I’m going to post this because I found it provocative. They are a series of quotes from my Journal that contains quotes from Tracy Kidder’s Mountains Beyond Mountains: The Quest for Dr. Paul Farmer, A Man Who Would Cure the World (Random House, 2004): While in Haiti, Farmer became interested in Liberation Theology. He himself is Roman Catholic, but had never came across this kind of Catholicism: “The Marxists Farmer had read, and many of the intellectuals he knew, disdained... Read more

Here’s a Journal entry from Saturday, April 30, 2006: “I remember as a young boy, in Smiths Falls, Ontario, watching another boy about my age climbing a tree next to a large field. Behind the tree, on the edge of a small bluff, stood a bagpiper playing a mournful dirge on his pipes, dressed in kilt and all, while the sun set. The scene is so beautiful and surreal, that it has an almost dream-like feel to it, but I... Read more

“God’s work… is accomplished most incisively through suffering” (Athanasiadis, George Grant and the Theology of the Cross, p. 44). Here’s another quote that I think is SO important in any kind of community, especially a Christian one: “… a direct connection is seen between suffering and the maintenance of religious integrity” (“Humility”, International Dictionary of the Bible). I believe this is true. I’ve seen it over and over again: those who suffer are more likely the ones with true spiritual... Read more

Read this quote, then what I have to say about it: The Christian “knows that God’s Word in Jesus Christ pronounces him guilty, even when he does not feel his guilt, and God’s Word in Jesus Christ pronounces him not guilty and righteous, even when he does not feel that he is righteous at all” (Bonhoeffer, Life Together, p. 22). This is what I wrote about that quote in my journal on Saturday, April 1, 2006: “If what Bonhoeffer says... Read more

I love this passage from Bono in Conversation with Michka Assayas: “… the children of Israel are wandering through the desert. They’ve just been delivered from captivity by Moses, but they’re straight back to worshipping the Golden Calf. It’s business as usual, they have forgotten the God who delivered them. They keep getting warnings, and finally God just has enough and says to Moses: ‘Get out of the way, I’m gonna destroy my people. Then I’m gonna start again. This... Read more

“… people who are open spiritually are open to being manipulated more easily, are very vulnerable. The religious instinct is a very pure one in my opinion. But unless it’s met with a lot of rigor, it’s very hard to control” (Bono, in Bono in Conversation with Michka Assayas, p. 221). May I suggest what might be meant by “rigor”? In my case: critical self-awareness; critical search for the revelation of God (truth); and these two tested against how well... Read more

I preached today. I don’t know… there’s often a lingering sense that I was far from adequate. I still haven’t preached my best. I preached on Psalm 37. My basic 3 points were: 1. depart from evil 2. do good 3. and you won’t regret it. Simple. Verse 27 summarizes the whole psalm this way: “Depart from evil, and do good; So you shall abide forever.” I feel there is something so solidly true about this, even in spite of... Read more

“… I do love the image of sheep. You’ve got to hand it to Jesus. (laughs) That is a great one, sheep, isn’t it? Because there’s something like: pigs are intelligent, they’re useful farm animals as they wallow in the muck. But sheep! They’re useful for making jumpers, of course, but they really are pretty dumb. The great image of mankind. And they move in packs as well. They all head off the wrong direction together. There’s no particular leader,... Read more

Here’s a shocking quote from Elie Wiesel’s book, Night, that MUST be heard: “In the beginning there was faith—which is childish; trust—which is vain; and illusion—which is dangerous… “We believed in God, trusted in man, and lived with the illusion that every one of us has been entrusted with a sacred spark from the Shekkinah’s flame; that every one of us carries in his eyes and in his soul a reflection of God’s image. “THAT was the source if not... Read more

“Everywhere you turn, hierarchies are being challenged from below or transforming themselves from top-down structures into more horizontal and collaborative ones” (Thomas L. Friedman, The World is Flat. A Brief History of the Twenty-First Century, p. 44). Like I’ve been saying, transform or be transformed! Walk your path or be dragged (Carl Jung)! Resistance is futile (the Borg)! I’m confident there is a new way of being human, a new way of being a pastor, and a new way of... Read more