Pentecost : the next church revolution

Emergent.  Transformation.  Post-modern.  Changing.  Gen X. 21st Century Church.  Hot catch phrases, often thrown around with the intent of sparking interest and justifying ones church credentials (or lack thereof).  Yet maybe these current buzz words about the shifting relationship between church and culture merely serve to say a lot without really saying anything at all?

The text for Sunday, according to the Lectionary, is the story of Pentecost [Acts 2:1-13].  The birth-story of the church community.  From the beginning multi-cultural, trans-national, inter-generational, and gender-inclusive; this community of faith was not just about preaching to the masses, but also listening to what is going on.

Bumper Sticker of the Week

Bumper Sticker of the Week

I might be time to moveon to another bumper sticker.  

I think that this ship has sailed.

Oakland Marathon (virtual)

The Oakland Marathon [site] is coming soon - March 27th! - a chance for Oakland to be in the spotlight - and for many folks to see more than just the crime and gun-driven side of the city.  Here's a cool e-recreation of the marathon route. [East Bay Express Article]

VIDEO

Bumper Sticker of the Week

The past few weeks I saw a lot of similar bumperstickers.  Not sure if it's wishful thinking in a difficult time, a deepening political polarization, or selective memory of past budget deficits.

Bumper Sticker of the Week

Blogging Towards Sunday, February 28, 2010

Luke 9:28-36 | Genesis 15:1-12, 17-18

The two texts proposed by the lectionary list for this day talk about theophany (the theological-ese word for "the auto or self-revelation of God."  They relate the identification of Jesus in a miraculously theological way as the Messiah, the Son of God; and also God concluding the covenant with Abraham.  The disciples don't get what's happening, even when they realize that the heavens are open, that the divine voice identifies Jesus as the One, their response reveals that they don't really grasp what that means for them in the moment or for the world in general.  They want to build a house to stay there, maybe some sort of tabernacle so that this moment can be preserved forever.  Yet Jesus is calling them - and is called himself - into the world, to action, to radical loving that transforms all through nonviolent acts of grace, compassion and justice - to practice resurrection in daily life.

Bumper Sticker of the Week

OK.  This isn't a sticker (I've run out of e-files of them) yet it's a hilarious image from a friend's facebook page.  It recalls a very funny moment on the Ellen show last year.  One that still makes me chuckle when I think of it.  I actually had a handful of thoughtful conversations about faith and life because of the show .  I think we tend to overlook the ways in which pop culture - even bumperstickers - can invite to discussion not simply proclaim one's values or moral sense.

Love: Cupid or Stupid?

Living cross-culturally always provides for insight, discovery and cultural challenge.  Culture is so much an innate part of the basic fabric of our lives that we don't always see it, nor can we be aware of it.  Valentine's Day is a big thing in America.  True - like in Europe - it's a money-maker for restaurants, florists and other commercial activities.  Yet the now-traditional and historically-exaggerated celebration of the Martyr Valentine isn't just about lovers, over-priced roses or reserving a table months in advance.  It's about love, saying it, expressing it, celebrating it.  This year our children have been decorating for weeks, making cards, boxes to receive Valentine's all the familiar kid things that happen in America and yet are so foreign here in France.  So we had a giant celebration with yesterday at home with about 8 cupcakes for each person.  Here in France, it's purely commercial, for lovers, seen as something that cheapen,s, consumerises and cheapifys love.  Yet maybe the international, and multi-cultural visions of Valentine's Day are actually revelatory of the ways in which love has been commodified, capitalized and codified in our cultures.

Advertising & Faith

I read an interesting article in SF Gate this morning detailing a current ad campaign "good without God?" (now playing in and around Sacramento after previous stops elsewhere) that is "plugging" atheism.  The article is interesting.  The best part for me was to read the comments and see the inter-faith bickering, name-calling and fighting. It made me wonder: can you actually advertise faith, or non-faith?  Does it even matter, or reach anyone?  Or is it merely preaching to the choir and rallying the troops around the flag-pole?

Here's some of the billboards in and around Sactown.

Blogging Towards Sunday February 14, 2010

Luke 6:17-26 | 1 Corinthians 15:12-20

What is life about?  How do you live a good life?  What is a good life?  Jesus offers a vision of a nonviolent world of peace, fullness and God-centered-ness in his beatitude teaching, as Luke tells it.  Paul talks about resurrection and how it informs and forms faith.  It's hard to know what "blessed" means in a world in which blessings are associated with brief pre-dinner prayers, year-end compensation, or miraculous salvation from sickness and disaster.  Can you be blessed in everyday life?

Blogging Towards Sunday February 7th

Isaiah 6:1-8 | Luke 5:1-11

Stories about our vocation to the mission we have as the people of God is what dominates the texts for Sunday.  Isaiah is called to serve as prophet, not to tell the future, but to speak God's word for the present, to give a different perspective to those around him.  His response is one of availability "here I am" to be used for God and to part from his past into and towards a new or emerging future "send me."

Luke tells his version of the miraculous fish-catch encounter as one of vocation of the first disciples.  Jesus comes to them, in their terms and on their turf to invite them to step out, to set their boats towards deeper waters, beyond the safety of the shoreline, to cast their nets in unfamiliar ways.  They're called to reprioritize their life, leaving behind the abundant catch of fish for the risk and potential of the unknown future of following after Jesus.  They're encouraged to try again, to despite their potential disgust, despair or disappointment with their lack of catching anything until then, to try again.

Bumper Sticker of the Week

This is my last one for a while.  (Thanks Nani!) I've run out.

If you see any good ones, email me a photo!

Blogging Backwards towards January 31

Luke 4:21-30 and 1 Corinthians 12:31-13:13

The passages proposed for Sunday play with the themes of hearing, seeing and recognizing the presence of God and the living Word of God in our lives both individual and together as the community of faith.

I found this funny image while surfing the internet that illustrates the paradox of the texts:

Bumper Sticker of the Week

I see this one a lot.

Blogging Towards Sunday January 24, 2010

Luke 4:14-21 and 1 Corinthians 12:12-31

What does God want to for the world?  How is/does God accomplish it?  What does that have to do with us?  In the wake of the earthquake in Haiti we ask ourselves the questions that resound through the limitations of our humanity: who are we?  is there a God? what's the connection?

Is Food the Future?:

Alice Waters and the scope of education

SF Gate recently ran an article about Alice Waters [The Scavenger blog], and specifically an Atlantic Magazine article [Cultivating Failure] criticizing her foray of the slow food movement into politics, specifically elementary education in America.  Is prioritizing the teaching of sustainable gardening and cooking to kids in school taking the place of the teaching of mathematics, English, science or other arts?  In a time of slash and burn education budgets is she wasting limited resources in view of teaching children an upper-class Bay Area-ite foodie culture practiced by the prius-driving latte-drinking über crust of our society?  Or is she as she would claim a sort of centurion for truth and justice fighting against the titan-like governator in Sacramento?

Marriage Equality: talking from beyond our polarization.

The definition of marriage in terms of legal rights, institutional definition, and constitutional ramifications continue to be a large topic in our ongoing dialogue about religion, church practice and what it means to be American in 2010.  This weeks' edition of Newsweek contains an article that is quickly making the rounds on Facebook and becoming a topic of great conversation.  "The Conservative Case for Gay Marriage" [includes a video] by Theodore B. Olson.  What makes the article so interesting is the fact that the author writes from a perspective that would seemingly be associated with an opposite viewpoint: a Republican actively working for Marriage Equality.

Bumper Sticker of the Week

Blogging Towards Sunday, January 17th

John 2:1-12

Water into wine: is that a big deal?  It almost doesn't seem to be when you read the gospel text for this coming Sunday.  No one draws attention to the sign or miracle - that Jesus performs at the wedding he is attending with his friends and family in Cana.  It's only when the wine is tasted that the miracle is revealed. It seems like there are two conclusions to the story: the first in verse 10 - a remark that the best wine was surprisingly served last (post-Jesus-intervention) and then a second one in verse 11 - by the narrator telling the story, informing us that the real miracle was that the disciples put their faith in Jesus and believed.  So what is the miracle: the water into wine, or the 5 disciples present moving from followers to believers?