How (Not) to speak of Pete Rollins

We spent the week with Pete Rollins, author of “How (Not) To Speak of God“, and a founder of ikon. What can I say except it was fun. Pete is a great guy and if you ever get the chance to hang out with him, do it. I say it is even better than reading his  book.

arg says the pirate

So, I'm still breathing air, for the most part. I have recently returned from a road trip in the great southwest of the USA. My travel companions and I hit Vegas(the fakest city I have ever visited), San Francisco, LA, San Diego and finally back home in 7 days, by car. The trip was fun, exhausting, fun, annoying and fun. We put something like 3000 miles on the car we rented(the car in itself is a story that I have told to some of you already)…Anyway the trip made me wonder, more than once, would Jesus have me punch someone out to help them learn others centered living? I decided not, but I really wondered for a bit. he, he, he…

the brief rundown- 

Vegas is a farce, like much of the world system and its consumerism that is so consistently forced upon us.

SF- i wish i would have had more time there

LA- traffic, traffic, traffic

SD- yes, oh thank God we made it, oh no do we have to leave already?

Death VALLEY looks like the moon,only with 109 degree F temps.

Yosemite- was snowed in. This caused us a four hour drive out of our way in order to find a cross-able mountain pass.

and I have many thoughts and stories to tell, for another time…

lots to say

it's true, more or less, that I have so much to say, and that is why I have'nt really said anything for a while.

The semester is coming to and end and the working full-time, running another business full-time, and going to school has kept me from posting the last few weeks…

If anyone out there is still interested I would like to share a short story I have been working on. and I will as soon as I figure out how to upload a file… 
also, remind me to tell you all about my thoughts on good news and St. Catalina day- how that led us to buy lunch for a king snake wielding homeless person… 

Gizoogle

Science- Anti God?

For too long it has seemed among some of those who dot the religious landscape of America that Science was somehow the enemy of faith. It appeared that "fact" became the opposite of belief, unless it somehow backed presuppositions…

Science was about proof, and faith was about belief, at times in the unbelievable, even contrary to the evidence.

No more! Those who follow the world of theoretical physics, cosmology, and quantum sciences already know what I'm getting at. Theoretical physicists such as Michio Kaku are now dedicating themselves to understanding what they call the “mind of God”. This, they say is something like a song, a melody playing throughout the "multiverese", the universe is aparently to small these days! We are on the cusp of a new scientific revolution akin to the Copernican revolution in its magnitude with tremendous theological implications.

My take is that those most dedicated to the search for God, (the people of faith) should lead the way in putting language and heart to what science is just now discovering, and what we perhaps have felt all along.

"She was like the sweetest of songs,

 

I didn't know the words at first so I just hummed along" –Nawbaw

You can catch a video of Dr. Kaku talking about all this and more courtesy the BBC.

Here…

St . Patrick

Happy St. Patrick’s day. St Patrick is one of my favorite Saints, no kidding. He was perhaps the first person to actually take the story of Jesus and His way of life to the ends of the known world, at his time, (early 5^th century). Ireland, at that time was actually beyond the reaches of the great Roman Empire, Patrick or Patricius was originally from Britain and ended up in Ireland as a slave. If you haven’t read How the Irish Saved Civilization by Thomas Cahill, you are missing out on a great telling of one of the most overlooked periods of history and yet one of the most important.

I was sent the following article in an email today; it speaks to some of the fascinating story of one of my hero’s, St. Patrick. Enjoy.

“If you ask people who Saint Patrick was, you’re likely to hear that he was an Irishman who chased the snakes out of Ireland.

It may surprise you to learn that the real Saint Patrick was not actually Irish—yet his robust faith changed the Emerald Isle forever.

Patrick was born in Roman Britain to a middle-class family in about A.D. 390. When Patrick was a teenager, marauding Irish raiders attacked his home. Patrick was captured, taken to Ireland, and sold to an Irish king, who put him to work as a shepherd.

In his excellent book, How the Irish Saved Civilization, Thomas Cahill describes the life Patrick lived. Cahill writes, “The work of such slave-shepherds was bitterly isolated, months at a time spent alone in the hills.”

Patrick had been raised in a Christian home, but he didn’t really believe in God. But now—hungry, lonely, frightened, and bitterly cold—Patrick began seeking out a relationship with his heavenly Father. As he wrote in his Confessions, “I would pray constantly during the daylight hours” and “the love of God . . . surrounded me more and more.”

Six years after his capture, God spoke to Patrick in a dream, saying, “Your hungers are rewarded. You are going home. Look—your ship is ready.”

What a startling command! If he obeyed, Patrick would become a fugitive slave, constantly in danger of capture and punishment. But he did obey—and God protected him. The young slave walked nearly two hundred miles to the Irish coast. There he boarded a waiting ship and traveled back to Britain and his family.

But, as you might expect, Patrick was a different person now, and the restless young man could not settle back into his old life. Eventually, Patrick recognized that God was calling him to enter a monastery. In time, he was ordained as a priest, then as a bishop.

Finally—thirty years after God had led Patrick away from Ireland—He called him back to the Emerald Isle as a missionary.

The Irish of the fifth century were a pagan, violent, and barbaric people. Human sacrifice was commonplace. Patrick understood the danger and wrote: “I am ready to be murdered, betrayed, enslaved—whatever may come my way.”

Cahill notes that Patrick’s love for the Irish “shines through his writings . . . He [worried] constantly for his people, not just for their spiritual but for their physical welfare.”

Through Patrick, God converted thousands. Cahill writes, “Only this former slave had the right instincts to impart to the Irish a New Story, one that made sense of all their old stories and brought them a peace they had never known before.” Because of Patrick, a warrior people “lay down the swords of battle, flung away the knives of sacrifice, and cast away the chains of slavery.” -From Break Point.

our father

I was in a car with my sister in laws’ husband in the Finnish Archipelago. We were discussing culture and indigenous expressions of Faith in God. Now this guy is smart, really smart a Phd. of some sort. And apparently the conversation was at least somewhat intellectually stimulating to him. I am not sure he would consider himself to be a religious person. As we were discussing he turned to me, boiling it all down and said “What is that God wants from us?”

What a question, that may be the question. The one humanity has been grappling with from the beginning. I don’t remember what I said. Probably something that at least on the surface sounded smart. I’m not certain that my response was even close to adequate considering the magnitude of the question. I have since thought a lot about that question, and still think a lot about it.

I think that different people have different answers to this question, as is evidenced by the various religions of the world, (I will for the sake of simplicity include things such as science and philosophy in this category because they really function as pseudo religions).

Think about it, how you see God determines how you answer that question. If you see him as a judge for example, always inspecting your actions, thoughts, religious practice etc. well then he wants you to do things right, or the right way. If you see him as a clockmaker that wound up the universe with a bang and let it loose to take care of itself, well then he perhaps wants us to play our part, like cogs in a machine, and nothing more. So then how we view God determines how we answer the question of what he wants.

I know some people who are so concerned with believing the right things. They so much so that if you don’t intellectually assent to that which they do, well then you are going to end up in hell. They seem to be so concerned with reading the right translation of the bible for instance, or using the right terminology. It makes me wonder how they see God. I personally have trouble with picturing God up in heaven being so concerned about which book this or that person is reading all the while millions are starving in Africa and dying of Aids. And the whole idea of God being off in heaven separated from the daily muck that we find ourselves in, how do we come up with that idea? What kind of lonely religion does that lead to?

When thinking about all this type of stuff I am challenged to look at my thoughts and practices as indicators to how I truly picture God. Is he judging, critical or distant to me? Do my thoughts, practices and human interactions betray these conceptions of Him? Do yours?

I am also reminded of a little part of a prayer which begins “Our Father…” And I wonder how I answer the question when I view God as a loving Father. How do you answer the question of what God wants from us when you view him as a loving Father?

the scene

Tonight we had a cool show at the Living Room, despite the drama… About a 100 people showed up to see some pretty rockin your socks bands, like The Jon Benet and The American Black Lung.

One of the bands, during their set threw a mic threw our soundproofing wall; I should say the lead singer of the band did. So we decided that we wouldn’t pay them. Now, we decided this not only to recoup the costs of replacing the specialized wall. But also because they disrespected “the scene” and they should not do that. I was breaking this news to the guitarist of the band and of course he was little upset. Which was understandable, they were touring and had to pay for gas to get to the next gig. I said hey, look we’re here day in and day out trying to provide a space for the scene to thrive, and you guys, you blow in and blow out, and you disrespect the scene, what’s up with that? I assured him that I understood it wasn’t his fault, it was the singer. But I said, hey man you’re a part of something, what the singer does effects you, it sucks, I know I feel bad telling you that we can’t pay you because of this but hey, I mean you understand right?

Well, he got it, after all, he got it. I think the band ended up laying into the singer pretty hardcore. He came in and apologized to us later. He said to us very genuinely that he hopes the money that we were going to pay them covers the cost of replacing the wall.

It occurred to me in that moment how much we effect one another. Especially for those of us who live in community, that what we bring, good or bad affects everyone else in the community. Sometimes we need each other to jump on us like this band did to their singer, and say hey man your disrespecting “the scene” and that’s not cool. Maybe for us “the scene” is humanity and the world.

Later on the band they were touring with asked if there was anything they could do for them. I explained the situation; they saw it, and agreed it wasn’t cool what they did. I said hey you can split what we paid you, with them, but that sucks for you. They said yeah, but were a team, and he smiled. I shook his hand and said right on man, that’s what it’s all about.

“the scene” was in this other band as well, and it was beautiful.

Maybe we can all learn from it.

I like new stuff too

So I decided that I would write something. This decision is mostly motivated by self induced guilt, just so you know. I read other blogs, and I find myself, (boy would that be a weird place for a period), a little annoyed when “they” don’t post anything for a week. I guess I, like everyone else, like to see new things. Sometimes I don’t even read the new posts. It’s just somehow comforting to know that they are there. That someone is blogging.

So Here is my new post, this is it. Rest assured that someone is blogging.