On my (still hotly contested) previous post about clergy who have lost their faith, I listed some of what I believe. I was simply trying to get it out, lest anyone think that I reject supposed orthodoxy and hold nothing in its place. But at least one reader found it lyrical, and broke it into poetic lines, and then sent it to me. The week of Easter. I can’t tell you how big a blessing that was, to receive such a lovely gift from across the country, and to read my own words reflected back as poetry or song. Many, many thanks.
This I believe (by Becca Clark, ‘remixed’ by Dave and Nan R., readers from Michigan)
I believe
God is
Transcendent and immanent,
Ground and Source of all Being;
We are in God as a sponge is in the sea.
I believe
the Bible is the story
of humanity’s relationship with God,
filled with truth and beauty
and adventure and sacrifice
and chaos and anger
and doubt and triumph,
and that this story is true,
regardless of whether it is factual.
I believe
that Jesus was,
more than any other wise prophet or old soul,
one and the same with that Divine,
that to see him was to see God,
to live the Way he taught is to live God’s Way.
I believe
that the consequence
of confronting power and corruption
and violence and domination,
the cost of articulating God’s vision
in the face of humanity’s greed
is deadly.
I believe
that the life and love of God,
and God in Christ,
and now God in us as we are in Christ,
is yet more powerful
than the deadly force of Empire
and fear and greed and corruption.
I believe
such life and love is eternal,
and so Christ was and is alive beyond death.
I believe that this Divine One,
this God, is present with us even now,
that we feel movement
through Spirit and in community,
that we are still called to be
and build
and participate in
a new way of being and living,
God’s realm, come to earth.
I believe
we are invited to make this new Way,
together with God,
and live as a people connected
to God,
to one another,
to all of life,
When that happens,
we will see face to face,
we will live as the Body of Christ,
fully restored.
We will see the fulfillment
of all that needs to be.
We Your People, Ours the Journey 
I’m putting on my tin hat. When people are determined to comb through one’s thinking to declare that one is a heretic, it’s always a tactical mistake to try to express what one believes. But I got your back. 😀
Thanks Pam. At least it does illustrate the point. But for every one person who comments negatively (albeit repeatedly!), there’s a couple positive replies, and a new virtual friend, and a surprise gift from across the connection. So well worth the naysayers in my mind. I figure if either you or I could be intimidated or shaken from our calling by someone thinking we were heretics, we’d have quit long before now!
I once preached in a Baptist Church as part of a pulpit exchange and a lady in that congregation writes poems. She wrote a lovely poem about the sermon that I gave and I found that effort really touching.
can i use this picture?