John Philip Newell is a poet, author, and peacemaker. He is the co-founder of Salva Terra: A Vision Towards Earth’s Healing. Formerly Warden of Iona Abbey in the Western Isles of Scotland, he is currently Companion Theologian for the American Spirituality Center of Casa del Sol at Ghost Ranch in the high desert of New Mexico. For more about Newell follow this link Newell’s progressive insights are permeated by his deep understanding of Celtic spirituality. It is no surprise then that Newell calls for a renewed understanding of the sacredness of matter.
In response to the current crisis of institutional Christianity, Newell sees three responses: denial of the crisis, shoring up of the old, or to ask “What is it that is trying to be born? What is it that is trying to emerge from the human soul and how can we within the Christian household be part of leading that and serving it with humility?” Newell’s gentle invitation is challenging the church to serve the deep knowing that is in the hearts of people everywhere and to empower the deep knowing of the sacredness of the knowings that come up from the deepness of our being which is of God.
It happens every year as Doubting Thomas makes his Easter appearance. It’s a kind of resurrection of a glimmer of the faith that I long to recall in my flesh. I harken back to the time when I could embrace those wounds as proof. Oh how that faith comforted me. Resurrecting the memory of Thomas, who for years functioned as a trusted hero in my scant faith, now sends me into the dream of belief as the answer in and of itself; a kind of innocence that once gone is never forgotten. My nostalgia for my faith in belief will pass. But for just a moment or two, I pause to embrace the wounds, waiting for my doubts to open me to the evolving reality of now. Jump!!!
For this sermon I used a video within the sermon to help illustrate resurrection. You can view the video within the written text of the sermon below or listen to the audio version provided. I am indebted to the work of James Rowe Adams for much of the New Testament Scholarship in this sermon.
The Scripture texts were John chapter 20:19-31 and Acts 4:32-35
Christ is Risen! Christ is Risen indeed! Alleluia! So, Christ is Risen! So What???What can it possibly mean to you and to me, that a rag-tag bunch of Jesus’ followers gathered together in an upper-room and talked about their experiences of Jesus and decided that not even death could extinguish the life that they experienced in Jesus? What difference does it make to you or to I that Christ is risen? The truth is that it can make absolutely no difference what so ever. Now there are a whole lot of people who will tell you that the important thing about resurrection is that you believe it. Those same folks absolutely love the story of doubting Thomas. And so every year on the second Sunday of Easter we read the story of doubting Thomas as a kind of inoculation against Thomas’ disease.
I sometimes think that the designers of the lectionary were trying to build up our resistance to doubt. Having problems believing in resurrection, well don’t do what Thomas did, don’t doubt, because you’ll be proven wrong. Jesus is alive, the wounds in his hands proved that to Doubting Thomas, so have no doubt about it the resurrection happened! Believe in the resurrection!
The trouble with believing in stuff is that it belief can make absolutely no difference what so ever. I can believe in justice for all, but unless I’m prepared to seek justice, to be fair, or to resist injustice, it makes absolutely no difference what so ever. You can shout, “Christ is risen!” all you want but unless you are willing to live it, the resurrection means very little at all. In order to live the resurrection you have to begin practicing resurrection. In order to practice something, you have to know what it looks like, what it sounds like, or what it feels like.
I’ve been trying to figure out how to show you what resurrection looks like in the flesh. Then I remembered a video that’s been doing the rounds on the internet, so I want you to watch this modern miracle of resurrection.
WATCH THE VIDEO CLIP FROM: Alive Inside
Christ is Risen! Christ is Risen indeed! Alleluia! Almost 2000 years ago, a bunch of rag-tag Jesus followers were huddled together in fear. Their beloved leader had been brutally executed by the powers that be and they were terrified that they would be next. Paralyzed by their fear, hiding behind a locked door, something happened that gave them the strength to burst forth from their own tomb and change the world.Continue reading →
This year’s Maundy Thursday commemoration at Holy Cross included: hand washing, soup supper, eucharist, intimacy and this story from the Reverend Susan J. Thompson who, along with Pastor Tom Doherty presided over our worship.
It was a dark and . . . windy night. The swinging doors into the sanctuary were banging, the tree branches scraping against the stained glass windows, and casting eerie shadows.
It was then my colleague and I decided to make the place a little cosier for our Maunday Thursday service. We scrambled around the balcony storage and found all our Christmas tea lights and holders, and both of us had plenty of candles in our studies. We placed all of them around the chancel, and on the window sills where the shape-dancing trees seemed a little less intimidating in the warm candle glow.
In a kitchen to the right , Session members were preparing warm scented water and gathering the tubs in which to immerse people’s feet. The towels were at the ready. All we needed now was the chalice and plate for the elements, so I raced downstairs to the cupboard.
I was stopped in my tracks by a pounding on the door. My heart sank as I went to it, for there was (let’s call her Louise) a client of our food bank. I opened the door, exchanged pleasantries, and politely informed her that the food bank would be open next Tuesday.
“Oh, I don’t want food, she said”. Just a pair of shoes”.Continue reading →
I have been asked to repost this particular post. It first appeared during my first months of blogging and I am often asked about this post. Its contents continue to invoke the wrath of some and the appreciation of many. I offer it here, mindful that in the intervening two years since I first posted it, I have had the opportunity to explore progressive and evolutionary theologies which have nourished me in my efforts to proclaim the Easter story in ways that move beyond the tired debate over the physical resuscitation of a corpse toward an understanding of resurrection that permeates my daily quest to know the unknowable ONE who lies at the heart of reality.
Peter Callesen’s Papercut Resurrection
Blogging is sometimes a very strange medium and I must say that I am overwhelmed by the responses to my recent posts about resurrection. While many have emailed or posted their ardent “amens” others have been scathing and some hostile to my remarks. I am grateful to everyone who has responded. All of your comments help me as I continue to ponder the theological and practical implications of the Easter story. For those of you who have suggested that I have no business calling myself a Christian or a pastor and have suggested that I ought to consider leaving the church, I offer the following.
A while back, I got together with clergy colleagues to talk about the challenges of preaching during Holy Week. When the subject of the crucifixion and the resurrection came up, the conversation became very lively as the traditionalists challenged the progressives. Toward the end of our conversation, it became clear that because I was unwilling to concede to the notion that Jesus corpse was physically resuscitated; I stood accused of having denied the resurrection.
Some colleagues rose to my defense and insisted that I wasn’t saying anything different than what we all learned in seminary. But they also insisted that most lay-people simply don’t want to hear it. So, I asked them if they were going to preach about what they had learned in seminary and beyond and the general consensus was that there are too many guests on Easter Sunday to tackle theology.
Some said, they were simply too afraid of the fundamentalists in their congregations to ever even attempt to preach what they knew. A few confessed that they were working up to it; but not on Easter Sunday.
The traditionalists in the group were disgusted. One colleague went so far as to insist that I had no business being in the church because my very presence puts the beliefs of the faithful at risk. He wondered aloud, “Why do you stay in the church if you don’t believe? If the church’s theology no longer works for you, why don’t you just leave?”Continue reading →
I am indebted to Michael Morewood for the theological insights in his book“It’s Time: Challenges to the Doctrine of the Faith”for helping me to see beyond the idols in my head! This sermon was preached on Good Friday 2013 at Holy Cross Lutheran Church. Additional Good Friday sermons can be found here and here
The account of Jesus’ execution that we have just heard from the Gospel according to John lacks the rawness of the earlier accounts of Jesus death. The author of this account wrote at the turn of the first century, some seventy to eighty years after the Romans executed Jesus. That’s enough time for two, maybe three, or possibly even four generations to have pondered these events. The first account of these events, the Gospel According to Mark was written slightly earlier, sometime after the year 70. Most scholars date it between the years 70 and 85. That’s still 40 to 65 years after the execution; still time for one or two generations to have pondered these events. Perhaps it’s the closer proximity of the Gospel according to Mark that gives it much shaper raw feeling when it is read. Or maybe it’s the decision of translators down through the ages to preserve the intensity of Jesus’ cry from the cross in Aramaic. I don’t know about you, but I cannot begin to contemplate the events of this dreadful day without hearing the echoes of Jesus’ plaintive cry, in his mother tongue: “Eloi, eloi, lama sabachthani?”
“Eloi, eloi, lama sabachthani?” “My God, my God, Why have you forsaken me?” The rawness, the bitterness, the desperation of this horrendous moment, and all the horrendous moments that have transpired before or since are captured in Jesus plea, “My God, My God, Why have you forsaken me?” I have always imagined a dying Jesus gathering up what little strength he has to raise his head to the heavens and cry: “Eloi, eloi, lama sabachthani?” In most of the films depicting the crucifixion that I can remember seeing, Jesus looks up, up toward the heavens to utter this painful cry to God.Jesus’ question has haunted the followers of Jesus for centuries as Christians have struggled to understand how and why Jesus died.This question has left the followers of Jesus tied up in knots for nearly 21 centuries as our ancestors in the faith have struggled to offer up answers to the questions of the faithful. Why did Jesus have to die?
In pulpits all over the planet, preachers are struggling to help their listeners cope with the realities of the violence that murdered the One whom we seek to follow. I have spent most of my life, struggling to understand exactly why Jesus died and what Jesus’ death means for all the generations who have trusted and followed Jesus. I have studied the answers that have been offered by successive generations of Jesus’ followers. I can recite chapter and verse of the various theories that have been offered by the church to explain Jesus’ death as all part of God’s grand plan to reconcile humanity to God. I can tell you about the Apostle Paul, who looked back to the Book of Genesis to try to fathom a reason for it all and settled upon the story of Adam’s disobedience as the source of our sinfulness. I could talk for hours about the theologies that hang on that apple. I know far too much about the fall and original sin and the need for reconciliation. I could recount the various theories of how God went about settling the score; of making us one with God. The theologians called this process of reconciliation with God, atonement and then proceeded to develop all sorts of theories of atonement. Lutheran pastors are required to study them all; all the way from the moral authority and ransom theories to the favorite of the last few centuries aptly named the satisfaction theory. Continue reading →
A powerful series contemplating resurrection in ever deepening ways in order to explore what a risen christianity might look like in terms of its offering of healing and blessing for the earth. Created by John Philip Newell a poet, pastor and scholar who opens our eyes o a vision beyond doctrines and dogmas that fail to proclaim the wonders of the universe in which we live. “Christianity will rise again to the extent that we remember the sacredness of everything that has been born in the universe.”
A Good Friday Sermon preached at Holy Cross Lutheran Church in 2012
The memory of it still haunts me to this day. I was 18 years old. Some friends of mine from church convinced me to go to a big youth gathering. I don’t remember who sponsored the gathering, I do remember that most of the Lutheran youth groups in the greater Vancouver area were in attendance and various Lutheran pastors were involved in the leadership. At some point near the beginning of the event we were each given a small nail, divided into groups and asked to line up behind one of the three wooden crosses that were laying in the hall. We were then given our instructions. We were about to hear a dramatic reading of the Gospel According to John’s account of the crucifixion. When the reading was over we would be invited to proceed to the cross nearest us, knell down, take a hammer, and drive our nail into the cross. With each blow upon the nail we were asked to remember our own responsibility for the death of Jesus. We were asked to remember that it was we who had crucified Jesus, for we were the guilty sinners for whom Jesus died. It was a powerful, gut wrenching experience that still haunts me to this day.
I wasn’t the only young person who wept buckets that day. I immersed myself into the ritual act as I recounted inwardly the list of my own sins. Together with my friends, we left that hall believing that Jesus died because of us. We left judged, convicted, guilty, tormented, anguished, and full of hope, for we knew that Jesus had died to save us from our sinfulness. Like so many who have gone before us and like so many who will gather on this Good Friday, we left that hall believing that God sent Jesus to die for us; to pay the price for our sin. Continue reading →
I was asked by a colleague: “So, if you do not believe that Jesus died for your sins, then why bother celebrating the events of Holy Week?” Behind this question lies the assumption that the only way to understand Jesus’ death is to frame it within the context of the theology of “penal sacrificial atonement” ie “we are judged to be sinful creatures, punishment is required, God sends Jesus to pay the price for our sin”. That Anslem’s theory of sacrificial atonement was formulated in the 11th century and continues to hold sway in the minds of so many followers of Christ is a testament to the power of our liturgies and hymns to form our theology. However, Anslem’s theory is not they only faithful way to understand Jesus’ death.
When one seriously engages the question, “What kind of god would demand a blood sacrifice?” the answers often render God impotent at best and at worst cruel and vindictive. I have often said that atonement theories leave God looking like a cosmic son of #%#%# ! Progressive Christian theologians are opening up new ways of understanding the death and resurrection of Jesus that empower the faithful to see new possibilities.
To my colleague, who fears that I am leading the faithful astray, and to those who find little comfort in the theories of an 11th century monastic, I offer the following:
Jesus said, “I give you a new commandment: Love one another. And you’re to love one another the way I have loved you. This is how all will know that you’re my disciples: that you truly love one another.”
That we should love one another is not a new commandment. There have been many before Jesus and many who came after Jesus who have commanded, advised, encouraged, implored, and even begged us to, “love one another.” What is new about Jesus commandment is that we are to love one another the way that Jesus loved. Which begs the question: How exactly did Jesus love?
I believe that Jesus loved in ways that I am only beginning to understand. I believe that Jesus was so open to the power of the LOVE that is God; that Jesus was able to live his life fully without fear.
I believe that Jesus wanted more than anything else for his followers to be so open to the power of LOVE that is God so that they too would live their lives fully without fear.
I believe that that’s what Jesus meant when he said, “I have come that you might have life and live it abundantly.”
I believe that Jesus lived life abundantly and that means that he loved abundantly and without fear.
Jesus was so open to the power of LOVE that is God that Jesus would not let the powers of darkness stop him from loving and living fully.
The kind of LOVE that Jesus embodied and taught has no boundaries. No darkness, no power, no fear, not even death can limit the power of LOVE.
For if LOVE is limited by death, then love will always be qualified and quantified.
That Jesus was willing to LOVE without boundaries, came at great cost to himself.
But Jesus was willing to pay that price in order to show others the way.
The way to LOVE without limit, without fear, without boundaries.
LOVE without boundaries is abundant life.
That Jesus’ LOVE endured the worst that the world could send his way, that Jesus’ LOVE was for all the world, dead and buried, and yet bursts free from the grave, bears witness to the power of LOVE.
That Jesus LOVE could not be destroyed, not even by the thing we fear the most, death itself, saves us from the need to fear death.
Jesus has shown us the way.
We can live abundantly lives that are free from the fear of death. Because Jesus has shown us the way we are free to live fully, to love extravagantly and be all that we were created to be.
LOVE shines in the darkness and darkness shall not overcome LOVE.
If Jesus, life, death, and resurrection teach us anything, surely they teach us not to be afraid.
Not to be afraid of the darkness.
Not to be afraid of living fully.
Not to be afraid of loving extravagantly.
Not to be afraid of the powers of evil.
Not to be afraid of the power of death.
LOVE will endure.
All will be well.
Jesus can’t save us from life.
There is evil to contend with.
There will be darkness and there will be death.
Jesus couldn’t save himself and he cannot save us from life. Darkness and death are part of life. Each of us must walk into the darkness that lies before us. We can beg God to take the cup from us! But the darkness will still come. And there will be days when the darkness will triumph. There are good Fridays too many to mention out there. We can shout all we want for Jesus to save us, but in the end we too will have to take up our cross and find a way to follow Jesus into the darkness and beyond, trusting that even though it feels for all the world that God has forsaken us, we will make it beyond the darkness.
The cross will not look the same for each of us. But there will be crosses to bear. Jesus has showed us the way. If we are to follow Jesus, then we must love one another they way that Jesus loved. It is the way beyond the darkness. Do not be afraid of evil, of death, or of the darkness. Follow Jesus who by love frees us from the power of darkness to hold us captive to our fears so that we can have life and live it abundantly.
Our final class in this series provided an opportunity to explore the so-called New Atheists: Christopher Hitchens, Daniel Dennett, Sam Harris, Richard Dawkins and Lawrence Krauss. The video below includes the keynote and videos that were used to stimulate conversation in the class.
Reposted today as the Church commemorates the life and witness of Dietrich Bonhoeffer.
When I was just a teenager, I was introduced to the writings of Dietrich Bonhoeffer by a wise Lutheran Pastor. I remember devouring Bonhoeffer’s “Life Together” and “Letters and Papers from Prison”. To this day, I credit Bonhoeffer for making me a Lutheran. While a great deal of water has flowed under a good many bridges since I was first enamoured of Lutheran theology, to this day I am grateful to that wise old Lutheran pastor who gave me my first taste of Bonhoeffer. Of late, there has been much ado about a little phrase that has been extracted from Bonhoeffer’s work: “religionless Christianity”.
(click here for full quotations from Letter and Papers from Prison)
“It is not for us to prophecy the day when men will once more ask God that the world be changed and renewed. But when that day arrives there will be a new language, perhaps quite non-religious. But liberating and redeeming as was Jesus language. It’ll shock people. It’ll shock them by its power. It’ll be the language of a new truth proclaiming God’s peace with men.” Bonhoeffer: Agent of Grace
Tragically, Bonhoeffer was executed before he had the opportunity to expand on his idea of Christianity beyond religion. The phrase “religionless Christianity” has intrigued agnostics, atheists, humanists, liberal christians and progressive christians. Eric Metaxas, author of “Bonhoeffer” dismisses the idea that Bonhoeffer was anything but a serious, orthodox Lutheran pastor right up to the end.
Despite the historical evidence of Bonhoeffer’s religious orthodoxy, the notion of religionless Christianity will not die. Bishop John Shelby Spong is among those who have tried to build on Bonhoeffer’s phrase and his book “Jesus for the Non Religious” has certainly moved the conversation along among progressive christians.
The dream of religionless christianity has moved well beyond Bonhoeffer as twenty-first century christians wrestle with archaic images of God and move beyond the religious trappings of traditional christianity. The notion of moving beyond religion has always intrigued me. Years ago, while studying Hinduism my professor offered a definition of God from one of the Vedas: “God is beyond the beyond, and beyond that also”. As I continue to explore the life and teachings of the man none as Jesus of Nazareth it becomes more and more evident that such a definition is compatible with his portrait of God. Jesus of Nazareth attempted to move his co-religionists beyond their religious images of God. What might our images of God become if we move beyond the idols offered to us by the religion of Christianity? Might we move toward images of God that more closely resemble the teachings of Jesus by moving toward a religionless christianity?
Sometimes we can better reflect upon our own tradition from the perspective of another tradition. In the video below, twentieth century philosopher and theologian Alan Watts explores the concept of the Religion of No Religion.
“Beyond the Beyond and Beyond that also.” Letting go of our images is the gift of faith that moves us beyond religion. I can hear Jesus call us to let go!
Recorded on March 15, 2014 – Those familiar with Pete Rollins work will recognize some familiar themes and stories at the beginning of this video which then moves into some interesting new ideas about “morons, idiots and imbeciles.” Rollins provocative ideas about the relationship of Christ to the symbolic order challenges us all to move beyond our moronic ideas and practices into the roll of idiots so that we might become imbeciles. Well worth a listen for those familiar with Rollins work and for those who have never encountered him before!!!
Recorded at the All Saints’ Pasadena Lent Event – March 24, 2014, In the third lecture in a series of lectures which function as a teaser for his forthcoming book: Convictions: How I Learned What Matters Most (due to be released in Canada on May 20/14), Marcus Borg turns to the biblical character Amos to express his own convictions about the lack of justice in all too many American expressions of Christianity.
Recorded at the All Saints’ Pasadena Lent Event – March 24, 2014, In the second lecture in a series of lectures which function as a teaser for his forthcoming book: Convictions: How I Learned What Matters Most (due to be released in Canada on May 20/14), Marcus Borg explores the nature of mysticism and mystical experiences and why they matter.
Recorded at the All Saints’ Pasadena Lent Event – March 23, 2014 – Marcus Borg begins a series of lectures which function as a teaser for his forthcoming book: Convictions: How I Learned What Matters Most (due to be released in Canada on May 20/14). Begun on the occasion of his 70th birthday the new book explores Borg’s convictions about Christianity and America.
Our last class in the series will be an introduction to what has been dubbed New Atheism. We will explore the work of the 21st centuries New Atheists who have become famous or infamous for the careers they have carved out of their “unbelief.” The videos below “The Four Horsemen of New Atheism” provide an introduction for the class. The Four Horsemen include: Christopher Hitchens, Daniel Dennet, Richard Dawkins and Sam Harris.
Our fourth class explored the critique of religion found in the work of Sigmund Freud. Out of our conversation about Freud we began to look at Richard Dawkins’ “The God Delusion.” The video clips used during the class are included below along with the slides of the keynote presentation. Next week we will move on to the New Atheists’ critique of religion. Below, you can view a video of the Keynote/PowerPoint that was used during the class. A pdf of the class hand-out can be found here
As our understanding of what it means to be human changes, our theologies are changing in ways that embrace reality rather than try to deny the evidence that is revealing a whole new dynamic that is drawing us toward an appreciation of creation that is even more amazing than our ancestors could possibly have imagined. Some Christians are afraid of this ever evolving view of creation, while others of us are compelled to wander beyond the confines of our comfort-zones. My hope is that we will find ways of staying in relationship with one another.
John Philip Newell is a poet, author, and peacemaker. He is the co-founder of Salva Terra: A Vision Towards Earth’s Healing. Formerly Warden of Iona Abbey in the Western Isles of Scotland, he is currently Companion Theologian for the American Spirituality Center of Casa del Sol at Ghost Ranch in the high desert of New Mexico. For more about Newell follow this link Newell’s progressive insights are permeated by his deep understanding of Celtic spirituality. It is no surprise then that Newell calls for a renewed understanding of the sacredness of matter. 
pastordawn 