the Sabbath, opening my home to strangers in need (foster care), and declaring the source of my joy? Mostly Mormons and fundamentalist Christians. Who do I see willing to radically alter their lives to exercise just stewardship of God’s creation? Mostly secular environmentalists and Wiccans. Who has astonished me by truly sharing what they have equally with a neighbour in need? The poor, the addicted, and the disabled – people who would stick out like sore thumbs in church.

I need to see other Christians struggle and overcome the challenges I may face. I want guidance about what I need to let go of in order to better do God’s work. I do not want a pat on the back; I want inspiration and challenge. I hope to find this from friends in the United Church. I’m afraid that it may be too much to ask.

Anonymous

Tim Scorer: Staying Connected to the Biblical Vision

What’s been going on in your life that makes a difference to your ability to maintain an alternative biblical vision in the face of the dominant values of the culture in which you live and move and have your being?

When I stopped to consider my own responses to that question, I felt grateful that I was able to identify eight things that genuinely support and nourish my desire to live critically and wisely within the powerful culture that is so much a part of my life. I offer eight responses, within the framework of eight key questions, in the hope that they will be a catalyst for your own reflection.

1. Where do you meet and talk with people of other faiths and belief systems?
   In August, I was the Christian on a leadership team that included Amir Hussain, a Muslim scholar from Los Angeles; and Hillel Goelman, a rabbi and university teacher from Vancouver. Our task, along with 24 others in the group, was to meet Abraham, Sarah, Hagar, Isaac, and Ishmael, to learn together about where our shared narrative ancestry connected us and also how it made us distinctive. Together, we three leaders insisted that emphasis be placed on the shared story rather than on religious practice. We learned about our religious identities too, but spent most of our time letting the stories lead us into a deeper awareness of shared origins, and into a profound respect for the uniqueness of each journey that led from that narrative starting point.
   
   I’m keen to go back there to see what other wisdom I might glean from that place of shared biblical story. That opportunity may come again next summer at Naramata Centre. Check out their summer programs when they are listed in January: www.naramatacentre.net.
   
   
2. Where do you go to experience the seminal energy of vibrant intergenerational Christian community?
   
   Every year on the long holiday weekend in August, about 25,000 people come from all over the UK to one of the largest horse race tracks in Europe, at Cheltenham in the west of England. There they participate in Greenbelt, a festival organized by an independent Christian charity working to express love, creativity, and justice in the arts and contemporary culture in the light of the Christian gospel. I can’t possibly do justice to the scope, colour, and energy of the event, which is a four-day festival of live performance, alternative worship, creative arts activities, spoken presentation (talks), music of every kind, film, multi-media, and much, much more. To get a quick sense of the feel of it all, go to the Greenbelt website where you will find hundreds of photos taken at this year’s festival: www.flickr.com/photos/greenbelt/
   
   I should say that I’m not naturally drawn to events of this magnitude and I wasn’t sure how it would be for my second visit. I can honestly say that it was even better than my first visit. Partly, I had figured out the whole massive thing and knew how to manage the immensity of opportunity and experience. Finding places of spiritual reflection like Soul Space helped to balance the extraverted activity of the overall event. This year we took along a friend who came away totally inspired and determined to take a group of young adults from Canada next year.
   
   
3. What books or authors are you currently reading that are a support and inspiration to you as you stand at choice points in your own life and in the future of the human community?
   
   One of the speakers at Greenbelt this year was the Irish poet, mystic, writer, and scholar, John O’Donohue. It was ten years ago now that his book of Celtic wisdom, Anam Cara, came to popular attention. I have to admit that I didn’t then give it the time and attention it deserved and it’s only subsequently through listening to O’Donohue on radio programs that I have begun to truly appreciate the significance of his spiritual leadership in the world today. At Greenbelt, although I missed O’Donohue’s main presentation, I attended the public interview session the day after. It was the highlight of the whole festival! He speaks like he writes, with a depth of holy wisdom and grounded humanity that is both inspiring and accessible.
   
   In addition to responding to the interviewer’s questions, he read three of his poems from his year 2000 collection, Conamara Blues. As I sat in the theatre where the interview was being conducted, I could literally hear people’s breath being taken away as they experienced the emotional and intellectual engagement of his poetry. I’m now reading his 1998 book, Eternal Echoes: Exploring Our Hunger to Belong, and imagining its six chapters as six sessions for a Lenten program I will create next year, which will provide small group reflection for people who are not within a faith community. For more on John O’Donohue, go to his website at www.jodonohue.com/.
   
   
4. How is story and narrative gaining more presence and prominence in your life?
   
   Our culture is in a time of powerful rediscovery of the role of story in our lives and communities. There are many manifestations of that re-orientation to the storied nature of human life. The most helpful resource I’ve discovered is a book by Seattle author, Christina Baldwin. Storycatcher: Making Sense of Our Lives through the Power and Practice of Story, is both inspiring and practical in its uncovering of how story makes meaning in the human journey within the larger story of creation.
   
   I’m also participating in an on-line conversation with people who are committed to creating a new story-based lectionary of bible passages for use in mainline denominations across North America. By lectionary, I mean that three-year cycle of bible passages, four for each Sunday, which many denominations have agreed to use as the chosen passages for worship and congregational life. The most common critique of the current Revised Common Lectionary is that it does not honour the fullness of the great biblical stories that are foundational to our faith journey as Christians. The new story-based lectionary, which will begin to be available later this fall, will shift the selection of passages toward the inclusion of those meta-narratives of the faith that have served as God-guides for countless generations of Christians, and which may do so again.
   
   
5. What adventures of learning are you intentionally taking?
   
   The small group movement has swept across all Christian denominations in the last three decades with the result that there is now a significant level of awareness and leadership expertise in relation to learning in small groups. Small groups are no longer just opportunities for vaguely directed discussion. Under the skillful guidance of experienced facilitators, participants in small group learning processes are discovering what such things as “learning through experience” and “facilitated conversation” are all about.
   
   The national Continuing Education enterprise of the United Church of Canada has initiated something called Facilitated Learning Circles, small groups of ministry personnel across the country who are coming together to participate in ministry-focused learning processes under the guidance of experienced and paid group facilitators. As they meet together and as the facilitators share their experiences in a national network of facilitators, a significant body of knowledge about contemporary ministry is forming.
   
   As I begin to facilitate two of these learning circles, I feel excited at the prospects of the kind of peer learning that can come through tapping into the wisdom, experience, and commitment of people who are engaged in all kinds of congregationally-based ministry. You can learn more about this initiative at www.united-church.ca/adultlearning/coned/learningcircles.
   
   
6. Where are you hearing voices of challenge to you as a person of faith?
   
   Like me you’ve probably been aware of the sudden appearance of recent books by intelligent atheists who are issuing a persuasive challenge against organized religion. Just to mention three of the most prominent: The God Delusion, by Richard Dawkins; god is not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything, by Christopher Hitchins; and The End of Faith: Religion, Terror and the Future of Reason, by Sam Harris. I am thoroughly impressed by the articulate intelligence of these three writers, even though I fundamentally disagree with the end point of their brilliant presentations. It’s so refreshing to hear challenges thrown in my path by people whose gifts and insights I profoundly respect.
   
   As much as the atheists themselves, I’ve been really appreciating the clear and balanced presentations that I’ve read and heard from other people of faith in response to the challenge of atheists. It leads me to fantasize about creating a small group study in which we would take selections from writings by atheists and challenge ourselves to respond to their perspective. Imagine doing that in an interfaith setting! That’s what I would call a genuine faith workout!
   
   
7. Where have you recently encountered profound beauty? What did you do there?
   
   We had two days in London in August before making our way to the Greenbelt Festival in Cheltenham. What do you do when you only have two days to explore such a fabulous city? By chance one of our sons had found his way to the National Portrait Gallery the day before and encouraged us to join him for a second visit. So after we had spent time with Salvador Dali at Tate Modern, we made our way to the Leicester Square underground station and then to the Portrait Gallery just off Trafalgar Square. I’d never been there before and was totally unprepared for the impact that the work of portrait painters would have on me. I could have spent the whole day meeting the people of the paintings and the artists who had brought their living to stunning life on canvas and board. I have rarely been so moved by the beauty of human creativity.
   
   We were fortunate to be at the gallery for the display of finalists in the annual BP Portrait Awards. You too can visit the show, although you cannot on line have the experience of standing with other awe-struck viewers before the intimacy of brush stroke and framed work. Nevertheless, I think you will be moved when you go to www.npg.org.uk/live/bpmenu.asp and click into the works of those who won awards, as well as into all the portraits that were present in the show. What beauty!
   
   
8. Whose passionate commitment to the Way of Jesus has touched your life recently?
   
   It was back in the mid-1980s when I learned from Walter Wink about Ched Myers and his book about the gospel of Mark: Binding the Strong Man – A Political Reading of Mark’s Story of Jesus. Every once in a while since then, I’ve encountered the title or recalled Wink’s recommendation and thought that I should get a copy and see what was so persuasive to him. Then, lo and behold, at least 20 years later, Ched Myers was one of the presenters at the Greenbelt Festival. His presentation was all about restorative justice.
   
   He gave colour and reality to his talk by referencing four lives that are inspiring examples of restorative justice in action: Marietta Jaeger, whose capacity to face the kidnapper of her murdered 7-year-old daughter has led her to a personal campaign against capital punishment; Myrna Bethke, whose youngest brother was killed in the collapse of the World Trade Center and who is now giving restorative leadership through Families for a Peaceful Tomorrow; Lawrence Hart, a Cheyenne of the Cheyenne Peace Center who is working diligently to repatriate the 118,000 remains of indigenous people from museums around the United States (read about him in Searching for Sacred Ground: The Journey of Chief Lawrence Hart, Mennonite by Raylene Hinz-Penner); and Nelson Johnson, of The Greensboro Truth and Reconciliation Project who is pursuing restorative justice in Greensboro inspired by the motto of the South African Truth and Reconciliation Process: “Without truth no healing; without forgiveness no future.”
   
   Perhaps those four examples offer a glimpse of what Ched Myers and his wife Elaine Enns are presenting in their work and in their book Ambassadors of Reconciliation: Exploring a Theology and Diverse Practices of Restorative Justice. As I sat listening to Myers that August English summer afternoon, appreciating that I had finally got to meet him, I mostly felt gratitude for the clarity of his conviction, and for the graphic example of what it meant for him to follow Jesus’ call to “Follow me.”
   
   

Resources for Congregational Leaders - Cause for Hope: Humanity at the Crossroads, by Bill Phipps

This new publication from CopperHouse (Wood Lake Publishing) is compact enough to be a handbook. And that’s exactly what I think its potential is:

Opportunity and Outcome

• Think of this book as a handbook for congregational transformation.
• Find within its pages a wonderful blend of prophetic conviction, personal story, and strategies for revitalizing faith communities.
• A leadership group in a congregation – like a Board or a Church Council – could use this book over four or five sessions, as a resource to help it refocus its mission and leadership.
• A small group in a congregation would find this a rich resource for initiating discussion, for asking the deeper questions of the faith journey, and for shaping new expressions of lay ministry in the congregation and community.
• Any group in which people are saying, “We have lost the true sense of Christian vocation and are way too concerned about our own survival” could use this book as a resource to lift them into a new orbit of engagement for justice, faith-based action in their community, and a deep sense of connection between their faith and their concerns for their community and their world.
• Phipps ranges over such diverse issues and topics that he touches most of the matters of concern that might arise in any small group. He is highly personal, personable, and accessible: a man of the community, a prophet of his time.

Process

• Discussion questions offered at the end of each of the nine chapters could be used by individuals or by groups.
• A five-session program could be developed using the chapters in this way:
  Chapters 1–3: Facing up to where we are and to the old story we’ve been living.
  Chapters 4–5: Uncovering the new story and imagining it as an integrating vision for our future.
  Chapters 6: Speaking spiritually and theologically about the crossroads and hope .
  Chapters 7–8: Water, the arts, and the power of metaphor in our lives.
  Chapter 9: A matter of humility/program integration and closure.
• The book is short enough that you could have people read it ahead of time and meet together for a 3-hour session in which they would speak about the highlights of the book and then work together on identifying the implications for their own life together in community.
• In the course of his writing, Phipps makes suggestions about processes that could be used by groups. I especially noted the idea of having people list together characteristics of the Old Story, and the New Story. The whole text invites that kind of naming and listing of things that are important to people.
  

Resources for Congregational Leaders - Experiencing the Bible Again for the First Time by Tim Scorer, with Marcus Borg

This is the first in the series Experience! Faith Formation for Adults. When you purchase the resource you receive the following:

• The original sourcebook Reading the Bible Again for the First Time by Marcus Borg. A copy of Experiencing the Bible Again for the First Time, the 138-page leader’s guide, by Tim Scorer
• 12 copies of the Participant Handbook
• One DVD with 10 video segments by Marcus Borg – one for each of the sessions
• 10 poster-size art images, one for each of the sessions

As an introduction to this resource, we offer this segment from Session One, “Reading Lenses: Seeing the Bible Again”.

Please note that the sections in bold represent what the leader might say at this point in the program. This is offered for the guidance of leaders of all levels of experience, some of whom may appreciate exact wording to use in leading a group.

Open
Welcome to this community of exploration and learning. A place has been prepared here for you.

Since our concern is with the Bible, at the beginning of each session we will hear a passage of scripture and share in a responsive prayer.

Light the candle as this passage of scripture is read:

Luke 4:14–21
Jesus returned to Galilee powerful in the Spirit.
News that he was back spread through the countryside.
He taught in their meeting places to everyone’s acclaim and pleasure.

He came to Nazareth where he had been reared.
As he always did on the Sabbath, he went to the meeting place.
When he stood up to read, he was handed the scroll of the prophet Isaiah.
Unrolling the scroll, he found the place where it was written,

God’s Spirit is on me;
God has chosen me to preach the Message of good news to
the poor,
Sent me to announce pardon to prisoners and
recovery of sight to the blind,
To set the burdened and battered free,
to announce, “This is God’s year to act!”

Jesus rolled up the scroll, handed it back to the assistant, and sat down. Every eye in the place was on him, intent. Then he started in, “You’ve just heard Scripture make history. It came true just now in this place.” (From The Message by Eugene H. Peterson, 1995, Navpress Publishing Group.)

Litany

Your response to the litany that follows is: “God’s Spirit in our lives!”

One: We are here to unroll the scroll and know what is written for us today:
Many: God’s Spirit in our lives!
One: We come to hear words of passion, a holy disruption for our time:
Many: God’s Spirit in our lives!
One: Our eyes are on Jesus, who shows us the way to the Holy One:
Many: God’s Spirit in our lives!
One: May God’s truth meet us with words alive in the circle of community:
Many: God’s Spirit in our lives!
One: The candle is lit! May the flame of God’s vision burn in the spirited life of our community!

Connect
One of the key elements of this program is interactive conversation, sometimes in groups of three or four, but right now in pairs. You will have two quick conversations, of about three or four minutes each, with two different people, on topics I will give you.

Paired Conversation 1:
Please turn to the person next to you for your first conversation and talk together about this:

Something memorable I recall hearing or reading from the Bible…

Paired Conversation 2:
Now turn to the person on your other side and talk together about this:

A person who had an influence (of any kind) on my relationship with the Bible…

Small group conversation:
In a moment, we are going to move into small groups, but before we do that it’s important to acknowledge that there may be differences of opinion within your small group concerning the statements about the Bible that you are about to read. Later in the session we will look at some principles to govern the life of this community. One of them says this:

“Assuming that in this community of learners there is a diversity of people in terms of faith practice, biblical and theological knowledge, association with the Christian tradition, commitment to the way of Jesus, and relationship with God, we will practice disciplines of inclusiveness, non-judgment, and openness to learning from differences.”

As we move into small groups, is this a principle we are willing to live by during our discussion? (Wait for responses.) We’ll come to the other principles later in the session.

Now, for this third conversation, please form small groups of three or four, preferably with people with whom you have not just had a conversation. This will require you to stand and move to some other place in the circle. Please form those groups now and move your chairs so that you can clearly hear one another and not be distracted by the other conversations in the room.

For this conversation, turn in your workbook to the page entitled, “The Bible and Me.”

Take time to read the statements on this page aloud in your small group. When you have read them, go around the circle and have each person identify which statements are most true for them at this time in their lives. Then move onto a general discussion about your relationship with the Bible. You will have 20 minutes for this process.

The Bible and Me

Which statements come close to describing where you find yourself in relation to the Bible?

1. The Bible is the inerrant and infallible Word of God. It comes from God as no other book does. “God said it; I believe it; that settles it.”
   
2. Because I can’t take many parts of the Bible literally, my participation in the faith community has been affected and I’m not sure that I really belong in the church.
   
3. I’m staying in the church while seeking a way of seeing the Bible that moves beyond biblical literalism and makes persuasive and compelling sense. 
   
4.  I’m very excited to be part of a faith community at a time when a growing number of people are responding positively to a more historical and metaphorical reading of the Bible. 
   
5.  I’m not as clear as I would like to be in how I see the origin and authority of the Bible. 
   
6.  I often experience conflict within myself about the Bible, because I find myself with people who have opposing ways of seeing the Bible, but are unable to live graciously with the differences.
   
7. I have to take a stand when it comes to the use of the Bible in relation to issues such as “creation versus evolution” and the place of gays and lesbians within the faith community.
   
8. Once you start questioning the historical factuality of the gospels, then you begin to undermine the very foundations of Christianity.

After 20 minutes of small group conversation:

You’ll notice that you will begin a lot of conversations in this program, some that you might like more time to finish. It will be up to you to find ways of pursuing these conversations beyond the session time. Make the most of the opportunities begun here!

Come back to the circle now.

Once total group is together again:

Let’s take a moment now to hear about what attracted you to this program and what your hopes for it are. Tell me what you hope might come from this course and I’ll note what I hear on the newsprint sheet.

Record in point form what people say on the newsprint, recording responses only once, even though you might acknowledge a repeated response when it is offered more than once.

When it feels as though you have received all the responses, call an end to the listing and make any personal response you might feel is appropriate to the list of “hopes” you have received. There might, for example, be hopes expressed that you know will not be fulfilled in the course of this program. Better to be clear about that right from the start, so that people are not waiting for something that will never come.

Having heard some of the things that attracted you to the course and that you hope might come from it, I want to be clear with you about the purpose of the program and some of the principles by which we will order our time as a community of learners. Take a couple of minutes in silence to read this page before we go on…

To order your own copy of Experiencing the Bible Again for the First Time, just click on the link.

Coming next!

In our Advent/Christmas issue:

• Next in the Experiencing! Faith Formation for Adults series: Experiencing Jesus, an experiential study guide to accompany Marcus Borg’s book, Jesus: Uncovering the Life, Teachings and Relevance of a Religious Revolutionary.
• Introducing Carolyn Pogue’s world religions guide for young people: A World of Faith
• Christmas gifts that support sustainable and spiritual values for our time Introducing the latest in the Spirituality of series: Ralph Milton’s The Spirituality of Grandparenting
• The Advent Couple’s Journey – Year II
• The Christmas Rant: Faith with Attitude
• Opening a new window on the Birth of Jesus: an item of accessible scholarship by a leading biblical and theological teacher and writer of our time