WHY DO I WRITE THIS?

Do I grind out this blog to inspire, inform, convince anybody of anything?  Nope. It's here for the same reason the other four blogs are around here someplace.  I like to write, I like to read the stuff I write and religion/spirituality in its many forms is one of the things I like to write about.  That is all.

Lots of prayin' goin' on

Do I pray?  Sure.  A lot.  Sometimes quite fervently. I feel no need to talk about it on Facebook or here. I like that Bible passage in the King James Version that says do it in your closet.  Newer versions say "room" but I'm quite comfortable praying in a closet.

BIG GOOFY NOISE

Militant atheists making lots of noise about  all religion being a man made fairy tale are just as goofy as militant fundamentalists making big noise about everything in the Bible being literally true.

WWJD?

What would Jesus do?  I have not a clue.  How could I know? By  something He  said or did in the Bible?  OK.  If you do know what He would do about things happening right now I am happy for you.

"My Bible Says ..."

Using the Bible to prove or disprove something  is crazy.

John Wesley and Sauer Kraut

Were it not for John Wesley and all the Methodists, I would not have bought a big jar of sauerkraut today. On my best behavior at the church supper, eating things I would not touch at home, I tasted sauerkraut for the first time.  Not bad.  Thanks, John.  It's good that I was not raised Lutheran. I might have to try Lutefisk. Or Lefse.  But who knows, I might like it.  God works in mysterious ways.  That would be real mysterious.

The Grandest old Hoax

Isn't it time for the "Madelyn Murray O'Hair getting religious broadcasting off the air" hoax to make the rounds again?   It's been decades. Oops, I should not have said that.  Somebody will pick it up and get it going again. She's been dead for a long time but  wherever she is, she will be glad to know she is still famous.  Or infamous.

Church people ain't all bad

I like church people.  The ones I know personally are not ignorant fools or dangerous nut cases. They are pretty good people.

Been to heaven?

A commentator about the "I went to heaven" books came up with an interesting phrase.  "Bad heaven theology."
I would say it in more down-to-earth fashion.  "Goofy ideas about what happens when you die." The goofier they are, the more books and movie tickets they sell.  
Is that terribly cynical?  I suppose it is.  Let us hope cynics do not go to hell.

Fake Church Bells

How old and traditional can a feller get?  I am so old and traditional that I don't want to hear those electronic church bells played through big speakers.  If I can't have real bells I don't want no bells at all.

Heavenly Sports?

I suppose there are huge TV screens in heaven, bringing in a perfect picture of every sports channel on the planet. There are lots of fans who will just refuse to go if they can't take sports with them. Not me.  I hope there is a small room someplace, far removed from the crazed sports people.  Just big enough for the handful of us who don't get it about sports. I just want to play my harp, sing in the choir and flap my wings once in a while to be sure my angel license hasn't been revoked. 
As for what hell might be like, I do not want to think about that right now.

Good old King James.

I still like the old Thee and Thou language of the  King James version of the Bible.  Do I believe God reached down from heaven in 1611 and declared it the one, true, final and authorized version of Holy Scripture?  Of course not.  

Fulton J. Sheen... if he were with us today

• Fulton J. Sheen was a masterful religious communicator on radio and in television's early days. His ratings beat some popular comedy shows.  Just think what he could do with today's technology.

         That's not my original idea.  I got it from one of today's great communicators, 
         Father Robert Barron.  I can't stop with just one of his videos. They are arresting.

The Road to Rome?

There are some Roman Catholic ideas, beliefs and practices that I like quite a lot.  Now I'm in trouble. I must tell my Catholic friends that I am a happy old mainline Prot, as Scott Hahn calls us.  (He said "All Prots go to hell")   I have no plans to hop on the Road to Rome like he did. Then I must assure strongly Evangelical friends that I am not going to embrace the Papacy, even as appealing as the present Holy Father is. Finally I will deal with those who have left The Catholic Church in anger or pain and want to tell me about it. So the only thing to do is just go into my self editing introvert mode and decide if I should delete the whole thing and keep these thoughts to myself.

The Reverend Doctor so and so

I like a clergyperson who has a lot of advanced education.  Oh boy, I can hear the comments this one will bring if anybody reads it. "What are you, some kind of far Left intellectual nerdy geek?  You might as well become a Unitarian. Isn't an ordination from a good Bible School enough?" Well, I like Unitarian Universalists.  They are interesting.  I did a couple of talks for their group a long time ago.  I have no plans to become one.  They are too much in their heads for me.
I like a Christian clergyperson who knows stuff about the Bible, church history,  what the early church fathers and the  great theologians have said over the centuries and a whole lot more that you can only get from a whole lot of education.

Avoid politics and religion??

Sometimes I get close to agreeing with those who say you should not talk about religion or politics.  They are so loaded with words that are prejudiced,  typical, stereotypical and fraught with emotional reaction.  You hear a word or phrase that makes a red flag pop up in your head and the hope of a nice, non confrontational conversation goes out the window. Oh, it's possible but not easy.

Extra goofy church stuff.

In church the far Left minister tossed a Bible to the floor in a dramatic demonstration of her conviction that it's full of stuff that is not true and downright wrong.  I didn't make that up or find it on the internet.  I was there. I can't say I was horrified.  It's more like the whole performance was just laughably stupid. It's like a fundamentalist hurling a copy of the Koran into the air.  I don't know if that has happened.  If it does, the whole world will know about it and the media pundits will love it. Some of them would applaud the lady preacher of whom I speak.  OK,   I have become a terrible cynic.

How social can the gospel get?

A friend says she learned in church that denigration of women, as practiced by Donald Trump, is a cause of rape.  That's OK with me if it came up in a church discussion group.  But I will vigorously shake my head and slap my forehead if it's from the Sunday Sermon. I can't handle that.  The old "Social Gospel" that I grew I grew up with a hundred years ago took its lumps from critics on the Right.  But it never got that outspokenly social. The infamous Father Coughlin provided that.  One of my favorite ministers had been in trouble for his anti-war stand in World War Two. But I never heard about it from the pulpit. He later became the social concerns director for one of the denomination's largest districts. He remains a cherished and admired memory.

One fine priest

I have discovered the most engaging religious scholar, thinker, writer and speaker that I have come across in many a decade. Father Robert Barron   is well known to others but it took a special online friend to turn me on to him.  He knows a lot about contemporary culture and he has some brilliantly insightful things to say about it. Plus his education and smarts, he's an appealing communicator.  He enjoys what he does and the audience enjoys watching him do it. I am hooked. If it matters at all, I'm not Catholic.

Church Forever

The Christian Church will survive in spite of itself. In spite of all the dreadful things done by its crazy leaders and members over the centuries.  Why will it survive? My far left friends will not like my simple minded answer a whole lot:  Because God wants it to.

Don't dally with the Dalai

I must be missing something about the Dalai Lama. I confess to being just a bit puzzled that he is apparently the most revered spiritual leader on the planet, almost always referred to as "His Holiness" by those who don't usually speak with such reverence about anyone.

The Bible Says ...

Quoting the Bible to prove or disprove something is a pointless pursuit than only leads to an argument.

Ain't no Christians

Contemporary thinking about religion:  "You are not a Christian if you _____."
Fill in the blank and you'll find others ready to help you get rid of him/her/them. I don't know if God is laughing or crying. I just want to cover my head, take a nap and hope it all goes away.

Joel's Teeth

I really, seriously try to avoid saying things that might offend my religious/spiritual friends.  That's not easy for one who enjoys nasty snide sarcasm. Sometimes it just pops out before I can stop it.  It happens when I watch Joel Osteen.  He sure has a lot of pearly whites.  How can anybody take him seriously? There, I said it.  Will I go to hell? Will my Joel fan friends unfriend me?

You can't win

This one will get me in trouble if anybody reads it.  That's why I put it here rather than on Facebook where folks love a good fight.  Here goes.  Way back, far back, I called myself a religious Liberal.  The L word didn't mean what it seems to mean these days. If being liberal means saying vile. obscene  or silly things like "Conservatives have no right to call themselves Christians" about anyone who speaks on the negative side of some current hot button issue, I would be inclined to call it reverse fundamentalism.  But that won't work either. It would offend my fundamentalist friends.  Yup, I have some.  They are quite decent, even admirable in their good works.  I don't even care  if they  pray for me to change my misguided thinking.  No matter what you say about politics, religion or just about anything else, somebody gets sore.  You can't win.

The Duggers? Don't ask/

Reason #457 why I would not want t be a clergyperson.  Questions like "What do you think about the Duggars?"  I would get in trouble by answering "What do you think?  You should make up you own mind." That's not the kind of answer folks want from the preacher.

Facebook Prayerbook

Facebook looks like a big prayer meeting. Members are asking for prayers and getting  nice  responses all the time.  I hope this does not sound too terribly snide and snarky. That is my style.  But just this once I don't mean it that way. I like praying. It  is  good thing.  You can pray for me any time, even if you pray for me to come around to your way of thinking. But my prayer life is nobody's business.  I won't talk about in on Facebook or anyplace else.

The other "F" word

The grand old word "Faith" is taking a beating lately. It's tossed around pretty loosely. You can  believe anything you want to or nothing at all if that's your preference and still be a person of faith and a member of a faith community.  That is weird.

Robert Schuller. Let him R.I.P.

I feel sad about the late Robert Schuller of Crystal Cathedral fame.  His squabbling family should shut up, bury the hatchet and let him rest in peace.

Holy person of God

We never got over that old double standard ... the notion that clergy should somehow be holier, wiser and more loving than the rest of us and not capable of doing dumb, stupid unethical and immoral things. Clergypersons are wonderfully and terribly human.  So let's give them a break for the human part, OK?

FACEBOOK RELIGION

There's a lot of religious B.S. and baloney on Facebook.  So what's the difference between that and what I publish here? Not much.  Only difference is I admit that mine is half-baked mutterings.  Which is just a creative way of saying B.S. and baloney.
 
Unlikely as it might be that you are reading this and even less probable that you give a rodent's rump or a cleric's collar about my Good Friday reminiscent musings... it's the next post.

GOOD FRIDAY BACK IN THE DAY

Good Friday was a big thing in the 30s and 40s.  A great many businesses closed from noon until three.  Churches of various denominations joined together for a three hour service featuring Good Friday sermons by three of the town's leading clergy.  Some of that still happens but not on the scale of how it was done back there.
Some cities carried the service on radio.  In Detroit the Fox Theater was the site for a big service and the entire three hours were broadcast on a major radio station each year. I still remember listening to the grand oratory, choir singing and organist Ole Foerch playing the Fox Theater Wurlitzer.  The Good Friday observance was that important.
That wouldn't work today.  A merchant who closed during that period would probably be charged with injecting personal faith into the business, not acceptable in today's multicultural society.  And Atheists would demand equal air time. Oh well. for us old folks it's a treasured memory.

Big bad religious traditiion?

I like religious tradition.  I like myth and legend.  They co-exist quite comfortably for me.  Much of tradition is built upon myth and legend. I know that.  So what?  I don't buy the idea that myth is good and tradition is bad. So kindly do not tell me that I must throw out one  to find meaning in the other. 

IT'S IN THE BOOK

So I hold the terribly old fashioned view that it would be nice if everybody had at least a basic, rudimentary idea of what's in the Bible ....even if they don't believe a word of it. Funny thing is, those who don't believe a word of it often know more about it than those who make a lot of noise about believing it.

BUT SERIOUSLY, GOD...

Religious people take themselves so seriously. And the progressives who claim they are spiritual but not religious do it, too. Sometimes more than the religious ones.

Old Church Guy

Pretty much like my other 4 blogs...or 5 or however many there are... this one is kinda different than others about religion and spirituality and church stuff.  That might be because I am quite terribly old. Oh, go ahead, take a look.  Most posts are short.

Boy? Girl? Both?

Is God male?  Nope.  Female? Not that either.  Both?  As in "Mother-Father God."?   It is my half baked opinion that God don't need no gender.

Boxes, Labels, bla bla bla

There are quite a lot of things I like about the traditional church.  Does that put me in the Fundelical box? There are lots of things in the Bible that are not literally true.  So does that get me labeled as an Agnostic or worse? We are what we are.  Whatever that is.

Church Invitations

There is a list of things I will never say to a fellow human person.  Near the top is "I know you would like my church."

Begone, you Fundies!

I do not share the view of some on the far left that we should scoop up all the Christian Fundamentalists and Evangelicals and ship them off to an island or some other planet where they can't do any damage.

Getting Personal

OK, so I broke my rule about keeping posts short and not too serious.  This one got out of control.
-------------------------

I am so grateful that I never had a crisis of faith or a big dramatic religious struggle. I have not been rejected by a church or harmed by a church or clergy.  I did not need to leave a church that taught wrong ideas that I had to unlearn or outgrow.  I did not need to search for a church that was right for me.  A great many of my friends have traveled that road.  It must be a painful thing. To put a positive spin on it, many of those same friends did find a group, on the Right or the Left,  where they are now accepted, appreciated, needed and involved.  That is a very good thing. I guess that's what all churches should strive to be.
I made one church change but it was not dramatic, not like I quit Christianity and became a Buddhist or something.  Not for a negative reason either.  I felt that a fledgling  group needed me more than the Methodists did at that time. But I carefully avoided saying that I had "left" my Methodist heritage. I never used that word. 
I was very involved in church affairs for a great many years.  Suffered through too many board meetings,  fancied myself a hotshot lay preacher for a while.  I no longer attend anyplace. Corporate worship is good, valuable and important but I don't feel a need to be part of it right now.   My age and introvert nature keep me comfortable  thinking, observing and writing about what's happening in religion and spirituality. And it gives me freedom to write things that I would not say if I were a committed member of a particular church.

A most superior Mother.

I am so pleased that EWTN is running those old Mother Angelica programs. Her handling of the phone calls is something wonderful. Touching, funny, wise and always loving. Not being Catholic, I don't know what it takes to become a saint but I think you have to have a miracle to your credit.  I'd say starting a world wide Catholic radio and TV network in Irondale, Alabama is a pretty good start.

Box me slap me. Not.

Alright.  If you absolutely must put me in some religious box and slap a label on it, call me a liberal mainline Protestant Christian.  I say that knowing that it doesn't mean precisely the same thing to anybody else that it means to me.  Which is why I don't much like boxes and labels.  And I'm not at all interested in a long, boring detailed discussion of just what it means to me.  So don't ask.

The Labels we get

Do not identify yourself as a Christian.  You will be labeled a right wing nutcase.  Misguided at best, dangerous at worst.

Heavenly Days!

The boy who said he went to heaven now says he made it up.  Does that disturb me?  Nope.  Makes me smile a wry smile but that's about all.  None of the goofy religious or spiritual things people do bother me all that much.  It goes with the territory. I suspect that those who have a great need to know what happens when we die will say the boy really did go to heaven and come back to tell us about it but he is too young to understand it so he thinks he made it up.