For example?

what ever questions you may have, my opinion Harpur, Borg, Crossan, Spong, Levine vere off main stream Christianity and Crossan, I believe uses Christian terminology then voids it of its meanings and rejects God , to Crossan, God is a projection that man places on the cosmos, that makes him an atheist 

Everyone who believes in God or doesn't, starts from a certain place and becomes conditioned to think about God in a certain way. Some walk into that conditioning later, and in limiting their view, call it 'discipline', some question it, wrestle with it- with every notion and question that arises along the way. The truth is, we can't all be in each others' heads interpreting their world views through the same lens because we've all had different lives. What we can do is agree to love one another in terms of the greater good for humanity. On some level, we who believe in God all believe that God supports the greater good. And those who don't also believe there is logically a greater good. So, why not start there?

Sorry, a little out of context. That was my response to BB.

What the original post talk about should have started in the 60's. My parents held similar views to all those scholars, but left the church in the late 60's. As a result, I believe they lost touch with the core message in a lot of ways- resorted to self interest without being aware they were moving that way. Now, it'd be hard to get many of them back into any church regularly, but despite what some say I think there's hope Christianity for my generation and younger- but it will look a lot different. It'll have to.

I find it very dishonest and deceving of  Crossans that he would  call himself a Christian but then reject that a Christian God even exists

but In Crossans case, he does not believe in a greater good, then step down from the pulpt 

God is not a Christian. He rejects that context. He doesn't reject love for humanity, does he?

agreed God is not a Christian, but God IS, in Crossen  belife, God is not 

I don't know that he believes that God is not. It seems to me he believes God is not confined to a particular context. I'd bet if you asked him- he might not believe God is confined to his own context. Doesn't mean we can't learn from that context. Doesn't mean Crossen doesn't believe in the greater good, IMO.

what ever Crossens theology is , he is not a beliver in mind independent being we call God, that makes him an athiest. 

he may believe in a greater good , which I believe he dose, but Crossen does not believe in a ultimate Good, that makes him 

an athiest 

yes of course 

http ://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aw9jvJp_nAo

He doesn't believe he's an atheist does he?

Maybe he does believe in an ultimate Good, but he has expressed it outside of a context that you understand. Doesn't make him an atheist.

he never admits what he is, a thiest or non thiest , but his interpertations of scripture is based on his athiestic views, simply because crossen rejects the notion of God, so there for he rejects a ressurection and miracels.

That would be impossible, an ultimate good indicates  a being other than humanity itself, which Crossen does not believe in 

On one hand- so do I. Today's discoveries are yesterday's miracles. But what do I know. I've never witnessed a miracle that someone couldn't explain away. I believe anything's possible. I also believe that belief in certain beliefs is purposeless. So even if they could happen what would they bring to the greater good, ultimately? To me the greatest miracle would be if we could agree that we all need to get along and cooperate for the greater good of one another- we're all connected and accountable to one another. We all carry a spark from the same light.

I'm almost sorry I started this thread.  I was hoping to hear from the UCC ministers and congregants.  I know that some here at WC don't like what the listed authors have to say.  I was hoping to get responses from people not afraid to question and express doubts at what has traditionally been taught.

I don't want or need another discourse on you're wrong and we're right accept it or go to the place of everlasting darkness!

.

If the mind encompasses both emotions and intellect (and the Roman idealism hates both when illustrated in the alternate self) ... then such a God-ism is pure crap in a physical sense leaving got to be mythological of somewhat like a dream in the non-existant mind ... without which people become mindless ...

So be IT! Though such crp could be fecund enough and stinky enough to make people in the PEW question! Alas they don't as follows tradition of: "Don't ask that!"

Thus people move beyond the church ... I return for the lighter values to see those that don't believe a person should think or be immersed in knowledge ... such floods of thought could disrupt the unthinking when the flood hits eM ... a no awe situation when they are deprived of awareness thereof ...

Yet some people still accuse me of lying when I state that I was told not to think (by the church I was raised in) and also that knowledge is evil according to Genesis 2 on the tree of logic (logos) and that Philosophy is evil ... while one perspective says that philosophy is the love of knowledge and wisdom of all things ... while all things or everything is a metaphor of God!

Would that set a somnolent mind in as stir of chaos?

what does debating  the existance of God have to do with lets say me getting along with a man like Crossen?

all im saying is, Crossen does not beleive in that spark from the same light you speak about , that makes him an athiest 

A decent man we can learn something from.

yes I do, but that does not stop me from arguing that the life with in him is a gift of God, just like it doesnt stop Crossen from preaching that Orthodoxy has got it wrong that his spark is not of God  because God simply 

does not exist 

as we can learn from other athiest and other religions and people, im sure hes a very nice man, just dont preach God  on Gods  pulpit from a position that you dont believe in 

Of course he's a decent man we can learn something from.  Am I saying scholars have all the answers - emphatically no, but they do make one think about what she/he believes and that is a good thing.  Blind acceptance is not what God requires of us.  If that were the case He/She would not have given us minds with which to think.

Hmmm. Some more thoughts on this, not fully formed. I'll come back to this tonight after work.

The point is , Crossen argues againts a God and explains away the ressurection and miracles in absence of a God, and yet calls himself a christian. 

so he believes no God exists

who does he pray to then????????????

Hi Happy Retiree:

These books are available for everyone to read. In the library of my previous UCCan congregation, all but Levine had been donated to the library by congregants, and were readily available and freely discussed by members of the congregation.

I think ministers don't teach and preach these from the pulpit because they don't want to offend the conservative members of their congregations. But every congregation has a book discussion group able to read and discuss any book they want.

The belief in the old, separate, supernatural authoritarian God still has a powerful hold on the Christian imagination. According to some surveys, 70% of professed Christians still believe in this kind of God.

Hi Happy Retiree,

Speaking only for myself.  I do not find Spong convincing.  Harpur iperhaps less so.  And I tend to read other scholarship. 

Again, speaking only for myself.  When I attended Seminary in the late 90's Spong was one text out of hundreds and I don't remember being assigned anything from Borg or Crossan.  Most of the scholarship I was directed to read was different.

Speaking only for myself I'm not any scholars answering machine.  It isn't my job, was never my job to swallow any theologians work whole just so I could regurgitate it later.  My understanding is that folk want evidence that I think all by myself.  So I read.  I read a lot.  I study what I read and then I process it alongside of everything else I have read.

Currently I am reading books by Christoph Schalk and Tom Bandy.

I don't know that folks don't want it.  I also don't know that if I shared it that they would appreciate it.  As I said above.  I'm not reading them, though I have read them.  I am reading other stuff.

The modern world is dead.  It is the post-modern world now.

Of the names you list only Borg fits into the post modern theological world.  Rob Bell, Stanley Grenz, Brian MacLaren, Stanley Haurwas are the big names now.  There are more but the list is pretty extensive.

It is pretty hard to keep up with everything coming down the pike.  Miroslav Volf is probably the most exciting theologian I have read recently.

Grace and peace to you.

John

I have been in many churches over many, many years and it seems to me that most sermons today could have been preached in the 60's.  The point I'm trying to make is that there is much scholarship (and I only mentioned the above authors because they came readily to mind) to suggest that we worry less about how factual the biblical accounts are and more about what truth the stories are trying to convey.

The most astounding words I've heard from the pulpit were, "Jesus was kiiled for political reasons."  Not the usual party line of, "He died for your sins."  It amazed me because, although I had read it, I had never actually heard anyone say it from the pulpit.

Many years ago I was in a church book store and I was purchasing some of these authors and a minister said to me, "I wish my congregation were reading those authors."  If that were to happen again I would ask him, "Have you introduced them to your congregants?"

RevJohn, I'm not for a second suggesting that you preach the gospel of Spong or Borg etc.  I am suggesting that perhaps it's time for congregations to be let in on scholarship ideas that most seminarians have known for years. 

They are. As far as I know. They edit:? Autocorrect probs? They are featured on the UCCan bookstore site. They are in many church libraries (well I guess I can only speak for the church I go to. I assume their books are in others.)

Have to agree with John. In my time at Emmanuel College I don't remember being assigned anything from the authors you cite. Spong leaves me cold to be honest. Harpur I'm not impressed with. Crossan is a fine historian whose work on early Christianity I've enjoyed. Borg is interesting in some ways, but largely uninspiring to me. 

I think these authors and their works are well suited to group discussions, etc. Preaching, however, is fundamentally the exposition of Scripture and the proclamation of the good news of the gospel. It's not leading a study group. Preaching by its very nature also has to reflect the views of the preacher. I'm unconvinced that my call is to explain to my congregation from the pulpit what Marcus Borg thinks. I do believe that my call is to be familiar with the broad trends of theological scholarship and allow that to inform and challenge me to grow in faith and understanding, and then to speak from a personal perspective about the good news as I have come to understand it.

As the shepherd of your flock is it not your calling to lead your congregants into new understandings and help them mature in faith. Forget Spong and all the others.  Good preachers teach - new ideas, new ways of looking at the same story. They do not just prattle on about the same old, same old every week.

It seems to me that the Easter story is always preached as if someone recorded it and these are the facts when in reality, as least as I perceive it, the gospel writers were simply trying to make sense of an overwhelming experinece in much the same way as the birth narratives were written to show how unique Jesus was. 

In this modern world and in light of the Gospel message, what sense does "Harpur, Borg, Crossan, Spong, Levine" make? Do they really address the Gospel itself or just historical stage drops? What part of the core Gospel message do they suggest is any different now than at anyother time? I find folks like these are far removed from any message closely resembling the promise of the Gospel and its covenant. I am not sure the pulpit is a place for scholarship or textual debates.... let alone areas for ascertaining hisorical accuracies...

I do not think scholarship would have prevented the exodus, and I do not think that the short-sighted use of scholarship made by some today, will reverse that exodus... The Gospel and its attendant faith are not subjects of scholarship or academics... As the poet Alexander Pope suggested, "A little learning is a dang'rous thing; Drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring: There shallow draughts intoxicate the brain, And drinking largely sobers us again.". But, being the happy go lucky crowd we are, me thinks we like shallow intoxications and are all too glad to taken in by the bartenders' stories...

The Christian message is still adapting to the new light being shed on scriptures... people made too much of scripture when they worshipped it, they make too much of it when they try to 'debunk' the Gospel by casting doubt on mere texts... The Gospel is a message from God to us... for us to personally hear and respond... perhaps the reason for the exodus is that people let someone else do their seeking and asking and knocking...

Its no longer Christianity once you void it of everything that makes the theology Christian.

Is he a threat to my belief, no not one bit, I have that which validates me. But I also have a right to refute his ridicules atheistic clams as he does towards Orthodoxy.

I do though find him disingenuous  

One thing they help (IMO) with is they strip down the bible to it's historical, cultural (and that's important) and linguistic context, instead of focusing on the 'magical thinking' aspects. Helps us see through all the layers of dogma.

actually alot of historians and bibical scolars disagree with there historical views, espically thouse of the Jewish people 

The Jewish people have more than one interpretation of their texts. There are several sects of Judaism.

what was Jesus?

http://www.jewfaq.org/m/movement.htm

He was a Jew. Does anyone know for sure what school of thought he was educated in (or do you believe he arrived as a baby knowing everything already)? He surely disagreed with some priests. Perhaps he learned from them all and discerned.

mabey you should watch the debate, 

www.youtube.com/watch?v=0jnBVXIL5-I

Good debate. Thank you for posting it. I listened to both sides. Overall, Crossen wins. Crossen wins, not because of the veracitity of his arguments (edit: I should say the perception or not of veracity of his argument i.e. arguing louder and faster doesn't make somebody right) or because he has more facts (because that could be debated for eternity- and who wants to be debating for eternity?). Crossen wins, in my opinion because he was patient, humble, and he made a lot of sense. Whereas, Craig went into the argument, not upholding his position, but first attempting to establish Crossen himself as foolish before the audience had heard him speak. Bully pulpit tactics- really obvious. William F. Buckey was biased to begin with and not a fair adjudicator (not to mention, he was an 'entertainer' with a persona that came through like a smug peacock who would attempt to diminish Crossens position with arrogant smugness), and at the end, in the review- even the interviewer snickered and sneered along with Buckley about Crossen when he was asking questions, as though they have some divine insider knowledge and Crossen was a fool, even though they wouldn't come right out and say it. Crossen came out looking better and more credible to me. Craig's argument was slicker, louder, and faster talking- but not stronger.That's not to say the he and Buckley aren't Christians. But I think they were unfair to Crossen and Crossen is very much a Christian. They just don't get him. I do. A lot of what he says resonates with me. I also disagree with Crossen on some things like the spiritual body. I don't agree with either side on that 100%. I believe the resurrected "body" in the flesh is all of us, while the individual spiritual body can be each of us- combined, is all of us.

And Crossen is by no means an atheist! Edit: that should be "Crossan".