By: Stu Cocanougher on April 5, 2018
Last year I wrote more than one article about prosperity theology. Some of the books that our doctoral cohort has read touched on the subject. These included Bad Religion: How We Became a Nation of Heretics by Ross Douthat and Nation of Rebels, Why Counterculture Became Consumer Culture by Joseph Heath and Andrew Potter. …
By: Chip Stapleton on April 5, 2018
[Note: This post was written with very spotty – and much slower than advertised – cruise ship internet, so please excuse errors and the lack of usual visual elements…. I get it, I am definitely not complaining, but it did take 10 minutes just to get the cursor to start typing!] This week our class…
By: Katy Drage Lines on April 5, 2018
“The Bible is clear on this.” How many times have you heard that statement, or one similar to it? Growing up in a church that took the Bible literally, it was common to hear, “just read the Bible and you’ll understand.” I heard these declarations in light of women preaching, leading communion, or baptizing (we…
By: Mary Walker on April 5, 2018
Affirming persons requires granting them respect, and that includes respect for their autonomy, their relationality, and their well-being.[1] In his book, Love is an Orientation: Elevating the Conversation with the Gay Community, Andrew Marin sought to build bridges between the LGBTQ community and fundamentalist Christians. Marin asked open-ended questions in order to start the dialog…
By: Jennifer Dean-Hill on April 4, 2018
Throughout the ages, Christianity has continually attempted to define marriage, relationships, and God’s role and expectations of both. Within each culture, denomination, and era, what used to be acceptable at one time might not be acceptable today. For instance, polygamy was widely practiced among many of the patriarchs in the Bible but is now considered…
By: Jim Sabella on April 4, 2018
Allow me to begin this post by stating that I don’t ever remember feeling so uncomfortable writing publically about a particular subject or subjects. This does not mean that I am not willing to engage. On the contrary, engagement is critical for me as a person, leader, student, and Christian. I am an undeterred seeker of…
By: Lynda Gittens on April 4, 2018
http://www.truthfollower.com/2015/08/woman-is-gods-finest-and-beautiful.html Author Adrian Thatcher wrote his book, God, Sex, and Gender: An Introduction, for three reasons. They are: 1. “To introduce students and general readers to the exhilaration of thinking theologically about sex, sexuality, sexual relationships, and gender roles. 2. To introduce students and general readers to a comprehensive and consistent theological understanding of…
By: Christal Jenkins Tanks on March 22, 2018
“I concentrate on a new goal: reclaiming the word love. My goal is to explore how Christ’s love manifests itself in believer’s lives, and in turn, how to best express that love to the rest.”[1] These are the words of author Andrew Marin in his book Love is an Orientation. Marin who identifies as a…
By: Stu Cocanougher on March 22, 2018
When I picked up the book Love in an Orientation this week, I had already had a lot of history with this work. Not only had I read the book several years ago, I have heard Andrew Marin, the author, speak twice. Once in front of about 3,000 youth workers and once in a…
By: Chip Stapleton on March 22, 2018
Amazon, for all of it’s faults, is a pretty amazing and useful website (somehow that title doesn’t do justice to what Amazon is… but I digress). For instance, when I went to the Amazon.com page for this week’s assigned reading, Love is an Orientation: Elevating the Conversation with the Gay Community by Andrew Marin, there was a little grew…
By: Katy Drage Lines on March 22, 2018
The Last Time The last time we had dinner together in a restaurant with white tablecloths, he leaned forward and took my two hands in his hands and said, I’m going to die soon. I want you to know that. And I said, I think I do know. And he said, What surprises me is…
By: Lynda Gittens on March 22, 2018
This book will push the traditional Christian either into their hiding place or to engage in conversation. In the traditional black Baptist church, we knew our musicians, were homosexual but we didn’t talk about it. They were men and heavenly musically blessed. They kept their private affairs outside the church members view. Our youth…
By: Jim Sabella on March 22, 2018
What an intriguing title: Love is an Orientation: Elevating the Conversation with the Gay Community. [1] Embedded in the title is the overarching theme of the book and a bit of an indictment for the evangelical church. Historically, the conversation about and with the LGBTQ community in the evangelical church has been at a level that…
By: Mary Walker on March 22, 2018
There is a difference between concentrating on a “correct set of beliefs” and concentrating on how to live like Jesus, and love even one’s estranged family, within one’s orthodox theological framework.[1] Andrew Marin knew that God was calling him to work in the gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender community when his three best friends shared…
By: Kristin Hamilton on March 20, 2018
In the late 80s I was confronted by the depth of my own homophobia. It’s not that I had been outwardly “anti-gay,” as I had spent time with some of the most amazing LGBTQ people for most of my adult years to that point. Yeah, I know, that sounds like, “some of my best friends…
By: Jennifer Dean-Hill on March 19, 2018
Topic aside, there are so many great quotes and spiritual concepts in Love is an Orientation that is so applicable for all Christians. When addressing the loaded topic for inclusivity of the LGBTQ in the Christian community, I was pleasantly surprised at the strikingly peaceful read for such a highly debated topic. I read this…
By: Chip Stapleton on March 16, 2018
I have a complicated relationship with the author of our assignment for this week, David Brooks. As a regular reader of the New York Times, I often find myself reading Brooks’ writing, as he has a regular op-ed column. Beyond that, I think it is accurate to say that he is one of the opinion makers that…
By: Christal Jenkins Tanks on March 15, 2018
In the book The Social Animal: A Story of How Success Happens, David Brooks uses story to bring understanding to the way in which human progress happens and its relationship to the depths of our inner unconscious mind. Throughout the 22 chapters of his book he intertwines economic, political, social and psychological theories as he…
By: Lynda Gittens on March 15, 2018
https://embed.ted.com/talks/david_brooks_the_social_animal” width=”854″ height=”480″ style=”position:absolute;left:0;top:0;width:100%;height:100%” frameborder=”0″ scrolling=”no” allowfullscreen></iframe></div></div> Reading David Brook’s book, The Social Animal, was similar to playing Scrabble. You get so many letter tiles at the beginning of the game and your objective is to create as many words (legitimate) with them. This book gives so many scenarios and your objective is to connect…
By: Katy Drage Lines on March 15, 2018
We are a mystery. A beautiful, complicated mystery. Sociologists, psychologists, economists, marketing analysts, politicians, biologists, educators—all seek to understand, interpret, and respond to the nature of humans.[1] And yet, we quickly come to a place where a person or group responds “irrationally” or out of character from what we would expect. Journalist and commentator David…
