THE ONLY THING WE REQUIRE TO BE GOOD PHILOSOPHERS IS THE FACULTY OF WONDER. Babies have this faculty. That is not surprising. After a few short months in the womb they slip out into a brand-new reality. But as they grow up the faculty of wonder seems to diminish. Why is this? Do you know?…
Posts Tagged
Jesus
Early Christians and Their Deluded, Prurient Love
But Romans frequently criticized the Christian emphasis on love as somehow a little deluded and perhaps prurient, suggesting that followers of the Jesus Way made it known that theirs was a path of love. Early Christians insisted that love–not rationality or politics or even virtue–was the primary bond between God and humans beings. Love was…
Continue to be and do not to perish: Poet T.E. Hulme and Learning to Abide
The Embankment By T. E. Hulme Once, in finesse of fiddles found I ecstasy, In the flash of gold heels on the hard pavement. Now see I That warmth’s the very stuff of poesy. Oh, God, make small The old star-eaten blanket of the sky, That I may fold it round me and in comfort…
Killing Creativity With More of The Same Old Same Old
Groups in which people are very similar tend to get along well. They don’t disagree, they don’t cause any trouble and they are frequently low in creativity. If you want to make sure that creativity is kept to a minimum then reduce the diversity in groups. In contrast when teams are made up of people…
Oscar Romero And The Violence Of Love
We have never preached violence, except the violence of love, which left Christ nailed to a cross, the violence that we must each do to ourselves to overcome our selfishness and such cruel inequalities among us. The violence we preach is not the violence of the sword, the violence of hatred. It is the violence…
A Fetish of Intimidation
Fear-as-fuel causes a kind of social global warming, filling our social atmosphere with invisible toxins that subtly, silently, relentlessly change everything and make our society less humane and less habitable. Those who live by the sword, Jesus said, will die by it, and I imagine the same could be said for fear, because the sword…
The Blueprint
Jesus is the blueprint, the plan, the pattern revealed in one body and moment of history to reveal the meaning of all of history and each of our lives. The cross is the banner of what we do to one another and to God. The resurrection is the banner of what God does to us…
Good Friday Poem: Terrible Beyond
Terrible beyond despairing walk, Menacing cold clutches its stalk. Fevering swells its crippling tense, Sickness untold unfathomed suspense. Destruction impending unjust disguise, Terrifying deceit in tearful reprise. Engulfed horror at trauma pursuit, Disease stricken by powers’ salute. Fleshly shudders panicking fright, Nightmares entranced by visible light. Ghastly quakes punish the soul, Spirit painstakingly swallowed in…
When The Answer is Also The Question
An image Bell returns to often in Love Wins is that of Jesus being the rock that gives water, an image from Hebrew scripture where Moses, leading the Israelites through the desert, called on God to give them water. God told Moses to take his staff and smack a rock with it. The rock cracked…
A Defective Love
What makes us humans is, of course, being more loving. And sin is a defect in this love. To say that Jesus was without sin just means that he was wholly loving, that he did not put up barriers against people, that he was not afraid of being at the disposal of others, that…