Science and Scripture are both valid informers concerning God, ourselves, and the world. Veracity and credibility, for the Christian faith, are hinged on these informers being in dialogue and a willingness to see what comes of it.
Monday, November 30, 2009
Thursday, November 26, 2009
The ZigZag Café
We will be convening here at the ZigZag café, Suisse, on Thursdays for conversation and dialogue. I invite you to stop by every Thursday for the question of the day. Your thoughts and participation are most welcome. Pull up a stool, avec un café, un thé, ou un chocolat chaud, et un croissant, and join in here on Thursday at the ZZ café.
For today:
If the reader of a text, let us say the biblical text, is a participator in and a producer of meaning, does this signify that we are left with an unlimited series of readings that are all valid?
Wednesday, November 25, 2009
Spiritual Rhythms of Life for Today
Literary genres in the biblical text are not merely formal structures or conventions, but function as theological directives concerning the complexity of the character of God. Theodiversity, in the biblical theodrama, opens horizons and dimensions of God that no single genre can contain. Scripture, as revealed through the communicative interaction of God in narrative, wisdom, poetry, hymn, prophecy, and apocalyptic attempts to portray in words that which is ultimately beyond capturing: God is the creator, redeemer, and mystery of the world.
Monday, November 23, 2009
Friday, November 20, 2009
Trusting and Suspicious Selves
I wonder if true selves have anything to do with true stories in both their telling and reading. Someone like Freud would have said there is no way of discerning between truth and fiction. For him, narrative is a move away from the real world - an assault on truth. Another way of saying this is that for Freud, all narrators are unreliable. The problematic, or at least so it seems to me, is one of trust and suspicion. At some point, we have to decide and keep deciding, who we trust and who we are suspicious of.
Thursday, November 19, 2009
The ZigZag Café
We will be convening here at the ZigZag café, Suisse, on Thursdays for conversation and dialogue. I invite you to stop by every Thursday for the question of the day. Your thoughts and participation are most welcome. Pull up a stool, avec un café, un thé, ou un chocolat chaud, et un croissant, and join in here on Thursday at the ZZ café.
For today:
Do you think our natural desires for acceptance, validation, and significance are obstacles for living spirituality and being true selves?
Wednesday, November 18, 2009
Spiritual Rhythms of Life for Today
The longing for validation and the fear of invalidation often creates a powerful dynamic that risks surpassing human norms. That is, these two emotions can be considered a part of being human and therefore appropriate, yet when they operate in such a way that they dominate our lives, then we have been deceived into being selfish and short circuiting our spirituality. Duped into false ways of relating to get what we want from the other does them violence and is ultimately unloving towards self and other. Oppressive and dominating power mechanisms such as these need to be confronted by a power that is greater than they, notably Christ and the agency of the Holy Spirit, which will lead to transformation and fresh ways of relating that re-connect to our spirituality.
Monday, November 16, 2009
Reflection for the Week
May God be with us as we seek to live by faith in the crucified and risen One.
Thursday, November 12, 2009
The ZigZag Café
We will be convening here at the ZigZag café, Suisse, on Thursdays for conversation and dialogue. I invite you to stop by every Thursday for the question of the day. Your thoughts and participation are most welcome. Pull up a stool, avec un café, un thé, ou un chocolat chaud, et un croissant, and join in here on Thursday at the ZZ café.
For today:
How do you understand Jesus’ perplexing saying in Mark 11:24?
“I tell you therefore whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours.”
Wednesday, November 11, 2009
Spiritual Rhythms of Life for Today
There are times when we have a sense of being lost in the desert, or groping in the wilderness. While we long for direction and release, God seems far away and disinterested. In spite of these circumstances we have to rely on God and his faithful promise to be with us, because whether we perceive his presence or not, he is there. Our faith in God cannot be rooted in perceptions, although they play a role, but rather it is to be deeply and holistically situated in God.
Monday, November 9, 2009
Reflections for the Week
Selfishly deceptive? Sometimes we assume that if we do what we want to do that God must be against it. God only approves of us doing things we don’t want to do. It goes like this: doing what we want to do is selfish. But this may be a deception. Why? God may not be at all opposed to what we want to do. We can all too easily deceive ourselves about being selfish, either when we are or when we are not.
Thursday, November 5, 2009
The ZigZag Café
We will be convening here at the ZigZag café, Suisse, on Thursdays for conversation and dialogue. I invite you to stop by every Thursday for the question of the day. Your thoughts and participation are most welcome. Pull up a stool, avec un café, un thé, ou un chocolat chaud, et un croissant, and join in here on Thursday at the ZZ café.
For today:
What are your thoughts about the viability of the “virtual church?”
Wednesday, November 4, 2009
Spiritual Rhythms of Life for Today
Finding our way along in this world is complex. True, God is faithful, as promised, to direct the lives of his children, but he leaves some important matters up to us. And that’s as it should be. Seems God wants us to achieve, to make good choices, and to grow in wisdom.
Monday, November 2, 2009
Reflection for the Week
Someone once said to me that because Christians are parts of a body this means that God has a specific plan for each one. I think the point is rather that Christians need each other and when some attempt to pridefully isolate themselves from their fellow believers they make a mess of things. Sectarian overtures in the Christian community, as in the Corinth of the Apostle Paul’s day, will inevitably produce a lack of love. Being part of a body is a symbol of unity and mutual interdependence, and the recognition of this reality should produce a more active love towards each other.
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