Glocal Christianity

Gay Sex for Evangelicals

Homosexuality is not a topic I blog on often as (1) I see little value in using my voice to inflame debates which are already overheated and (2) homosexuality is not a topic which I consider myself particularly qualified to comment on in any case. 

My friend Nigel Chapman, however, has written an article that I feel makes a worthy contribution to the conversation. As church secretary for Surry Hills Baptist, a suburb where up to 30% of the population is homosexual, he has a wealth of experience in engaging with the gay community and Christians with same-sex orientation. It is with this in mind that I highly recommend you read his article, Gay Sex for Evangelicals - Why gay sex is biblically condemned, and how this understanding solves the Evangelical impasse over same-sex attraction. 

I'm not going to quote it, I'm not going to comment on it up front, I'm not even saying how much I agree with it or not, I'm just going to encourage you to read it in full, without any short cuts.

Skinning the fish before you've caught it

Yesterday I was having lunch with Melinda West, a Community Network Developer for the Mt Druitt Community Ministry, when she came out with a fascinating phrase, “Skinning the fish before you've caught it.”

“What do you mean by that?” I asked.

You see, we’d been talking about public Christianity and the problems it sometimes experiences in engaging with our pluralistic culture. I had a sense where she was coming from but just had to make sure.

“It’s when Christians try to force Christian behavioural standards onto people who haven’t experienced Christian conversion yet,” she said, or something to that effect.

“Legislating grace you mean?”

“Yeah”

Melinda then related the story of a prostitute who’d been drawn to a church and had gotten the message that she needed to tithe. So she did. But it was only belatedly that the pastor realised she was faithfully tithing from her prostitution money, which understandably triggered a rethink.

Sometimes the issue is not the real issue.

Which brings me to the current controversies about same sex marriage. I thinker there is a lot of “skinning” of uncaught fish going on here. Whilst I agree with conservatives, that it is very difficult, even impossible, to reconcile homosexual lifestyles with holy scripture, I do not see church defence of state legislation as a particularly biblical response. What we need to encourage more of is transforming relationships not legalistic lobbying.

Godless Gatherings: Lust for life drives UK atheists to church

Fascinating video. Don't you think? I hear folks like this are being dubbed as "New, New Atheists". I find myself asking, "How can this expand our understanding of the religious impulse?", "What exactly is emerging here?", and "How might this co-option of church style prompt further evolution in Christianity and our understanding of Christian community distinctiveness, particularly in contemporary and post-contemporary evangelical quarters". What a world we live in eh? Western Buddhists, Eastern Christians, post-institutional Evangelicals and now church-planting Atheists. What can I say? It looks paradoxical at first glance, but does that just mean we need to expand our imagination?

Do You Believe in Jesus?

"Do You Believe in Jesus?" by JW-Jeong

I was taken by this critique in particular:

"What this piece speaks to me is the sickening state that modern western christian culture is in; where sermons intend to do no more than to satiate and encourage the self-obsessed consumerist worldview we’ve had spoon fed to us from our earliest years of cognizance. This culture is a religious one in every sense of the term: the very ideology that assumes that the sporadic participation in vain traditions merits a sense of piety which one can use to both patronize others and blind his or herself to personal imperfections and struggles."

Siddhartha and Jesus

"Siddhartha and Jesus" by DonMak.

I was reading an article recently on the difference between informed imagination and uninformed imagination. 

Whatever the artisitic merits, I can't see how this image is in any way informed by apostolic memory.

Burning Down The House

"Jesus Lazors" by Melyon

I had to laugh at this.

I hate pews.

Idolatry of Self

"Idolatry of Self" by Miss Jess.

If self is the centre of our world, what an ephemeral world we live in.

Is this what Jesus would do?

"Is this what Jesus would do?" by Patches67

On the eve of ANZAC Day, as we honour dead Australians, let us nevertheless remember the difference between laying someone life down for others, and someone laying down the life of others.

Imagination as an act of worship

Last night stimulated some further reflections on the place of imagination within Christianity, and on how we can recover it where it has been forgotten, neglected or exiled. 

In the process I came across these words from Leland Ryken, in an article entitled, The Imagination as a Means of Grace. Ryken says:

"In our Christian circles we find a place for the arts as an aid to worship, but not often as an act of worship. Yet 91 out of 107 references to music in the Psalms specify God as the audience of music (Topp 13). The principle that emerges from this is significant for the arts: anything offered to God can become an act of worship. This means that our artistic experiences, whether as creators or participants, can be an act of worship--a means of grace."

I would also insist, following Brueggemann, that the imagination can be prophetic. Or dare I say it, apocalyptic. 

Different Perspectives on Sacred Space

This is a question I posed earlier today on the Pagan and Christian Moot on Facebook:

I know I am not the only one here who has noticed the parallels between the four living creatures of Revelation 4 and the watchtowers of Wiccan ritual. Phil Johnson first drew my attention to this in conversations on the tarot and I’ve been fascinated by it ever since. Could this be a conversation starter for different perspectives on sacred space?

I ask this because I have long been bothered by the phrase “interfaith conversation”. It’s because of the Western association of “faith” and “doctrine”. I can’t help noticing that many interfaith conversations end up focussed on doctrinal issues, on what different people from different paths “believe”. Leaving what they “feel” and “do” under explored. Yet I feel ritual and experience are just as important to explore here as doctrine and interpretation.

Well, here is what my sons and I did and experienced the weekend before last. They asked me if we could do home church. The kids program is in recess for the school holidays so I said, sure. I chose Acts 2 as a focus and used that to explore what it means to be a church, what it means to gather in the name of God. As part of this we broke bread together and offered our lives to God. And what looms large in the lives of my kids? Video games! So in setting up the table I invited them to surround the bread and the cup, which represent the living Messiah, with elemental Skylanders. Four of them in fact.

The kids were excited and enthusiastic about this. In the process we reflected on how, for us, Christ is the centre of the cosmos, not us and our everyday concerns. How living as Christians is the ongoing experience of entrusting our lives to God through him.

So, you’ll no doubt notice some muddiness here. Was this distinctively Christian?

But maybe, before rushing to analysis, open yourself to the other parts of yourself. Give your imagination, your intuition, your experience of liminal spaces some place in this conversation as well.