Category: DOC Thoughts
Evolution & Creationism .2
Thanks to the Westar Institute for tweeting a link to this article in The Seattle Times by Michael Zimmerman. It is a nice synopsis, I think, of a manufactured controversy between religion and evolution. Now, if only there was something similar about the manufactured “War on Christmas.”
Where There Is No Conflict Between Religion and Science
Michael Zimmerman | Opinion Guest | The Seattle Times | Feb 8, 2014The Christian clergy members who believe evolution can coexist with theology, like most clergy of most religions, recognize that their sacred texts were not written as scientific treatises.
They are comfortable embracing the words of the Dalai Lama, which appear at the top of a letter signed by American Buddhist clergy members: “If scientific analysis were conclusively to demonstrate certain claims in Buddhism to be false, then we must accept the findings of science and abandon those claims or adopt them as metaphor.” Click here to read more.
Fandom Christianity
I recently reposted a link on my Facebook page about phrases that are driving millennials away from the Church though many remain interested in practicing Christianity. This article by Rev Mark Sandlin, Fandom of God is Upon Us and It’s Killing the Church, is another observation about the state of what I call “pop-Christianity.” Rev. Sandlin’s observations are probably more on target than many would want to admit. A paragraph and I encourage you to keep reading. Visit Rev. Sandlin’s blog, The God Article.
The Fandom of God Is Upon Us and It’s Killing the Church
Mark Sandlin | Huffington Post | Nov 11, 2013When the Church’s focus is on fandom practices rather than on kingdom practices it tends to become not only self-centered and self-serving but self-selecting as well. When we are fans of Jesus rather than followers of Jesus, our focus is inward turned, like in fandoms, concerned with and finding full satisfaction in what we think and feel and believe. We are more interested in who gets to be labeled insiders, who are “real/true” fans of God, than we are with following the sometimes difficult teachings of Jesus when it comes to those we see as different. Our world shrinks. It becomes far too easy to worry about those we claim as our “own” and to forget that there is a world of hurting people who we are not only called to stand with but who we are to recognize as equally created in the image of God.