Why We Fight

Blair Talks

I like to talk... Well really I like to think and if someone else happens to be around me when I am thinking I will think out-loud with them or to them. 

When I am around the same people for very long, they sometimes get tried or hearing me "talk." This happened a few days ago. I was going on and on about how it was not right for the world to be run by the oil and car companies today or the railroads yesterday. Then the person I was talking to said I needed a cause to actually do something about it. Well I don't want a "cause" my ideas are bigger than a "cause" but I do need to do and not just talk about the world's problems. 

That is when I saw a film about The Technology, Entertainment, and Design Conference (TED). They have four days, each year, of talks (which I love) but then they give three TED prizes to ideas that could change the world. As part of the prize, they grant the person with the idea one wish that everyone at the conference will help grant. (It is sort of like a prayer request but one that is not a waste of my time because people actually answer it-- they don't just sit around waiting for "God" to do all the work). Bono was one of the first people to make a wish. His wish led to the one campaign. 

TED is a place for us to talk and think and share our ideas (and by "our" I mean humanities) and also to turn the best of those ideas into reality. 

Check it out at www.ted.com  

    

Who Killed the Electric Car?

I so want to get an electric car now. 

“Bad” theology v. “Good” theology

Bad theology comes from blaming God for everything. Example: My house won’t sell. Why God? It must be God’s will. Thanks God for making my life just a little bit harder.

 

Good theology comes from understanding that we can’t know what, if anything God does. Example: My house won’t sell, maybe because of the sub-prime mortgage fallout and subsequent housing bust, probably not because God hates me or wants to teach me a lesson out of love. 

 

Bad theology comes from saying, “The Bible is literally the words of God. I will not listen to you unless you have scripture to back it up. If you say, ‘I was thinking,’ stop right there. You were thinking. Don’t think, just read the Bible.”

 

Good theology says, “Maybe it is not the best idea to discourage people from developing critical thinking skills. Simply following orders from the Bible or other holy scripture historically leads to the suffering and death of many of our fellow humans and ultimately us too.”

 

Bad theology says, “It is God’s world, He can do what He wants, and you have to be ok with that.”

 

Good theology says, “First of all God is not a “He,” second of all it good and well is our world and we had better start taking responsibility for our actions in it and too it.”

 

Bad theology says, “I am thankful for the cross because when I die I will spend forever in heaven, consequently you, who have never been saved like me, will spend eternity in hell.”

 

Good theology says,” The cross is not about you or I going to heaven when we die, the cross is the culmination of the self-giving life of Jesus and an invitation to enter into a self-giving life that exposes the powerful civil and religious institutions of this world for the arrogant perpetrators of oppression that they are. Thus the cross would be the gospel or good news to everyone even if they have never heard it or been saved.” 

god is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything

One might think that because I am in seminary I would not recommend a book called god is not Great but in fact I highly recommend the new book from Christopher Hitchens to all.

Global Capitalism: Savior or Satan?

What is a faithful follower of a homeless rabbi to do in the face of Global Capitalism?

Well most of us simply embrace this earthly kingdom with arms wide open while we can only imagine of a better place to go after we die, but I don’t think that quite answers our own question of what would Jesus do.

Some of us after seeing the light (or darkness as in the case with GC) go around preaching the evils of a system that gives 80% of the resources in God’s creation to only 20% of God’s children. (By the way for those of us that can only imagine let’s hope JC was wrong about the sheep and the goats.)

But as much as it would be easy to say GC is the all-good savior of the world or that it is the all-evil incarnation of Satan himself, the truth of the matter is probably somewhere in-between. (Although theologically and biblically the Satanic label is much more accurate.)

There are programs like Bono’s Project (Red) that attempt to redeem the seemingly unstoppable force that is capitalism by diverting 10 or 15% to help those in need but while I support this effort it does not go nearly far enough to stem the tide.

Maybe the homeless rabbi was right when he told his followers we couldn’t serve God and money. It’s just that none of us believe him.

A Turn to Music

I have never really found much in music. I am more visually wired. When people ask me what kind of music I like to do not know how to answer the question.

But recently I have been discovering the joy that is good music. I have by no means exhausted that joy but I have caught a glimpse.

Right now I am lost in the psychedelic-ness that is Pink Floyd.

God can be found in music after all…

A Lost Faith

I have lost faith…

Not in God, but in us…

I have lost faith in our leaders…

I have lost faith in our institutions…

I have lost faith in our religion…

And I do not know what to do about it…

What if we could be?

Every organization by its very nature is oppressive. It gives power to a few at the top, by taking it from the many at the bottom.

I was asked who were the oppressed in the “church”? I don’t know. Who do you see oppressed? And by “church” I mean the religious institution, which isn’t really church at all. There can be no “Christian” organizations since all organizations are at some level oppressive.

But what if there was another way? What if we had a mutually interdependent community made up of people who where each a part and a whole? Could it happen? What would it look like?

And what if to be that community of reciprocal relationships we did not have to do anything special except to be?

What if all we have to do is simply to be?

Cost of War

Barack Obama: Atlanta Rally 2007, Part 1

Barack Obama: Atlanta Rally 2007, Part 2

The Easter Story: A Film By Johnathan Blair

Truth: A Soteriological Event (Or Why I Hate Preachers)

Truth: A Soteriological Event

"isn’t she beautiful” Church leader seminar at Mars Hill

What can I say?

The past two days have been life giving, altering, affirming and challenging.

For the first time I felt privileged, glad and proud to be in a room of pastors and church leaders. This has been the culmination of everything I have been dealing with and struggling through for the last five or more years. I have now been able to more fully except who I am. I have come to grips with my identity. And it is freeing. Now I can get on with what I am to do.

Thank you… Rob Bell, Don Golden and the entire Mars Hill staff and community

I look forward to “isn’t she beautiful” 2