Faith and Fallacies

My Staff Parish Relations Committee and I worked on our evaluation form last night. We dutifully and fruitfully prayed about and discussed the sense of living into Jesus the vine, and then engaged the questions on the sheet. The first one gave us trouble. We felt like the wires were a little crossed. ... Not…

Diary of a Delegate: Dude, where’s my church?

Sisters and brothers, I don't even know what day it is. I think about 3 days of legislation have passed since last I posted. They weren't good days for me and the people I care about. It seems that progressives make up about 40% of the voting body on just about anything. Other people have…

Diary of a Delegate: Days Four and Five- Let me be full, let me be empty

When Bishop Weaver gave his episcopal address a few days ago, he concluded by inviting us to share in the Wesleyan Covenant Prayer, which contains the phrase "let me be full; let me be empty..." The past two days have been both full and empty.You'll note that I don't distinguish between the two days or…

Diary of a Delegate: Who are the Bullies? (a call for repentence)

Last week I mentioned on facebook/Twitter that I was wearing pink as part of Pink Shirt Day, a movement to help raise awareness about bullying (here's one article that gives a little background about why pink shirts). At the time I wrote that wearing a pink shirt was not all I planned to do to…

(Diary of a Delegate) Vital Signs and Flat Lines

This week is the deadline by which my Annual Conference wants me my church to submit goals into the dashboard of the "Vital Congregations" website. Coming out of the UMC's "Call to Action" report, we are supposed to be working on creating and supporting vital local congregations (which I think is a good idea), by…

I love Jesus, but I kinda like religion too

A lot of folks on facebook have been posting links to this video, where political science graduate and non-profit worker Jefferson Bethke seeks to "highlight the difference between Jesus and false religion" (text of video description). Mr. Bethke is a self-proclaimed healed pornography addict, and attends the Federal Way campus of Mars Hill Church (dot…

Spiritual but not religious, part the millionth.

In response to the whole "spiritual but not religious" conversation (links within my link), I just want to say exactly what Pam said. That, and the funeral home in town sends all the grieving "spiritual but not religious" families to me for memorial services, and it's all sacred to me.

What Happens Tomorrow

I don't really want to give airtime to the ridiculous notion that the end of the world begins tomorrow. It's a non-biblical idea about rapture plucked from random texts and mashed together with poorly-constructed numerology and a re-calculated dating of Noah's Ark. It's a lot of nonsense. But really, it's much worse than that. First,…

poem for a hate group leader

Fred, Fred. One day it'll happen. I don't know when or how, but then none of us ever do. Perhaps you'll be blessed enough to die of old age. Or maybe disease will consume you, or the poison you spew take an inward toll. Or maybe, tragically, a grief-stricken family member at a funeral-turned-protest will…

Glenn Beck, why do you hate John Wesley?

... or churches with a history of opposing slavery? Yeah, what Jeremy said. That's what I think.