I’ve got a different kind of answer to the most recent Question That Haunts: Since being diagnosed with cancer six months ago, I find myself revisiting my understanding of terms like faith and hope. Next month I preaching about faith the topic of faith. In the process of preparing for the two sermons I am going to preach the thought occurred to me that I might benefit from other people’s insights. Here’s my question, how would you define faith? What... Read more
Robert Jones points us to some interesting stats. Maybe marijuana is the next issue, widening the gulf between younger and older Christians in America. …while half (50 percent) of Christian young adults believe that marijuana use should be legal, only approximately 1-in-5 (22 percent) Christian seniors agree. Similarly, Christian young adults (52 percent) are more than twice as likely as Christian seniors (25 percent) to say that the use of marijuana is morally acceptable. And although a majority (54 percent)... Read more
Callid Keefe-Perry has recently been named as a new co-host of Homebrewed Christianity, and he’s starting a PhD in practical theology at BU. He’s a Quaker, an improv actor, and a teacher of acting. He’s posted a first draft of his theology of ministry, which is probably something that more pastors should do, or at least reflect on. I don’t agree with all of it, but it’s interesting reading, especially if you’re somewhat unfamiliar with the Quaker tradition. It begins:... Read more
At Slacktivist, Fred shows that TBN is doing some fuzzy math when counting their conversions over the years: Let’s do the arithmetic here: 36 million conversions in 40 years comes out to 75,000 per month. So either February was a horrifically slow month for TBN — with 74,150 fewer conversions than usual. Or else February was pretty typical, and the truth is that it will take TBN more than 3,000 years* to reach 36 million conversions at its current pace.... Read more
You may have already seen the above test, given to 4th graders at Blue Ridge Christian Academy in Greenville, SC (as confirmed by Snopes, where you can also see the second page of the test and read the backstory). Yeah, that’s pretty bad. On the other hand, you’ve got these three amazing teenage girls who won the 2011 Google Science Fair and gave a talk at TEDxWomen. It is those two juxtaposed images of youth engaging science with which I’m... Read more
When I talk to journalists, I regularly need to ask them not to refer to me as “Pastor Tony Jones,” or “Tony Jones is a Christian pastor…” That’s because I am not, currently, a pastor. Call me a “minister” or a “clergyperson” or a “theologian-in-residence,” but not a pastor. “Pastor” is a role, not a title. Even better than a noun, it’s a verb, and if one is “to pastor,” then one needs a congregation to pastor. Deriving from the... Read more
My friend and fellow Minnesotan, Jay Bakker, is known to throw his Bible to the ground during his talks, in order to break his audiences of their bibliolatry. At first blush, it seems like an act of sacrilege, but his point is that the Bible is ink on a page, whereas the Word of God is something more than that. The always insightful Stanley Fish draws our attention to a class at Florida Atlantic University, in which students were asked... Read more
As much as you will after watching this: HT: Keith DeRose Read more
In case you missed it over the weekend (since I missed my Friday deadline), on Sunday I posted my response to last week’s question, in which I argued that God is not omniscient in the way that most people think God is. This week’s question comes from Steve, a pastor. I know that a lot of reader of this blog struggle with “faith” and “belief,” and that many of us have one foot in faith and one foot out. So... Read more
Odyssey Network asked me what I thought of Christian leaders like Jim Wallis and Rob Bell coming out in favor of marriage equality now, after being silent (Bell) or against gay marriage (Wallis) in the past. Here’s my response: Read more
Theoblogy
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