1. Watch your thoughts and feelings and urges. Close your eyes, stay quiet for 20 minutes, and observe what is going on in your mind and your body. What claims your attention? What emotions and bodily sensations do you feel? What ideas and plans and memories bubble up? Simply be present for your experiences, like a trusted, caring friend, without trying to judge or change what you observe. God is the one within you who observes all with loving attentiveness... Read more
Yesterday, I read about the 2-year old child who shot herself by accident in North Carolina over the weekend. Then I read about the horror of another school shooting in Nevada. Only hours later — shots rang out again on our block in North Philadelphia, for the second time this week. This time a bullet went through the window of one of the houses owned by our non-profit. I was talking to a friend about my anger over the 300... Read more
This morning on the Today Show, co-host Savannah Guthrie interviewed Dick Cheney about his heart condition, the Tea Party, and the Republican Party role in the government shut down. Cheney’s remarks on the government shutdown caught my attention, especially from the viewpoint of mimetic theory. Guthrie began the interview by stating that, “A lot of people see this current time as a moment when the Republican Party is almost in a civil war with itself. Do you think the government... Read more
21 Big Ideas from 21 Leaders in 21 Minutes Each. That’s the enticing tagline for the upcoming Christianity 21 Conference taking place January 9-11, 2014 in Denver, Colorado. Produced by emergent Christian leaders and event gurus Tony Jones, Doug Pagitt, and Sarah Cunningham, the conference brings together 21 exciting and diverse voices of faith to share their big thoughts on the future of Christianity. There will be well-known names (Nadia Bolz-Weber, Phyllis Tickle, Paul Rauschenbush, Bruce Reyes-Chow, and Kent Dobson) and... Read more
René Girard has said that his entire mimetic theory “has existed silently in common language”, hidden in plain sight we might say, in the modern usage of the word scapegoat. First coined by William Tyndale to refer to the goat who escapes being sacrificed in the atonement liturgy recounted in Leviticus 16, the (es)caped goat has figured prominently in atonement theories since the dawn of Christianity. But why was it the un-sacrificed goat who come to be the figure of victimization? How did we... Read more
Far too many churches are places where people are expected to show up with the rough edges planed off or hidden, minds clear, and hearts aligned. We need to find new ways to welcome people who are struggling. Read more
For the past four decades, the Shalem Institute for Spiritual Formation in Washington, D.C. has been a leading light in the Christian contemplative movement in this country and around the world, serving clergy, spiritual directors, lay people, and individuals seeking to open themselves more fully to God’s presence and call in their work and lives. Now, to celebrate its 40th anniversary, the Shalem Institute is launching a 40-hour Contemplative Prayer Vigil — an intentional time of silent prayer open to all... Read more
One of the big hurdles when it comes to teaching nonviolent Atonement is the anger, or wrath, of God. Those of us who promote mimetic theory and the nonviolent view of Atonement claim that there is no wrath within God. Which means that when it comes to the Atonement on the cross, it’s not God’s wrath that needs to be appeased. As Michael Hardin says in his book The Jesus Driven Life, when it comes to wrath “We humans are the ones who need to... Read more
Today (October 4), Christians around the world remember one of the great heroes of our faith, and the Pope’s namesake – Francis of Assisi. But Francesco Bernadone (Francis of Assisi), who died on October 3, 1226 must be laughing at the irony of it all. He was one of the first critics of capitalism, one of the earliest Christian environmentalists, a sassy reformer of the church, and one of the classic conscientious objectors to war. Even though it’s hard to... Read more
[Join our live chat with Michael Hardin of Preaching Peace on Patheos’s premium content channel Teaching Nonviolent Atonement this Thursday at 11:00 central. We will discuss mimetic theory and the upcoming second edition of Michael’s book The Jesus Drive Life: Reconnecting Humanity with Jesus, with a special emphasis on two new chapters, one on the Letter to the Hebrews and the other on the Revelation to John.] The landscape of American Christianity, indeed, of world Christianity, is changing. Of that... Read more
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