Christianity is not about the divine becoming human so much as it is about the human becoming divine. " We walk into the mystery of God; we do not define that mystery. Jesus could not have imagined such an idea as Albert Einstein's theory of relativity. The author of this book is not a single individual, but is at least three different writers/editors, who did their layered work over a period of 25 to 30 years. Oh the Christian church has encouraged enormous immaturity among the peoples who are its primary adherence. Follow AzQuotes on Facebook, Twitter and Google+. Some people think prayer is telling God what to do. I live on the other side of Copernicus and Galileo; I can no longer conceive of God as sort of above the sky, looking down and keeping record books. I want to say something positively, something about the conclusion that I presently hold and bear witness to why I continue to be a member of this community.. Introducing John Shelby Spong the Rt. John Shelby Spong When I grew up in the South, I was taught that segregation was the will of God, and the Bible was quoted to prove it. They amuse themselves by playing an irrelevant ecclesiastical game called "Let's Pretend." The Bible interprets life from its particular perspective; it does not record in a factual way the human journey through history. Oh, my God, teach him rather to think like other people! var cookiePair = cookie.split('='); Jesus exhorted people to love their enemies and to pray for their persecutors (Matt. After love, he shared his beliefs about experiencing God. Matthew was not alone in his understanding of Jesus message. Eugene Taylor Sutton to give closing sermon of 22, Sacred Song, Three Taps close season by reflecting, rejoicing, Josh Stafford, on Massey, to present comedic Keaton classic, Playwrights Hnath, Hamill take stage to talk writing, theater with Kahn, A true people person: friends and family reflect on the life of vic gelb, Robinson to close with message of Chautauquas unique role in the world, Stafford, Robinson reflect on 2021 season, look ahead to final Sacred Song Service, 2022, Alumni Association of CLSC raises record-breaking amount at auction, Eberhardt reflects on social psychology of American racial biases, African American Heritage House strives for diversity at Chautauqua. His admirers acclaim him as a teaching bishop who makes contemporary theology accessible to the ordinary layperson he's considered the champion of an inclusive faith by many, both . John Shelby Spong 27. That's sort of fourth-century Christianity that got turned into doctrines and dogmas that we've never been able to escape. If you begin to give people hope that there is a brighter future, there is a new tomorrow, then the people who were yesterdays terrorists become tomorrows elected officials and theyre part of the system. if (window.csa) { It is not necessarily words addressed heavenward. Rev. Chapter seven begins with quotations from the Pauline Epistles, including Gal 5:12, "I wish those who unsettle you would mutilate themselves", Col 3:22, "Slaves, obey in everything those who are your earthy masters, not with eye service, as men pleasers, but in singleness of heart", and from 1 Cor 14:35, "It is shameful for a woman to speak in I cannot possibly conceive of my planet Earth as the centre of a three-tiered universe. for(var i=0; i=0){return}if("ue_https" in e){f=e.ue_https}else{f=e.location&&e.location.protocol=="https:"?1:0}i=f? Both papal infallibility and biblical inerrancy require widespread and unchallenged ignorance to sustain their claims to power. I could not believe that anyone who has read this book would be so foolish as to proclaim that the Bible in every literal word was the divinely inspired, inerrant word of God. There's a Psalm that says "Happy will you be when you take your enemy's children and dash their heads against the stones." I was taught that it was okay to hate other religions, and especially the Jews, and the Bible was quoted to prove it. And I have no reason to abandon it because it leads to where I want to go. John Shelby Spong I Am 21st Century Child Am "I believe that God is very real. I'm interested in penetrating the meaning of certainty. The Bible was quoted to defend slavery and the bible lost. If you're really thinking prayer can stop rockets or bullets, you have to ask why some people do get hit by rockets or bullets. I want the traditional family upheld, but I don't want it upheld to the detriment of other people. Q & A for 2-14-2013 electronic newsletter, A New Christianity For a New World, Last edited on 15 February 2023, at 00:06, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, The General Convention of the Episcopal Church: House of Bishops, "John Shelby Spong, 90, Dies; Sought to Open Up the Episcopal Church", "The retired Bishop John Shelby Spong interview", "Former Newark Episcopal bishop Spong suffers stroke", "Dominus Iesus: The Voice of Rigor Mortis", "God is not a noun, that demands to be defined, God is a verb that invites us to live, to love and to be", "No life, here no joy, terror or tears", "Fear of ideas: The decline and fall of Anglicanism", "Sydney Archbishop Jensen bans John Shelby Spong", "My Evening with Bishop John Shelby Spong", "John Shelby Spong, liberal Episcopal bishop, dies at age 90", "Bishop John Shelby Spong, firebrand who championed LGBTQ inclusion, has died", https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=John_Shelby_Spong&oldid=1139405551, This page was last edited on 15 February 2023, at 00:06. " John Shelby Spong 2. Therefore, no external description of one's being, whether based on race, ethnicity, gender or sexual orientation, can properly be used as the basis for either rejection or discrimination. John Shelby "Jack" Spong (June 16, 1931 September 12, 2021) was an American bishop of the Episcopal Church. } I think that anything that begins to give people a sense of their own worth and dignity is God. "Q&A on The Parliament of the World's Religions," weekly mailing, 2007-SEP-05, as reported on. Praying and living deeply, richly and fully have become for me almost indistinguishab le. window.Mobvious.device_type = 'mobile'; 23:33), "blind fools" (Matt. If I could not move my search beyond angelic messengers, empty tombs, and ghostlike apparitions, I could not say yes to Easter. True religion is not about possessing the truth. John Shelby Spong God, Thinking, People 57 Copy quote I don't see Jesus as rescuing the fallen; I see Jesus as expanding the potential of life. This self-denigration stuff - Jesus died for my sins - is nothing but a guilt message. In a 2013 interview with Religion News Service, Spong spoke about his own spirituality and beliefs, which he said had grown deeper as he aged. And all I can tell you is if we accepted every invitation we had, I'd be away every day of my life. q("f", arguments) googletag.enableServices(); True religion is not about possessing the truth. Why dont we understand that? October 13, 2011. JOHN SHELBY SPONG: The first homosexual person that I ordained knowingly was a man named Robert Williams. No religion does that. var node = document.getElementsByTagName("script")[0]; "Christ must be served in every person," he said. "[24], Spong died in sleep at his home in Richmond, Virginia, on September 12, 2021, at the age of 90. He held visiting positions and gave lectures at major American theological institutions, most prominently at Harvard Divinity School. try { })(); In [the story of Jesus] I found a center for my being. The audience that I try to reach are members of what I call the church alumni association. The author made sure that it was understood as a universal happening, Spong said. Terrorism is a real despair. (function() { It grew and developed year by year over a period of forty-two to seventy years. About us. Gate tickets and other revenue cover only a portion of the cost of your Chautauqua experience. It was never, even in the New Testament, a finished story. " I go where I'm invited. Jamie Landers is entering her third season as a reporter for The Chautauquan Daily, covering all things music-related within the online platform. I describe God as the source of life and the source of love and the ground of being." John Shelby Spong Life Love God Day "Mother Nature is not sweet." He received his Master of Divinity degree from the Virginia Theological Seminary in 1955. John Shelby Spong is an influential public speaker, writer and media figure. A.src = t; The Bible has lost every major battle it has ever fought. If I were a child of Tibet or of Arabia, I suspect the path I'd walk would be the Buddhist path or the Muslim path. "Application": "GoodreadsMonolith", . window.Mobvious = {}; Jerry Falwell says, on Pat Robertson's program, that the reason we got attacked on 9/11 is that we were accommodating the ACLU and abortion and homosexuals and feminists in America, so God smacked us down. I spend my life studying that book, and every book I've written has in some sense been a book about the Bible, and that's what I mean by reclaiming its value and its essence for a world that no longer treats it literally and no longer reads it traditionally. John Shelby Spong has long been known as the "nightmare" of the more conservative element of the Anglican Church in America. ! It is not by pitching the old insights out but by journeying deeply through them into new visions that we are able to change religion's direction. I do not live in a world where people can walk on water, or still a storm, or take five loaves of bread and feed 5000 men plus women and children. I am trying to understand what it means to be a Christian without being religious. John Shelby "Jack" Spongis a retired American bishop of the Episcopal Church. Spong proffers a third way, one that involves being "fully human." We are not really separated from God, he asserts. [19][20] After Spong's book Jesus for the Non-Religious was published in 2007, Peter Jensen, the Archbishop of Sydney, banned Spong from preaching at any churches in his diocese. It has not only to do with erasing human divisions, but about revitalizing our most cherished beliefs.. session: { id: "242-2972433-4130551" }, The primary reason the old idea of rescuing the fallen is no good is that there never was a time when we fell from perfection into sin. John Shelby Spong, Rescuing the Bible from Fundamentalism: A Bishop Rethinks the Meaning of Scripture . //]]> There are more than 14 quotes written by John Shelby Spong on our site. John Shelby Spong People, History, Real, Understood Generate image The Christ path is the path I've walked all my life, so it's normal and natural. There are passages in the Gospels that portray Jesus of Nazareth as narrow-minded, vindictive, and even hypocritical. I believe that I live my life every day inside the reality of this God. It is rather an invitation into a journey that leads one toward the mystery of God. 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