The God Who is Mystery Can Be Found Within

When I was a younger man, in the 1980's, I was a fundamentalist. As a fundamentalist, I took a very literal view of the Bible, and saw God as a stern father living in the sky. God in this mindset is someone who must be pleased. This god is a projection of the super ego, an archetype filled in by one's experience of a stern human father. It is incredible to me how many intelligent adults still hold to this god, this idol. It is a god who sends tornadoes to punish the “liberal” Lutherans for accepting gay people, or who has the moral right to kill women and children. We should be grateful this god does not kill us, because we are sinners and don't deserve to live. This god is promoted by many Christian celebrities, such as John Piper. This is the god of red-meat politicians, the god whose religion is mere moralism, which is what passes for Christianity in this country.

After awhile I outgrew that kind of religious fundamentalism. The kind of god presented in not only fundamentalism, but in the Bible itself, and in much of religious history. This god is an external deity. The jagged edges of life eventually will crush that god to pieces. One finds that life is not black and white, that simple prescriptions from the bible or the church cannot hold up under the realities of life.

The fact is, we do not know that much about God. Thich Nhat Hahn is absolutely right to say in his book Living Buddha, Living Christ, that theologians are better off not talking about God too much. It is safer, Nhat Hanh says, to say little about God.

God is mystery.

This view of God has precedent in Christian tradition of apophatic theology. Apophatic theology says that God is essentially unknowable. This theology is beautifully developed in the Eastern Orthodox Church, but also has expression in the Christian West with St. Thomas Aquinas, who said we cannot say what God is, only what God is not.

So where do we find God? Again, the tradition offers us understanding.

The Desert Fathers say, "Seek God and not where God lives."

St Nektarios of Pentapolis says, "Seek God every day, but in your heart and not outside of it."

A few days ago, I shared this quote on my blog from Bruce Cockburn:

“I...find there has been change in my understanding of what/who God is. It's a little hard to articulate. But I think, for me in the beginning there was a tendency to relate to the biblical God...with the beard in the sky. I think that rather than thinking of God as outside us and looking down on us, [God is] the presence of the divine is in all of us.”

It is within that we must seek God, who is always mystery.

Rising above individualistic concerns

I think the importance of doing activist work is precisely because it allows you to give back and to consider yourself not as a single individual who may have achieved whatever but to be a part of an ongoing historical movement.

- Angela Davis


An individual has not started living until he can rise above the narrow confines of his individualistic concerns to the broader concerns of all humanity.

- Martin Luther King, Jr.


Let each of you look not to your own interests, but to the interests of others.

- Philippians 2.4

Kicking at the Darkness: Bruce Cockburn and the Christian Imagination By Brian J. Walsh

Kicking at the Darkness: Bruce Cockburn and the Christian Imagination
By Brian J. Walsh

When a friend told me about this book late last year, I thought that all my Christmas had come early.

A theological treatise on Bruce Cockburn has been very necessary for years, but surely he was such a cult artist that no publisher would ever see a book on him as profitable. So fair play to Brazos Press for the courage and vision. And the author might have swayed the deal.

Brian J. Walsh has had some notable success, particularly his Colossians Remixed; Subverting the Empire, written with his wife, Sylvia Keesmaat, and read by most people I know with an imaginative Christian mind. I’ve used it as a foundational text for preaching through Colossians – twice!

A Canadian like Cockburn, Walsh is a Christian Reformed campus minister at the University of Toronto and Adjunct Professor of Theology of Culture at Wycliffe College, Toronto School of Theology. That he was perfect for this particularly important and skillful task has been obvious for some 20 years since, in partnership with Richard Middleton, he wrote the first serious theo-musicology I had ever read — a very lengthy essay on Bruce Cockburn called, "Theology At The Rim Of The Broken Wheel."

Walsh does a good few things in Kicking At The Darkness; Bruce Cockburn and the Christian Imagination. He confirms all your thoughts on your favorite Cockburn lyrics. (They were as theologically potent as you always thought!) He also reminds you how many great lines Cockburn has written, causing you to scuttle back to re-listen to every album right back to the first.

Walsh actually causes you to realize the width and depth and breadth of Cockburn’s theological comment. Songs that you hadn’t looked at closely because you were so taken by other songs on the same album, suddenly open up rich strata of Christian thought you’d never before considered.

The author’s approach is actually very simple and he uses this welcoming foundation to weave his immense insight into Cockburn’s songs to finish with much more than a commentary on Cockburn but rather a Christian worldview. He asks questions.

Walsh has used these questions before particularly in his books The Transforming Vision: Shaping a Christian World View and Truth is Stranger Than It Used to Be: Biblical Faith in a Postmodern Age, both again collaborations with Middleton.

The questions are: Where are we? Who are we? What is wrong? And what is the remedy? From these questions Walsh dialogues with endless lyrics of Cockburn’s to arrive at his answers in very articulate, Christian ways.

From Cockburn’s creation dance songs (particularly on Dancing In The Dragon’s Jaws) and the brokenness of humanity on Humans , to the justice at the rim of the broken wheel ("Justice" from Inner City Front) and some sense of kicking the darkness ‘til it bleeds daylight (with particular reference to the more recent album You’ve Never Seen Everything ) we are showered with memorable line, couplet or verse after memorable line, couplet or verse.

At times it seems that Walsh has become the thread that weaves Cockburn’s words together. Kicking at the Darkness is an astounding work on an astounding musical catalog.

For me,  the book made me fall in love with Cockburn all over again. It caused me to listen to songs such as "Dialogue with the Devil" that had gotten lost in Cockburn's huge catalog. Yet, it led me way beyond that.

Kick at the Darkness gave me a refresher course in my Christian worldview. It led me into theological thinking and inspired me to imagine the way the world is — and how the world can be — and how, as a preacher, I can at least attempt to share those thoughts in ways that are perhaps a percentage as creative and imaginative as Bruce Cockburn.

Steve Stockman the minister of Fitzroy Presbyterian Church in Belfast, Northern Ireland, and blogs regularly on the intersection of faith and culture at Soul Surmise, where this reflection first appeared.

source: Kicking at the Darkness: Bruce Cockburn and the Christian Imagination- on the God's Politics Blog 

Esperanza Spalding Performs at the 84th Oscars

Esperanza Spalding sang a lovely rendition of What a Wonderful World during the Memorial Tribute section of the 84th Oscars. She is joined by the Southern California Children's Chorus. It was a beautiful performance. Click on the picture below to her Esperanza's performance.

The Spirituality of George Harrison: in Honor of George's Birthday

Today is George Harrison's birthday. He would have been 69 had he lived. Today, I want to honor the spirituality of George Harrison. I find George's spirituality very inspiring for my own relationship to God.

George did not always “walk the talk,” as evangelical Christians say, and George would readily acknowledge this. But he steadfastly followed his spiritual path all his life. He never swerved from it. George's life long passion as an adult was the pursuit of God.

When George passed away in 2001, his widow Olivia Harrison said, “George left this world in the same way he lived in it- in the consciousness of God.” According to Olivia Harrison, upon George’s death, “There was a profound experience when he left his body. It was visible. He just lit the room.”

George's spiritual path was based on Hinduism, which he first embraced in the mid sixties. During the filming of the 1965 movie Help! on location in the Bahamas, the Beatles met Swami Vishnu-devananda, founder of Sivananda Yoga, who gave each member of the band a signed copy of his book, The Complete Illustrated Book of Yoga. George became interested in Indian and Hindu culture. He learned to play the sitar, and had as his teacher Ravi Shankar. Shankar was not only a musical mentor, but a spiritual one as well.

The Beatles went through their famous chapter with the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, and visited him in India in 1968. The other Beatles lost interest in the teacher, but George remained committed to his spiritual practice.

To understand George's spirituality, we need to know a little bit about Hinduism. In its popular form, Hinduism may seem to be polytheistic, with many divinities. But actually, Hinduism teaches that there is only One Reality, which is the foundation of our being, and our task in life is to realize our divine potential, our union with this One Reality. In Hindu scriptures, Ultimate Reality, God, is called Brahman. The Divine within us is called Atman, roughly analogous with the Soul in Western religion. Hinduism (at least one major stream of the tradition) teaches that the Brahman and Atman are ultimately the same. Our separateness from God is an illusion.

The method for realizing this identification with the divine is Yoga. There are different types of Yoga, two of the most common forms are Karma Yoga, union through detached action, and Bhakti Yoga, union through devotion. There are other types of of Yoga as well.

George followed a path of devotion most of his life. Following the path of devotion, one must choose an image of God, and be devoted to that image. For George, it was Krishna, God in human form. The Bhagavad Gita, one of the primary Hindu scriptures, presents teaching on devotion to Krishna, and on the paths of Karma and Bhakti Yoga.

George was also ecumenically minded. He believed that Jesus was a manifestation of God, and said in an interview in the early eighties, “The Greek word for Christ is Kristos, which is, let’s face it, Krishna, and Kristos is the same name actually.” During his 1974 American concert tour, George encouraged his fans to “Chant Krishna! Chant Jesus! Chant Buddha!”

Besides his devotion to God, George was also devoted to Hindu teachers, especially Paramahansa Yogananda. Paramanhansa Yogananda is famous for being the wisdom of Hinduism to the West, and he taught the fundamental unity between Yoga and Christianity. George wrote his song, Fish on the Sand, from the 1987 Cloud Nine album about his devotion and reliance on Yogananda. George often enjoyed visits to the Self-Realization Fellowship Center in Encinitas, California, which was founded by Yogananda.

George's spiritual practice was largely based on saying a mantra and chanting the Name of God. His big #1 hit from 1971, My Sweet Lord, features the chanting of the Hare Krishna mantra, and chanting the Divine Names of Vishnu and Lord Rama. He also produced a hit single of the Hare Krishna Mantra performed by the Radha Krishna Temple in 1970.

George maintained his practice of mantra all his life. For this sort of spiritual practice, the Name of God and God are the same; to practice Mantra is to put one's self in the presence of God. George likened the practice of mantra to “God dancing on your tongue.”

One of my favorite religious songs of George is Awaiting on You All, from the 1971 All Things Must Pass album. The song proclaims that by “chanting the Names of the Lord you'll be free..” The song is upbeat. I love the words expressing devotion to Jesus:

“You don't need no passport

And you don't need no visas

You don't need to designate or to emigrate

Before you can see Jesus

If you open up your heart

You'll see he's right there

Always was and will be

He'll relieve you of your cares.”

I also like the lyrics that seem to be distinguishing between religion and God in this song:

“You don't need no church house

And you don't need no temple

You don't need no rosary beads or no books to read

To see that you have fallen

If you open up your heart

You will know what I mean

You've been kept down so long

Someones thinking that we're all green.”

George shared his faith on all of his albums, sometimes to the chagrin of critics and some fans. But I personally find his spiritual songs very edifying.

Probably his two most well known spiritual songs are My Sweet Lord from 1971, and Give Me Love, 1973, both #1 hits which express devotion to God. But for me, the greatest of his spiritual songs was the title track on his last album, Brainwashed.

The message of Brainwashed is that we are in a “Matrix”-type of world, “brainwashed by the military, brainwashed by Dow Jones... brainwashing us in Brussels, brainwashing us in Bonn, brainwashing in us in Washington, in Westminster and London...”

In the song, George cries out, “God, God, God, won't you save us from this mess...”

In the middle of the song, there is an interlude in which a lovely female Indian accent recites a brief passage from a Hindu religious classic book, How to Know God - The Yoga Aphorisms of Patanjali, page 130:

“The Soul does not love, it is Love Itself;

It does not exist, It is Existence Itself;

It does not know, It is Knowledge Itself.”

George, as his wife said, lived his entire adult life in the consciousness of God.

As a Christian, I find I have a lot in common with George. My spiritual teacher is Bede Griffiths. I follow a path of inter-spirituality, which is based on my devotion to Christ, but also influenced by yoga. My own practice is a mantra based on the Christ, which is taught at Bede Griffith's Shantivanam Ashram in India. I also chant the name of Christ. I find peace in this practice amid life, which can often be stressful. It is reassuring to me to realize that God is lives in me, and that I can know God. It gives me hope for the future.

For me, George is a spiritual brother. His example of clinging to God all his life, in spite of his failings, is inspiring to me.

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Here are some links to some online articles about George's faith:

1982 GeorgeHarrison Interview on the Hare Krishna Mantra

George Harrison's Spiritual Life

In His Own Words: George Harrison on Spirituality

Beatle George Harrison’s Formula for Spiritual Health

George Harrison in his own words

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Below is my YouTube mix of some of George's spiritual songs. The song list is:


1) Within You and Without You
2) The Inner Light
3) My Sweet Lord
4) Awaiting on You All
5) Give Me Love (Give Me Peace On Earth)
6) Fish on the Sand
7) Brainwashed

Barack Obama's Christian Testimony

Many call into question the President's Christianity, or even claim he is a Muslim (as though that would be evil). But President Obama is a Christian, and has made a commitment to Christ. And as far as I am concerned, reading this rough transcript, Barack Obama was doing the Lord’s even before he accepted Christ. This is from a church in Macon Georgia, Harvest Cathedral, in 2008. - Lance


Rough transcript:


I didn’t know a soul when I moved to Chicago.  I was 25 years old.  I moved there after college. I had been working Wall Street but I wasn’t content.  I knew that I wanted to be part of something that was larger than myself.  So I went to work as a community organizer with a group of Christian churches who had come together to deal with the devastation of steel plants that had closed on the south side of Chicago and thousands of people had been laid off.  Communities had fallen into disrepair.  There were young men hanging out on the streets, buildings were boarded up, people had lost hope. 

And during these three years as an organizer it wasn’t easy.  There were days when we got tired, days when the road ahead seemed too long or too hard to trek.  But working with this community, ordinary people, who had discovered they could do extraordinary things when given the opportunity who never stopped believing in the Samaritans sense of justice.  Month after month, year after year, we provided: job training for the jobless, hope for the hopeless, after school programs for working families and block by block we help to turn those neighborhoods around. 

And this is were I want to give some personal testimony, if you don’t mind.  Because I was meeting with lay leaders and lay people of these churches and I was trying to get them organized.  We were busy with meetings and we were busy with plans.  I recognized myself in them.  I could recognize my hopes and my fear and my joys in their lives.  I knew scripture and I knew that many of the values I held that had propelled me in my work were values that they shared.  But I think they also noticed that there was a detachment to me. There was a part of me that was an observer when I was in church and slowly I came to realize that something was missing in my life. 

Because you see I wasn’t raised in a particularly religious household.  Some of you know my father was from Kenya in Africa and he was not a religious man.  He left when I was two so I didn’t know him.  I was raised by my mother and my grandparents. 

My mother who was from Kansas was a deeply spiritual person but she wasn’t religious in the way most of us use the term.  Partly because she had grown up in small town Kansas and she had seen that sometimes people who preach the gospel or went to church didn’t always act very church like.  And so she had sensed that you can be in church without being of the church.  You can call yourself a Christian but not act the way Jesus Christ would have us act.  So she had rejected and rebelled from organized religion.

My mothers parents who had raised me throughout my childhood, they were Methodist and Baptist.  But they had kinda fallen away from the church.  So I didn’t have a particularly religious household. Partly because of this upbringing I had no real anchor for my beliefs.  No commitment to a particular community of faith. 

And so I’m going around these churches in Chicago, trying to organize these churches, some of these pastors, these pastors are slick, because they’d call me into their office and they’d say well you know Barak we think its wonderful work your doing, this job training work.  And we like your ideas in terms of challenging the city to deliver services to communities that had been neglected.  We want to help you but its hard getting our folks involved. 

If you’re organizing churches, it might be helpful if you were a member of a church.  Just a suggestion, no pressure, but it might be helpful if folks saw you in church once in a while.  I had to admit they had a point.

So one Sunday I woke up at 6 AM and I brushed the lint off the only suit I had.  I was getting paid 12,000 dollars a year plus car expenses.  I had one suit and it was a little thread bare.  And I went over to Trinity on 95th Street on the Southside and I heard a sermon about hope and faith and the love of Jesus Christ. 

During the course of the sermon I was introduced to Jesus in a way that I had not been introduced before.  And I learned my sins could be redeemed if I placed my trust in him.  That he could set me on the path of eternal life.  It was because of these newfound understandings that I was finally able to walk down the isle one day and get baptized.  I have to say, I didn’t fall out in church, it didn’t come as an epiphany.  It was a gradual process, all the questions and the doubts and the pain that I sometimes felt didn’t magically disappear.  The skeptical bent of my mind didn’t suddenly vanish.  But kneeling beneath the cross I heard Gods spirit beckoning me.  I submitted myself to his will and I dedicated myself to discovering His truth and carrying out His works.

The Foolishness of Franklin Graham

I don't think much of Franklin Graham as a spokesperson or interpreter of Christianity these days.

During an appearance on Joe Scarborough's Morning Joe show on MSNBC this morning, Franklin Graham expressed uncertainty that President Obama is a Christian. However, Graham is certain that Rick Santorum is a Christian.

He says that the world of Islam considers President Obama "a son of Islam." When asked why he was less certain about President Obama, Graham said it was because President Obama does not have Christian values.

But as for Santorum, Graham  told the Morning Joe panel  "His values are so clear on moral issues, no question about it."

Graham obviously has not learned a lesson from his father's involvement with politics in the 1970's. His father Billy Graham got close to Richard Nixon, and later felt used and compromised by that association.

Furthermore, Franklin Graham's understanding of Christianity seems very narrow to me. He cannot accept President Obama's profession of faith in Christ; rather, Graham seems to have a narrow, moralistic interpretation of Christianity, that falls along party lines. Graham should consider that he is adulterating "pure devotion to Christ" as St. Paul says, with politics.

The Divine within us, rather than the bearded man in the sky

I...find there has been change in my understanding of what/who God is. It's a little hard to articulate. But I think, for me in the beginning there was a tendency to relate to the biblical God...with the beard in the sky. I think that rather than thinking of God as outside us and looking down on us, [God is] the presence of the divine is in all of us.


- Bruce Cockburn

Thoughts on Universalism and the Love of God

I believe God is love, and we are all his children; some of us just don't know it yet.

I don’t believe hardly anyone “goes to hell.” I don’t think God is as capricious as we are. I think “hell” has been used as  a means of behavior control most of Christian history, and has served the interests of those in power. Maybe we go through some kind of purging for our selfishness after death, I don't know.

Pete Townshend once sang, “The Sea refuses no river.” Eventually, all will come back to God, for God is “the source, guide, and goal” of all things (Romans 11.36, NEB).

I think God is beyond any concept of love we can imagine. All people have a spark of the Divine. It seems like too precious a thing to perish.

Kevin Costner's Message of Grace at Whitney Houston's Funeral

I hope my readers have been able to see Whitney Houston's funeral, or clips from it on YouTube. I think the funeral for Whitney Houston was so beautiful, with wonderful speakers and music. Watching Whitney's funeral inspired me, and renewed my personal faith.

Tyler Perry and Kevin Costner I think gave the most moving speeches. I have already posted Tyler Perry's speech, in which he shared how much Whitney loved the Lord.

Kevin Costner's affectionate reminisces presented Whitney as a woman of faith, who like him, had a Baptist Christian upbringing. He also presented Whitney as a woman who still struggled with self-confidence, even with her beauty, talent and success. Costner assured us that she was "great," and "perfect," and as "beautiful as a woman could be," that she had set the "bar so high," that other singers will not attempt to emulate her. Only young girls, who aspire to be the next Whitney, dare to follow in her footsteps. I think it is very touching how much love and admiration Costner has for Whitney Houston.

It was so beautiful what Costner had to say to Whitney:

"You weren't just pretty, you were as beautiful as a woman could be."

"People didn't just like you, Whitney. They loved you. I was your pretend bodyguard once not so long ago, and now you're gone, too soon, leaving us with memories".

Choking back tears, Kevin said goodbye one final time: "Off you go Whitney, off you go. Escorted by an army of angels to your heavenly father. "

"When you sing before him, don't you worry. You will be good enough".


Costner in his speech acknowledged Whitney's struggles, but he movingly proclaimed that Whitney was good enough to appear before her Father in heaven. By implication, Costner was also telling us that we are all acceptable to our Father in heaven.

Music Review: Kisses on the Bottom by Paul McCartney

Paul McCartney has just released a beautiful album of standards called, Kisses on the Bottom. I greatly enjoy this CD of jazz pop standards, they are part of the American song book. Paul's treatment gives them all such a warm feel. The album's title, "Kisses on the Bottom", comes from the album's opening track "I'm Gonna Sit Right Down and Write Myself a Letter," originally a hit for Fats Waller in 1935. The album has a light jazz feel, and Paul gives a charming vocal performance throughout the album. This is new territory for Paul, although he has has loved music like this all his life.


Some of the highlights are standards made popular by Sam Cooke ("Home (When Shadows Fall)"), Ella Fitzgerald ("It's Only a Paper Moon") and Danny Kaye ("The Inch Worm"), among others.

Paul plays acoustic guitar on two tracks, "Get Yourself Another Fool" and "The Inch Worm," but otherwise contributes only vocals to the album. Paul is backed up on the album by Diana Krall and her band.

In addition to the standards performed on this record, Paul pens two original compositions, the albums first single, “My Valentine,” and the CD's last track, “Only Our Hearts.” Eric Clapton plays lead acoustic guitar on “My Valentine,” and Stevie Wonder plays harmonica on “Only Our Hearts.”

I especially love “My Valentine.” It is a beautiful song, with a lovely melody and sung with much feeling by Paul. It stands with his best work, including any of his songs with the Beatles. Paul gave a live performance of the song at this year's Grammy Awards show.

The disc was produced by jazz producer Tommy LiPuma, who has worked with such notables as Miles Davis and Barbra Streisand, among others.

In announcing this new release, Paul said, “This is an album very tender, very intimate. This is an album you listen to at home after work, with a glass of wine or a cup of tea.”

Indeed, it is wonderful to listen to if you want to unwind. I enjoy having something light but interesting to listen to. This fits the bill. I have been listening to it on my Blackberry all week.

On this CD, Paul maintains the high level of performance that he has given us on recent CDs. Paul has done some of the best work of his career in the last 20 years, proving to this often ageist culture that the mature artist has much to offer.

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Below are two videos of Paul's "My Valentine," one the official video, and the other his performance of the song at this year's Grammy Awards Show. I have also below the track listing and order links. 






Here is the track list to "Kisses On The Bottom": 

01. I'm Gonna Sit Right Down And Write Myself A Letter 
02. Home (When Shadows Fall) 
03.  It's Only A Paper Moon 
04. More I Cannot Wish You 
05. The Glory Of Love   
06. We Three (My Echo, My Shadow And Me) 
07. Ac-Cent-Tchu-Ate The Positive 
08. My Valentine 
09. Always 
10. My Very Good Friend The Milkman 
11. Bye Bye Blackbird 
12. Get Yourself Another Fool 
13. The Inch Worm 
14. Only Our Hearts 
 15.  Baby's Request (Deluxe Edition) 
16.  My One And Only Love (Deluxe Edition)


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Order Links for Kisses on the Bottom: 


Kisses on the Bottom, standard edition 


Kisses on the Bottom, Deluxe edition 


Kisses on the Bottom, MP.3


Kisses on the Bottom, Vinyl edition

Tyler Perry: Whitney loved the Lord- Nothing can separate us from the Love of God

Very moving sharing by Tyler Perry about Whitney Houston's love for God.

93 Economists Say Obama Stimulus Plan Worked

‎93 top economists say the Obama stimulus worked. Read their BIO's....and how and why they voted the way they did. "Poll Results | IGM panel was chosen to include distinguished experts with a keen interest in public policy from the major areas of economics, to be geographically diverse, and to include Democrats, Republicans and Independents as well as older and younger scholars. The panel members are all senior faculty at the most elite research universities in the United States.  The panel includes Nobel Laureates..."

click on the link below to read more: 
Question A: Because of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, the U.S. unemployment rate was lower at the end of 2010 than it would have been without the stimulus bill.

Whitney Houston's Accapella version of How Will I Know?

By now you may have heard about Whitney Houston’s vocal track for her song How Will I Know? It has gone viral on the internet, and is available for download. This shows why she Whitney was nicknamed “The Voice.” It is an amazing testimony to her talent.

How Will I Know (Acappella) through Amazon MP.3

How Will I Know (Acappella) through iTunes

Nelson Mandela pays tribute to Whitney Houston

Nelson Mandela today honored the memory of Whitney Houston.


As Lawrence O'Donnell said tonight, let's remember Whitney the way she deserves to be remembered: singing to Nelson Mandela on his
birthday, and singing to him at the White House. 


Whitney Houston was a staunch supporter of the fight against apartheid and refused to work with any agencies who did business with pre-democratic South Africa during her modelling days.


Whitney Houston: Nelson Mandela pays tribute to star


Whitney performing at the Concert for Nelson Mandela's 70th Birthday in 1988.

Barry Goldwater on the Danger of Religion in the Republican Party

War on Religion or War on Democracy? by Rev. Susan Russell in the Huffington Post

Excellent piece by Rev. Susan Russell. As a believer, I reject theocracy!

from the article:
Because here's the deal: It's time to call foul on the much ballyhooed "war on religion" and call it what it is ... and it IS a theocratic war on democracy. It is not a "war on religion" when 1st Amendment protections are employed to protect both freedom of religion and freedom from religion -- because nobody has the right to write their theology into our Constitution.

You may read the entire essay here:
War on Religion or War on Democracy?

Rev. Susan Russell is Senior Associate for Communication and Inclusion, All Saints Episcopal Church, Pasadena, Calif.

Poetry: My Lovely Valentine

Worked too long today

Late for dinner she prepared for me

Showed up at her place at quarter to 8

Figured she had probably already ate

But she kept dinner warm

And answered the door

Wearing the lingerie I bought her

She welcomed me in

Took my Roses

Grabbed my hand

A big kiss on my face

My fingers played with her lace

We walked past the dinner

To the bedroom we went

I threw my clothes on the floor

She got up, shut the bedroom door

Under the covers

Locked tight in love

Writhing around

Breath and kisses the only sound

Making love all night

Till the morning light

The first shaft of day

I decided to stay

This girl is mine

My lovely valentine


copyright © 2011 Lance Goldsberry

Prayer for Whitney Houston

Last night on the Grammy Awards show, Jennifer Hudson sang beautifully Whitney's song, I Will Always Love You, with a gospel feel to it. I hope Whitney from heaven can see how much people love her.
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"Into your hands, O merciful Savior, we commend your servant Whitney. Acknowledge, we humbly beseech you, a sheep of your own fold, a lamb of your own flock, a sinner of your own redeeming. Receive her into the arms of your mercy, into the blessed rest of everlasting peace, and into the glorious company of the saints in light. Amen."

- the Book of Common Prayer,  page 499

My Tribute to Whitney Houston- A Youtube Play List

In tribute to Whitney Houston, here is a short play list I compiled on Youtube. It starts out with an electrifying performance of her big hit, I Get So Emotional from a 1988 Concert for Nelson Mandela's 70th birthday.

Watching these videos, I am convinced that Whitney, this stunningly beautiful woman, with her strong lovely voice, was the most talented female pop vocalist of our time.

Rest in peace, Sweet Angel.

Rest In Peace, Sweet Angel: Whitney Houston found dead at 48

Whitney Houston passed away tonight, her publisher announced.

I remember back in 1985, my mother, who has impeccable taste in music, bought a self-titled album by a new singer, Whitney Houston. The album was terrific, of course. It featured three number one singles, "Saving All My Love for You", "How Will I Know" and "Greatest Love of All." I also liked the duet with Bassist Jermaine Jackson, "Take Good Care of My Heart."

The debut album thrust Whitney into super-stardom, which she follow up with many other hit albums, songs, and movies. According to her Wikipedia article, Whitney received 2 Emmy Awards, 6 Grammy Awards, 30 Billboard Music Awards, 22 American Music Awards, among a total of 415 career awards as of 2010. Houston was also one of the world's best-selling music artists, having sold over 170 million albums and singles worldwide. She was extremely talented and had a great voice.

I always liked Whitney's recordings, and thought Whitney was such a beautiful woman- so did a lot of other guys I knew.

Whitney, in spite of her talent and success, also had heart ache, including a stormy marriage to singer Bobby Brown, and struggles with substance abuse. But I remember what a beautiful, radiant talent and person she was.

She was a sweet angel, I am so saddened by her death. Good night sweet princess, rest in peace.

Barbara Harris, First Female Bishop in the Episcopal Church

Today, February 11^th, marks the 23 anniversary of the consecration of Barbara Harris as a bishop of the Episcopal Church. She was the first female bishop ordained in the Anglican Communion.

Barbara Harris is a veteran of the civil rights movement, having marched with Martin Luther King Jr. in the 1960's. She helped registered black voters in Mississippi. She has also been outspoken for women's rights and the rights of gays and lesbians.

In 1974, she acolyted at ordination service for the first eleven women ordained in the Episcopal Church. In 1979 she was ordained a deacon, and as a priest in 1980. In 1989 she became the first female bishop of the Anglican Communion. She retired in 2003.

Speaking of her work as bishop, Harris said, "I certainly don't want to be one of the boys. I want to offer my peculiar gifts as a black woman...a sensitivity and an awareness that comes out of more than a passing acquaintance with oppression.”

I am a firm believer in ordaining women to the priesthood and consecrating them as bishops. I believe that there were female priests and bishops in the very early church. In any event, both male and female are made in the image of God (Gen 1.27). The image of God is Christ (Col 1.15), and therefore, women can image Christ at the altar as well as men. In the American Episcopal Church, this is now a long settled issue. For me, female clergy is a non-negotiable.

Today, we honor the witness of Barbara Harris, who has fulfilled a prophetic role in society and in the church, as an African-American Woman and a Bishop. 

Bishop John Shelby Spong on John A.T. Robinson. NT. Wright comments on Honest to God

One of the most controversial books of the 1960's was Bishop John A.T. Robinson's Honest to God. In it he questions traditional understandings of Christian dogma and metaphysics. His thesis is that the traditional Christian message can no longer be accepted by modern (Spong will say, "post-modern") people. Robinson was a Bishop in the Church of England, and his book caused quite a stir. He was a New Testament scholar. He passed away in 1983.

I have posted below Bishop John Shelby Spong's reflection on John A.T. Robinson and the Honest to God book. Spong knew Robinson and considered him a mentor. Spong sees Robinson as a prophetic voice, a voice that still has a message for us today.

I also have a link to N.T. Wright's discussion of the Honest to God book. He has some good criticisms of the book. The material is copyrighted so I link to it rather than provide it here.

I personally find the book compelling. I am not sure I buy the whole project of Robinson and Spong. But I also do not see how we can avoid some of the questions brought up in Honest to God.

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This column appeared originally in the September 1995 issue of The VOICE, the newspaper of the Diocese of Newark

JOHN A.T. ROBINSON REMEMBERED
by the Rt. Rev. John Shelby Spong, Bishop of Newark

(source: http://www.dioceseofnewark.org/vox30995.html )

One of the great mentors of my life was an English bishop and New Testament scholar named John Albert Thomas Robinson. He burst into public awareness in the United Kingdom in the late fifties when he testified before a commission seeking to ban the novel Lady Chatterley's Lover. For a bishop to favor Lady Chatterley titillated the English media who love juxtaposing religion with sexual expose. People were not aware at this time that this Bishop of Woolwich was also a serious student and a prolific, if not yet well known, writer.

In 1962 a back ailment required that John Robinson be confined to bed for a number of months. His fertile and imaginative mind was freed from other distractions and he wrote a little book called Honest to God that appeared on the bookstands in 1963. It made the controversy about Lady Chatterley's Lover look pale by comparison. This book forced people to recognize that the language of traditional religion was not a language that people believed today whether they continued to use it or not. An advance story in London's SUNDAY OBSERVER trumpeted the headline, "Bishop says the God up there or out there will have to go." Thus, the Church was launched into what came to be known as the "Honest to God Debate," and John A. T. Robinson became a household word in the English-speaking world.

That little book sold more copies than any religious book since Pilgrim's Progress. It was translated into dozens of languages. It was discussed, not just in religious circles, but in pubs, on golf courses and over bridge tables. It brought religion out of the churches and planted it firmly on Main Street.

One would think that the leaders of the churches would have welcomed such an initiative, but that would be to misunderstand the nature of institutional religion. The religious establishment, instead, recoiled defensively. Every would-be theologian rushed into print to denounce this book. Calls were issued for Bishop Robinson's resignation or for him to be deposed for heresy. A book of reactions to Honest to God was published to keep the waves rolling. It revealed just how deeply John Robinson had touched the hot buttons of religious fear that the traditional defenders of the faith struggle to conceal.

The echoes of this debate reached my ears in my small-town parish in Tarboro, North Carolina. I did not rush to read the book. Reviews indicated that it quoted extensively from Rudolf Bultman, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, and Paul Tillich. I was quite familiar with these thinkers and so I dismissed the book as a popularizing effort of no great significance. Nonetheless I placed the book on my reading schedule, and finally got to it in 1965.

I remember the day I first opened this book. Vacationing on the Outer Banks of North Carolina, I sat on the beach one afternoon with Honest to God. I did not put it down until I had read it through three times. I knew from that moment that my life would never be the same.

John Robinson made me aware that my childhood understanding of God would not live in my world. He forced me to face the fact that the words of both the Bible and the Creeds sound strange to post-modern people and that my faith had to grow or it had to be abandoned. I began on that day the long, tortuous and, to this moment, not yet completed process of rethinking all of the symbols of my religious past so that I could continue to claim them with integrity. I also pledged myself never again to use pious cliches that I clearly no longer believed.

This book drove me first back to the Bible. I knew that the Noah story, or the splitting of the Red Sea story, could not be literally true, to say nothing of the stories of Jesus turning water into wine, walking on water and ascending to the heaven of a ptolemaic universe that had ceased to exist with Copernicus. My church had prepared me poorly, I discovered, to live as a believer in a post-Copernican world, to say nothing of a world shaped by such giants as Newton, Darwin, Freud or Einstein. The Church still lived in a world of miracle and magic, where reward and punishment were meted out by God according to human deserving.

Seven years later, in 1972, this internal struggle emerged externally in the form of my first book which was deeply shaped by the "Worldly Holiness" chapter in Honest to God. My publisher entitled my book Honest Prayer, hoping, I am sure, to be pulled into the Honest to God energy that was still abroad. In 1973 I first met John Robinson. This larger-than- life man came to speak in Richmond on the 10th anniversary of the publication of Honest to God. He was very British, displaying little emotion. After the session I was introduced to him. I thanked him for what his writing had meant to me. I presented him with a copy of Honest Prayer. We talked for a while and then we each returned to our respective lives. Five years later in 1978 John and I met again at the Lambeth Conference of the Anglican Bishops of the world. I was now one of those bishops and John, who had returned to Cambridge to teach New Testament, was present as a consultant. Both of us, bored by the speeches, decided to leave early and walk through the woods of Kent to discuss the New Testament. We came across a country pub and stopped to share "a pint." We even engaged in the pub game of "bowls," but all the while still discussing the New Testament. It was such a pleasant experience that we decided to repeat it each day. So while the bishops were debating, John and I probed the gospel tradition and I learned from his incisive mind.

In those years John and I both continued to write books which addressed the theme of bringing the church into dialogue with today's reality. I read everything he wrote. John Robinson's echoes were heard in me every time I spoke and certainly every time I wrote. When one reviewer referred to me as the American Bishop Robinson, I was deeply touched. After Lambeth, John and I began to correspond. I yearned to bring him to lecture to our diocesan family, and finally he agreed. Six months before his scheduled appearance, however, John wrote that he had received a cancer diagnosis and had only a few months to live. He sent me a copy of the sermon he preached at Clare College, Cambridge, the Sunday after he received the diagnosis. I was deeply touched by it, though it made me aware of how lonely I would be without this kindred spirit. John died in the early months of 1983. In my grief I was pleased to be asked to write the American tribute to him published in THE CHRISTIAN CENTURY. Someone else had recognized how important he was to me.

I did not have either John's intellectual training or his Cambridge PhD. Yet after his death, in a real sense I was the only other bishop who was addressing publicly the issues he had raised. That fall of 1983 I published a book entitled Into the Whirlwind: The Future of the Church. It marked a watershed moment for me from which there was no turning back. It was not that it was a great book, but reading it today I discover that the seeds of every book I have written since were present in its pages.

In 1988 Living in Sin? came out. That book was for me the kind of birth to the wider public that the debate on Lady Chatterley's Lover had been for John Robinson. Because of that book and the controversy it sparked, I increasingly found myself occupying the space in which John Robinson once stood and bearing the hostility he received. Now I was the most controversial bishop in the Anglican Communion. My vocation clearly was to transform Christianity so that it could be lived out appropriately today. Each new book fueled this growing flame. Invitations to lecture began to come in from across America, as well as from Australia, Canada, New Zealand and the United Kingdom. To be a bishop leading this debate became the heart of my vocation. Hence, I worked long hours lest I violate either the integrity of my office or of my scholarship. I could not walk away from the role for which everything in life had equipped me. I have lived this role with vigor, yearning more than once to have had John's counsel.

This past summer I returned once again to the United Kingdom on a lecture tour. I had speaking engagements in Yorkshire, Aberystwyth, Cardiff, Sheffield, Leeds, Milton Keynes, London and Leicester. There were also breaks to allow us to visit family and friends. In one of these downtimes I came face to face with John Robinson once again.

We went to visit two friends, formerly of St. Peter's, Morristown, who now live in a tiny, secluded village in Herefordshire. To our amazement their next-door neighbor was John Robinson's only brother, Edward. We spent an evening with him reminiscing about John's career and his influence. My tour ended at a conference in Leicester for an organization called "The Sea of Faith," where I debated the radical English theologian Don Cupitt. To my joy a member of this conference was Ruth Robinson, John's widow. Once again we spent an evening remembering John Robinson. It was as if grace had touched me twice. The theological child of John A. T. Robinson had been welcomed home. I have now lived and worked twelve years beyond the life span of my mentor. I have picked up and addressed some issues that never surfaced for him. It has sometimes been a lonely journey. Today I can see the horizon of my career and wonder who the next John Robinson will be.

There will always be the "John Robinson" role present in the life of the Church. It will be welcomed by some, feared and hated by others. But that role is always the means by which growth and the renewal of the church is accomplished. I have been privileged to walk, however ineptly, in these footsteps.

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Here is a link to N.T. Wright's critical reflection on Honest to God:
Doubts about Doubt: Honest to God Forty Years On

Henry Winston, African American political leader and Marxist civil rights activist - Black History Month

Who was Henry Winston?

  

An unsung hero of Black History.

  

Winston was an African American. A Cold War political prisoner.  A communist.

  

Imprisoned with other communist leaders for a “conspiracy” to teach revolution, Winston was stricken with a brain tumor behind bars.

  

Thousands around the world rallied for his release.

  

Fidel Castro offered to trade the imprisoned Bay of Pigs mercenaries for his release.

  

President John F. Kennedy granted him executive clemency, but his release was too late.

  

Henry Winston went blind from medical negligence while serving a prison term because of his belief in a Socialist USA.

source: Communist Party, USA: Celebrating the Life of Henry Winston 

February is African American History Month. It is also the 100th anniversary of the birth of Henry Winston, former national chairman of the Communist Party USA. On Sunday, February 19, 2p.m., the Communist Party will hold a celebration and tribute on Winston's legacy in New York City. The event, "The Legacy of Henry Winston: Fight against Racism and the Far Right in 2012" will be livestreamed. Speakers will include professor and political activist Angela Davis, CPUSA Exec. Vice Chair Jarvis Tyner and Committees of Correspondence for Democracy and Socialism founder Charlene Mitchell.
People Before Profits Education Fund, New York State Communist Party, Young Communist League and Longview Publishing are sponsors. Tickets are $10 in advance and $15 at the door with a special discounted price of $5 for low-income attendees. Make checks payable to People Before Profits Education Fund. Checks can be sent to 235 W 23rd St. 7th floor New York, NY 10011. For more information call 646 556-7409. Click here for the event invitation.

Henry Winston lived a heroic life. Born in Hattiesburg, Miss., into a poor working-class family in 1912, Winston at a young age became active in the unemployed movement during the early years of the Great Depression. It was then that he joined the Young Communist League and was soon elected as a national leader. Winston helped in the building of the 3-million-member American Youth Congress, the Southern Negro Youth Congress and the Abraham Lincoln Brigade whose members fought fascism in Spain.

Winston served in the armed forces, which were segregated, during World War II. Upon his honorable discharge, he became national organization secretary of the Communist Party. In 1948, despite his service to his country, he was among the first 12 leaders of the CPUSA who were indicted for their political beliefs under the unconstitutional Smith Act. Winston spent seven years in jail under this infamous thought control act, and became blind due to the racist negligence of his jailers and the Jim Crow prison system. In 1966 he was elected national chairman of the CPUSA, a position he held until his death in 1986.

Winston made profound theoretical contributions to the class and democratic struggles of the United States. His book, Strategy for a Black Agenda, which first came out in 1973 "remains a fundamental contribution to the struggle," says Tyner. Winston focused on the unity of the class and "national questions," stressing the need for the "Black liberation movement to come to grips with the long-term economic crisis faced by our community, and to direct the struggle against racism toward a broader struggle against the power of monopoly capitalism and imperialism," Tyner says.

In addition, Winston was active in the struggles for Black liberation, black-white and working class unity, and among the American pioneers in building solidarity with peoples of Africa, in particular the struggles against apartheid in southern Africa.

Tyner says the celebration of Winston's life is relevant for 2012 and the elections, especially the struggle against racism. "I think Winston's legacy is still very powerful for today.  Much has changed since Winston's time, and today holds its own complexities, but we are still confronting racism, economic injustice and reactionary political forces."

From the Wikipedia article Henry M. Winston :  

Henry M. Winston (2 April 1912– 13 December 1986) was an African American political leader and Marxist civil rights activist.

Winston, committed to equal rights and communism, was an advocate of civil rights for African Americans decades before the idea of racial equality emerged as a mainstream current of American political thought.

An early member of the American Communist Party, Winston was elected to the party's National Board in 1936, serving as Chairman of the CPUSA from the 1960s to the 1980s.

Born on 2 April 1911 to Joseph and Lucille Winston in Hattiesburg, Mississippi, Henry grew up there and in Kansas City, Missouri. The economic situation of the poor Winston family was troubling enough to force Henry to leave high school early. Though once again uemployed after the start of the Great Depression, Winston's organizational skills and intellect when he took a position with the Kansas City Unemployed Council at 19.

By 1936, Winston was serving the Communist Party USA as both the national organizational secretary of the Young Communist League member of the Communist Party National Board.

As a high-ranking member of the Communist Party organization, Winston encouraged members of the party to sign up for military service to fight Fascism and Nazism in the Second World War. Winston himself served in the Army, participating in the liberation of France from Nazi occupation. He marked the war's end with an honorable discharge from the military.

The Red Scare
Back to political activity after his World War II discharge and the reorganization of the Party in 1946, Winston, along with the rest of the CPUSA leadership, was a victim of an early Cold War attempt by the American government to "decapitate" the Communists' leading ranks. In 1948, Winston, together with other notable leaders within the Communist movement, was brought to trial in the Foley Square trial on charges of violating the Smith Act prohibition prohibiting the encouragement of overthrowing the American government.

Unable to produce any evidence that any of the leading party members had actually called for the armed overthrow of the American government, the prosecution, boosted by the American public's antipathy toward radical activists during the opening years of the Cold War, based its case on selective interpretation of quotations from the works of Karl Marx, Vladimir Lenin and other revolutionary figures of Marxism-Leninism, and the testimony of "witnesses" hired by the FBI. During the course of the trial the judge held several of the defendants and all of their counsel in contempt of court.
Convicted of revolutionary insurrection alongside the rest of the defendants for advocating the ideas of Marxism, Winston escaped while on bail. In disguise, traveling around the country under a false name, Winston was sheltered by sympathetic to Marxism and leftist political work. Undeterred from maintaining his links with the party above-ground, Winston continued his activities from within the party's underground organization: his 1951 pamphlet on party organization, "What it Means to be a Communist," was produced by the Communist Party while Winston was still underground.

Following his surrender to federal authorities years later, Winston served out his sentence in Terre Haute, Indiana, remaining imprisoned, despite severe health problems, until his release in 1961.
Winston's state of health began to see a rapid deterioration throughout the late 1950s. By 1958, he began to suffer from headaches and dizzy spells; no adequate treatment was administered to him until 1960; by then, although the tumor was removed when he was transferred to a hospital New York, Winston was left permanently blind as a result of denied treatment. Winston's release, now sought even by anti-communist preachers and liberal activists, was refused.

Addressing President Kennedy in a 1961 debate, Comandante Fidel Castro, whose July 26 Revolution swept the Communists into power two years earlier, called for the release of Winston and other political prisoners.

Against the backdrop of both waves of protests from various quarters of the United States in addition to criticism from across the world, the Kennedy administration allowed Winston executive clemency, following which he was permitted to seek medical attention in Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union. The same year, the Supreme Court, in Noto v. United States (1961), put an end to the jailing of party leaders, having reversed a conviction under the membership clause because the evidence was insufficient to prove that the Party had engaged in unlawful advocacy:

"[T]he mere abstract teaching of Communist theory, including the teaching of the moral propriety or even moral necessity for a resort to force and violence is not the same as preparing a group for violent action and steeling it to such action. There must be some substantial direct or circumstantial evidence of a call to violence now or in the future which is both sufficiently strong and sufficiently pervasive to lend color to the otherwise ambiguous theoretical material regarding Communist Party teaching, and to justify the inference that such a call to violence may fairly be imputed to the Party as a whole, and not merely to some narrow segment of it."

The legal recognition of the illegitamcy of the federal government's basis for the imprisonment of party activists was now complete. Although the party was seriously damaged by the repressive moves, aggressive party activity was now again possible.

Later life
Winston was elected CPUSA Chairman in 1966, sharing the running of the party organization with Gus Hall, the General Secretary.

In 1964, he spoke to students at the University of Washington, after radical activists from the Baby Boomer generation staged protests against the university's ban on "communist speakers."

The 1970s witnessed the publication of two books connecting the long-denied issue of African American equality in America and the Communist philosophy of class struggle: Winston's Strategy for a Black Agenda (1973) and Class, Race, and Black Liberation (1977), which argued that the struggle for civil rights had reached the stage of fusion with the struggle for economic rights.

His 1971 lecture to a seminar of Communist Party organizers, "The giant industrial monopolies, the big banks and insurance companies, the financiers and landowners, all spawn racism and use it as one of their chief class weapons to maintain and defend their regime of exploitation and oppression, of enmity among peoples, of imperialist wars of aggression.

"It follows that all democratic and antimonopoly forces, with the working class and Black liberation movement in the van, can effectively defend the interests of the vast majority of people only when they actively further the struggle against racism. This is an essential precondition for the development of a fighting alliance which will unite all democratic and [anticapitalist] forces in the country."

A close ally of the South African Communist Party and actively involved in the American movement to end support for the United States' then-ally, apartheid South Africa, Winston proposed the following strategy as a backbone of principles for the U.S. sanctions and divestment movement against the apartheid regime:

1. No economic, political or military relations whatsoever with the Vorster regime in the Republic of South Africa.
2. Congress shall tax and the Treasury shall collect taxes on all profits made in South Africa at maximum rates without deductions for local tax paid.
3. The Overseas Private Investment Corporation shall refuse to insure any new investments in South Africa and cancel all outstanding insurance on investments in the Republic of South Africa.
4. The President shall instruct the Export-Import Bank and all other U.S. credit agencies to refuse all credits for business with the Republic of South Africa and instruct U.S. representatives of international lending agencies to oppose all credits to the Republic of South Africa or companies operating therein.
5. The State Department shall denounce all existing investment, trade and commercial treaties with the Union of South Africa and the President shall remove most favored nation treatment from South African goods.
6. The immediate withdrawal of the sugar quota to the Republic of South Africa.

As Chairman of the CPUSA, Winston condemned the Reagan administration's nuclear buildup, increases in military spending at the expense of social welfare programs, and sponsorships of civil wars against leftist forces in Nicaragua and El Salvador. Winston died on December 13, 1986, aged 75, in the Soviet Union, where he had again returned in search of medical treatment.