Thoughts

I feel the Christian Church should not only apologize, but do public penance for the way we have treated people of color, women, adherents of other religions and those we designated heretics, as well as gay and lesbian people.

John Selby Spong.

I subscribe to John Selby Spong's Newsletter "A New Christianity for A New World." I find his thoughts to be my thoughts articulated better. I listen to him when he calls Deity the "Ground of his Being" and I rejoice when I find a church such as the Holy Cross Lutheran Church in Canada which is a radical departure from the churches I see around here. They say: "Jesus added our minds to the equation: Love God with all you’re your heart, with all your soul, with all your strength and with all your mind!
Inquiring minds want to know:"

I stopped attending Church and no longer identify with a particular church. I do identify myself as a Christian (but not the Christian of the right wing fundamentalist Churches who practice more hatred than they do Love).

Spong says:

I will no longer listen to that pious sentimentality that certain Christian leaders continue to employ, which suggests some version of that strange and overtly dishonest phrase that "we love the sinner but hate the sin." That statement is, I have concluded, nothing more than a self-serving lie designed to cover the fact that these people hate homosexual persons and fear homosexuality itself, but somehow know that hatred is incompatible with the Christ they claim to profess, so they adopt this face-saving and absolutely false statement.

I feel that God sent (Infused Himself in) Jesus to show us how to act towards one another and therefore I will:

[Try to:]
Respect women
Respect those of different faiths
Treat all people as my brothers and sisters
Try not to Judge others.
Be grateful for all that God has given me over my lifetime
Work to protect the natural world which He has provided for us and our decedents.
Treat his animal creatures with respect.
Ground MY being in Him.
Recognize that in performing a creative act I am joining with God in the act of creation which is ongoing.
Rejecting evil and those who are evil and hate (even though they say they are doing so in the name of Christianity) (I won't hate them I just will try not to argue with their ignorance any longer,)
Continue to study and pray (in my own way) to improve myself and be a better person.
Forgive those who have trespassed against me (and that my friends is one of the hardest things I have to do)
Recognize that I do not have all (or even part) of the answers and just LOVE for that is all there needs to be and by arguing and fussing about those who think that THEY have all of those answers ( - I still feel that this poem is my message for them. ) is counterproductive.

There is more I could say but I am going to quit here. 'nuff said.

Thanks for stopping by. Hugs. j