Frustrated
It is frustrating when people look past their history and fall into a narrative that they believe regardless of the past. It is frustrating is when people do not look into the idea of changing and reforming. Lots of frustration.
Read MorePositive Immigration Rhetoric
A conversation about weddings and immigration as well as the comic culture and great keys for the bassoon. Jerrod Hugenot joins Jonathan for this first part of their time together.
Read MoreMozart Morality
For this deep conversation, Jonathan and Doug geek out on Mozart’s great opera Don Giovanni. Yes, it gets a little music nerdy at times, but they also look at the theological themes that can be found in this classic Don Juan story.
Read MoreNot Easy Listening
The arts are not necessarily meant to be a salve for people speaking to the lowest common denominator of experience, but something that can offer a depth of experience drawing the individual into more profound truth wherein one may encounter the divine
Read MoreWhat Me Believe?
Believing seems to be hinged on a choice. There is a moment when someone can chose to believe or to not believe and then live life accordingly. The risky part of this is that it takes away an ontological reality that many people (believers or non-believers) like to hold to and instead say that we just do not know. So choose one or the other and live.
Read MoreShow Me Your Papers
Authority is not claimed by an individual, but is given by the community whether it be a structured hierarchy or a local congregation. This makes authority relational by nature and when one breaks relationship with the community one’s authority as a clergy person comes into question. So be nice to each other!
Read MoreDestined to be Free
For a Calvinist God is sovereign, in control, and that offers a good deal of comfort. Unless you are not “in” but then we won’t know if that is the case or not until this life is over. So you should be a Pascalian Calvinist, entwining the Divine Wager with God’s sovereignty. For some reason Jonathan and Josh missed that point.
Read MoreClosed Fisted
It is important to remember that it was violence that was the cause of Christ’s death and he did not respond in kind. In his resurrection we do not find a response around the notion of “getting even” but instead around love and forgiveness. So many Christians seem to forget this, seem to embrace the violence that is very real in our world, and accept it as a given. Christ calls us to a better path.
Read MoreLet's Get Political
We are dealing with and working with people. Some of these people have their own religious story and others do not, but they are all people with their own struggles, worries, and ideals. It is important that in working with people in the political arena that we continue to share and show the love of Christ to all that we encounter.
Read MoreThe Many Faces of Jesus
Each gospel offers a different perspective of Jesus, a different approach and understanding of who Jesus is and there may be some wisdom to this. You can never know someone fully through just one perspective, so with four we find a greater depth to the person and work of Jesus Christ. Perhaps then you can try to offer a fifth perspective (and we always like a fifth) – which would be yours. Listen to the episode, their pithy summary of the different gospels, and consider what your story of Jesus might be.
Read MoreMo' Money, Mo' Money
There is a real problem with the amount that some have in comparison with the amount that others have. It is a problem when some are living in lavish excess and others in the abhorrent squalor. I suppose you could say that they are in favor of sharing the wealth. ... The voice of religion needs to have a place at the cultural table when considering matters of economics. There is something deep-seeded about religions (most of them) that pulls people to consider again and again the least of society and to ask how certain policies and practices are effecting them. So it is economic as well as political, but that is no surprise.
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