This week we talk about:
- Nick’s scooter wreck
- The Homebrewed Christianity Podcast
- Matthew Sleeth and the oil spill
- The first ever N & J Podcast with a prayer
- Did Jesus make any errors? [from this blog post]
An extra link about a call to prayer for the oil on CNN.com via Josh
[Direct link to ep 155 - Nick and Josh Ramblecast]
RE: Prayer:
Nick has a good point. If it’s something we can do, it wouldn’t be right for us to use prayer as a cop-out. “Oh God will take care of that.” Well, how do you know God isn’t asking you to do something? Know what I mean?
RE: Did Jesus get anything wrong?
Yeah, the whole “love your enemy” thing. He couldn’t have been seriously about that right?
Travis, I just asked for your friendship on facebook, because you didnt trash me for my views. Thanks for listening.
I fully appreciate what Nick is saying on prayer. My theology has moved from a “God in the sky” god who is all powerful and can do magic IF he wants to (and if we pray hard enough!), to a process-relational God that interpenetrates all creation and is persuading (not coercing)creation towards better possibilities. This is a God that mourns with us when tragedy strikes, and a God that, if we are open, will call us into new realities. This God is not “omnipotent”, but this does not make him a weak God. This is a God that needs us to cooperate and participate in his dreams, and not simply “talk about it” in prayer. Now, in process theology, prayer still plays a crucial part – but is one where one is trying to “align” themselves with God’s direction. So we can (and should) pray about the oil spill (though I tend to do contemplative forms of prayer rather than “wordy” ones), and then find ways to DO something, both short term and long term, to move things towards shalom.
Even the end-of-times theology (like that of N.T. Wright) imply that “God will put things to rights” in the end. This theology doesn’t make sense in process thought. That theology, to me, gives us an “out”, and can tend to disengage people. It’s kind of like a kid messing his room up with all his toys. Well, if child knows that mommy or daddy will clean his mess up at the end of the day, he will probably only put a half-hearted effort into doing HIS part (if any).
I would LOVE it if you guys could interview some process theologians! I LOVE the fact that this theology EMBRACES science, instead of conflicting with it!
In the mean time, here is a link to an overview:
http://www.processandfaith.org/resources/curricula/Process%20Theology-Study%20Guide.pdf
And the main page: http://www.processandfaith.org/
I should have included this great article:
Almighty? No Way! Coming to Know the God We Already Love
by Rabbi Bradley Shavit Artson
http://www.jewishjournal.com/shavuot/article/almighty_no_way_coming_to_know_the_god_we_already_love_20100511/
jeff, who are you thinking of?