I can only give away the love that I have received. I was taught that women were by nature in inferior to men, and the Bible was quoted to prove it. [CDATA[ Doctrines are never a description or definitionof our God experience. John Shelby Spong 27. Sometimes, you're just in the wrong place at the wrong time. The church is like a swimming pool. a[a9] = { googletag.pubads().setTargeting("resource", "author_45659"); He looks at the vastness of the universe and it looks hostile. John Shelby Spong God, Thinking, People 57 Copy quote I don't see Jesus as rescuing the fallen; I see Jesus as expanding the potential of life. } else { But I'm not fighting as the man he knew today, as a Gold. To me, neither option is worth pursuing. I operate with an emotional fearlessness, and I really feel music; I really feel songs. John Shelby Spong 82. God is not a Christian, God is not a Jew, or a Muslim, or a Hindu, or a Buddhist. Recipient of many awards, including 1999 Humanist of the Year,[6] Spong was a contributor to the Living the Questions DVD program and was a guest on numerous national television broadcasts (including The Today Show, Politically Incorrect with Bill Maher, Dateline, 60 Minutes, and Larry King Live). Oh this age! According to Spong, when Matthew said to go and make disciples of all nations, he placed words in the mouth of the risen Jesus. May your reign come. Thats where I think God is made visible.. "Walking into the Mystery of God" by John Shelby Spong, www.uua.org. Christianity is not about the divine becoming human so much as it is about the human becoming divine. How divine is the message that says for your finite failings you will be cast into the outer darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth (Matt. Are they people who God just didn't like? It has nothing to do with time periods, whether three days, forty days, or fifty days. We've collected the best John Shelby Spong Quotes. }("apstag", window, document, "script", "//c.amazon-adsystem.com/aax2/apstag.js"); His admirers acclaim him as a teaching bishop who makes contemporary theology accessible to the ordinary layperson he's considered the champion of an inclusive faith by many, both . Browse top 25 most favorite famous quotes and sayings by John Shelby Spong. The author of this book is not a single individual, but is at least three different writers/editors, who did their layered work over a period of 25 to 30 years. I don't see Jesus as rescuing the fallen; I see Jesus as expanding the potential of life. Christ must be served in every person, he said. Inequality for gay and lesbian people is no longer a debatable issue in either church or state. Spong described his own life as a journey from the literalism and conservative theology of his childhood to an expansive view of Christianity. If you begin to give people hope that there is a brighter future, there is a new tomorrow, then the people who were yesterday's terrorists become tomorrow's elected officials and they're part of the system. And this came after I had written a book called "Living In Sin" on the whole gay. url = "https://s.gr-assets.com/assets/mobile/phone_images-9e9093f0cfddba8c2b1e815375d976a3.css"; Tweet. Because that's when you get religious wars and persecutions and burning heretics at the stake. You can't go to church without praying ten or fifteen times for God to have mercy on you. You can't have a world where 50 percent of the people are dieting and 50 percent of the people are starving if you want stability. //]]> [15], New Testament Catholic scholar Raymond E. Brown was critical of Spong's scholarship, referring to his studies as "amateur night". Now they are people who have not found in institutional religion a God big enough to be God for their world. John Shelby Spong 1 Mother Nature is not sweet. g.parentNode.insertBefore(A, g) There is no way that the Fourth Gospel was written by John Zebedee or by any of the disciples of Jesus. And I dont mind saying that I dont invalidate any of those paths. John Shelby Spong Quotes - BrainyQuote American - Clergyman Born: June 16, 1931 Mother Nature is not sweet. [21], Mark Tooley, a Methodist who is president of the Institute on Religion and Democracy, a think tank noted for its critique of liberal religious groups, criticized Spong in 2010 as "brandishing the stale theologies and ideologies of a half-century ago". This is an opportune time for those who identify with liberal Christianity to take a critical look at his legacy. (function() { With the passing of retired Episcopal Bishop John Shelby Spong in September 2021, the movement known as Progressive Christianity has lost one of its most revered writers. window.Mobvious = {}; All of those are human systems which human beings have created to try to help us walk into the mystery of God. Theism is dead, I joyfully proclaim, but God is real. function isShowingBuyableFeatures() { Improve yourself, find your inspiration, share with friends. setDisplayBids: function() {}, if (window.csa) { I know rather that the sun, around which my planet Earth revolves, is a middle sized star in a galaxy called the Milky Way that has over a hundred billion other suns or stars within it. stylesheet.type = "text/css"; The Christ path is the path I've walked all my life, so it's normal and natural. Have these people simply not read the text? "The older I get, the more deeply I believe but the. Previously, she recapped the Chautauqua Lecture Series in 2019 and the Interfaith Lecture Series in 2018. In [the story of Jesus] I found a center for my being. "It is with great sadness that we announce the death of the Rt. Jesus becomes the captive of the hysterically religious, the chronically fearful, the insecure and even the neurotic among us, or he becomes little more than a fading memory, the symbol of an age that is no more and a nostalgic reminder of our believing past. return cookiePair[1]; "The older I get, the more deeply I believe but the. I know rather that the sun, around which my planet Earth revolves, is a middle sized star in a galaxy called the Milky Way that has over a hundred billion other suns or stars within it. var cookies = document.cookie.split('; '); He has also lectured at universities, conference centers, and churches in North . He claims he is a Christian yet he champions causes that historic Christianity has often . He attended the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, where he was elected to the Phi Beta Kappa honor society and graduated with a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1952. I live on the other side of Copernicus and Galileo; I can no longer conceive of God as sort of above the sky, looking down and keeping record books. There is no one who has been braver and ready to take whatever came his way for saving the truth., At 2 p.m. on Thursday, June 28, in the Hall of Philosophy, Spong, retired Episcopal bishop of Newark, discussed Matthew, his mantra and his legacy during his last lecture of the week and his career, titled Universalism: The Future of Christianity and Why I Remain a Christian, for Week Ones interfaith theme, Producing a Living Faith Today?, Todays the day, Spong said. As I look at the history of religion, I observe that new religious insights always and only emerge from the old traditions as they begin to die. })(); 5:22), yet he called his enemies a "brood of snakes" (Matt. He is as radically liberal as it is possible to be and still maintain a nominal identification with the name "Christian.". [CDATA[ stylesheet.href = url; For that view of resurrection is not believable, and if that is all there is, then Christianity, which depends upon the truth and authenticity of Jesus' resurrection, also is not believable. I don't think so. By contrast, Phillip Aspinall, the Primate of Australia, invited Spong in 2007 to deliver two sermons at St John's Cathedral, Brisbane. I think the worst way to go is to have somebody think they speak for God. [5] Spong also honors Robinson as a mentor in the opening pages of his 2002 book A New Christianity for a New World. John Shelby Spong. It calls us beyond our limits into the fullness of life - into a capacity to love people we are not taught to love - and into an ability to be who we are. John Shelby Spong Quotes 1. God is not a noun, that demands to be defined, God is a verb that invites us to live, to love and to be. In a 2013 interview, Spong credited the Anglican bishop John Robinson as his mentor in this journey and said reading Robinson's writings in the 1960s led to a friendship and mentoring relationship with him over many years. I do not think so. (wikipedia) Born On June 16, 1931. - John Shelby Spong. Top John Shelby Spong Quotes. Steve is an accomplished poet and social media expert based in Brooklyn, New York. John Shelby Spong (16 June 1931 - 12 September 2021) Introduction. The audience that I try to reach are members of what I call the church alumni association. Are they people who no one prayed for? Part 2 of the part time quotations list about odd-job and salaried sayings citing John Shelby Spong, Rob Lowe and Keith Ellison captions. try { I cannot say my yes to legends that have been clearly and fancifully created. That's sort of fourth-century Christianity that got turned into doctrines and dogmas that we've never been able to escape. Plenty of people out there think of me as the Antichrist or the devil incarnate because I do not affirm the literal patterns of the Bible. "[23], Albert Mohler, president of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, described Spong's teaching as constituting the historic definition of heresy, having "denied virtually every major Christian doctrine. I live on the other side of Charles Darwin and I can no longer see human light as having been created perfect and falling into sin, I see us rather emerging into higher and higher levels of consciousness and higher and higher levels of complication. Because as he becomes self-conscious, he's no longer part of nature. //
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