The Bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of New Hampshire, Gene Robinson, was on The Daily Show last night. In case you missed it, here’s the first part of the interview: The Daily Show with Jon Stewart Get More: Daily Show Full Episodes,Political Humor & Satire Blog,The Daily Show on Facebook A few of his statements that stood out to me: “Even and especially people of faith are seeing that there is a way forward on this gay marriage issue.”... Read more
I’m getting back to my series of posts in which I “Get Theological” with the range of topics common in Christian systematic theology. In case you missed any, so far I’ve written about God, being human, Jesus as Christ, remember Sabbath, church, and the bible. This post focuses on the Christian claims about fundamental flaws in human nature: Sin. There’s a long tradition of theologians describing what sin is and where it came from, and assumptions about it by Christians... Read more
So, apparently, we’ve been doing it all wrong. Christianity isn’t a religion! It’s a philosophy. Here’s how Bill O’Reilly explains it to us: Also you heard an atheist on this program last night say the federal holiday of Christmas imposes religion on him. What religion would that be? He says Christianity. But Christianity is not an organized religion, a church that can be imposed. There are many different churches that promote the Christian philosophy in many different ways. Does the... Read more
You may have heard by now that The Church of England recently voted down a measure that would have allowed women priests to become bishops. {~audible sigh~} Sarah Coakley points out in her article on the whole matter that the two bodies of church leadership, the houses of bishops and clergy, overwhelmingly voted in support of this measure, but the house of laity that is the third part of the General Synod effectively defeated this measure with its very narrow... Read more
“The Lutheran maxim that the finite bears the infinite (finitum capax infiniti) is an incarnational and sacramental summary of this good news. Indeed the good news of Christmas is that the Word is born into the flesh of all creation.” This statement frames my answer to the latest #progGOD question: Why an Incarnation? What does it tell us about God, about humans, about the world? An incarnation tells us that the human, finite, material world is in fact capable of... Read more
These are the kinds of things I want to hear more men saying about guns and masculinity. In the days after Kansas City Chiefs linebacker Jovan Belcher fatally shot his girlfriend, Kasandra Perkins, and then himself, both in front of other people, we’ve been having our periodic too-short-conversations about gun culture. Earlier this year, following the mass shooting at the Sikh community in Wisconsin, I wrote about how talking about this after a terrible tragedy is, for those involved, too... Read more
These were the three most-viewed posts here at feminismxianity in November 2012: David Frum (Surprisingly?) Gets it Right on Abortion Pussy Riot = Feminism + Religion + Russia Seriously, Where’s Jesus? This last one was also picked up by and published in my local newspaper, the Jacksonville Journal-Courier, which has been lots of fun. My contribution to the Patheos Movie Club feature on Life of Pi, Can A Story Make You Believe in God?, was closely next on the list,... Read more
Sally Steenland, Director of the Faith & Progressive Policy Initiative at the Center for American Progress, interviewed me recently as part of our work on Faith & Reproductive Justice this year. The transcript, as well as the audio podcast, are available on the CAP website. Here is a sample: SS: Let me ask you another question about the election. Some commentators who noted the defeat of Tea Party candidates like Todd Akin from Missouri and Richard Mourdock from Indiana have... Read more
I’ve had the privilege of worshipping and speaking at herchurch in San Francisco a couple of times in recent years. It’s a creative community committed to celebrating the divine presence “through many names and metaphors,” particularly those that are female: “We are a diverse community, standing firmly within the Christian tradition in order to re-image the divine by claiming her feminine persona in thealogy, liturgy, church structure, art, language, practices, leadership, and acts of justice. Challenging the church’s restricted language of... Read more
In the interview that Sally Steenland, Director of the Faith and Progressive Policy Initiative at the Center for American Progress did with me, published earlier this week, I noted that we should absolutely celebrate the election of the most sexually, racially, and religiously diverse Congress in history. In case you haven’t yet seen it, ThinkProgress put together this great infographic depicting the many diversities increasing in the Congress after the 2012 election. Though The Friendly Atheist has written more about... Read more
Caryn Riswold
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