Here in LGBTQ-friendly Massachusetts, there are not too many places where we are not welcome. We are invited to conferences, schools, public events, and churches. Don’t be complacent, though. Next week, April 23- 25, Christian conservative evangelicals …
read moreI wish Leelah was alive today. She would know how a petition on the White House website with 120,000 plus signatures calling for the enactment of “Leelah’s Law to Ban All LGBTQ+ Conversion Therapy” not only went …
read moreWith a new understanding about suffering and how it victimizes the innocent and its aborts the Christian mission of inclusiveness, Jesus’ death at Calvary invites a different hermeneutic than its classically held one.
read moreWe live in an increasingly polarizing time. In politics and church life, many people are on hair-trigger alert, ready to retaliate at the slightest provocation. Disagreements lead to division and governmental and congregational gridlock. Even proponents of diversity often launch attacks on those who hold more conservative positions on immigration, global climate change, and marriage equality. It is clear that our times call for prophetic action. We need to present imaginative alternatives to injustice, environmental destruction, and prejudice. But, in our quest for social and political justice, we need to find ways to nurture Shalom practices that include our opponents as well as those for whom we advocate. If we are to be true to our progressive and prophetic ideals, we need to treat the opposition with the same care that we treat the oppressed.
read moreDeeper Love is a web resource, updated regularly with input from its users, offering faith-based language for progressive political and social action. It provides activists, lay and clergy people, politicians, campaigners, and organizers with inspiring rhetoric to advance social change. Deeper Love is edited by Rev. Jim Burklo, Associate Dean of Religious Life, University of Southern California, with the Theological Reflection Committee of Progressive Christians Uniting. Deeper Love is a project of Progressive Christians Uniting – pcu-la.org – a social justice activist organization based in Los Angeles, California, a Partner Organization of ours.
read moreCheck out this Inclusive, Spiritual, Progressive and Diverse Faith Community!
read moreThis episode reacts to the media’s continual speculation over Bruce Jenner’s gender identity. “This is bullying. Stop. Stop. Bruce Jenner is a human being. This is not disassociated from the more vivid and violent terrors and horrors of the world. This climate of bullying and judgment and cruelty is a violence of its own nature. It contributes to the climate. All of these things are real. Like ripples in a lake. Like when you can see heat disrupting the air on a hot day. There are connections. There are things that we don’t quite see, that we don’t quite sense, but are there. Connections between all of us. If we fill these waves with hatred. It’s not going to be good for anybody.”
read moreTraditional churches have resisted the substantive change necessary to remain relevant in the modern world. There is a huge chasm between the higher biblical criticism and liberation theology of most seminaries and what is actually proclaimed from the pulpits of American churches. This is true, in large part because ministers are afraid of losing their jobs and parishioners want to hold onto the magical thinking that has helped them to cope with the vicissitudes of life.
read moreChuck Queen explores the following themes from a distinctly progressive Christian viewpoint: Scripture, faith, Christianity, salvation, discipleship, and the Beatitudes. Each chapter consists of seven reflections; each reflection is followed by questions that probe deeper into the topic and facilitate group discussion.
read moreG. Yamazawa takes you back to his childhood to share an important lesson he learned. A Little Girl Waved At Him. He Didn’t Wave Back Because She’s Gay. His Dad Responded Appropriately.Button Poetry is committed to developing a coherent and effective system of production, distribution, promotion and fundraising for spoken word and performance poetry.
read moreOne of my reasons for writing my blog is to share what I’ve learned and am learning spiritually with other progressive Christians. It’s not a “gay blog” (though there’d be nothing wrong with that!) but the blog of a progressive Christian.
read moreAn important and respected voice for liberal American Christianity for the past twenty years, Bishop John Shelby Spong integrates his often controversial stands on the Bible, Jesus, theism, and morality into an intelligible creed that speaks to today’s thinking Christian. In this compelling and heartfelt book, he sounds a rousing call for a Christianity based on critical thought rather than blind faith, on love rather than judgment, and that focuses on life more than religion.
read moreThis book articulates a progressive faith that represents a true marriage of the academic work of the modern biblical critical movement and the historical Jesus work of the Jesus Seminar applied within the life of an active parish.
read moreThis past Sunday morning in Los Angeles was bright with strong wind blowing clear air over the mountains from the high desert. The palm trees swayed along Highway 10 west into Santa Monica. Two right turns at the Cloverfield exit took me past the garbage company and into the chain-link gate of Bergamot Station, a former warehouse complex turned into dozens of art studios. In the back corner, in a galvanized iron building, is the “Writer’s Bootcamp”, a complex with offices and meeting spaces, where I found Thad’s.
read moreOn this summer Sunday, Mark Andrew Nouwen shares about his fundamentalist Christian background, which included countless church services and immersing himself in the Christian sub-culture. He shares how, near the end of Bible College, he eventually questioned and then rejected many of the tenets of fundamentalist Christianity. He concludes by sharing a new vision of what Christianity could be today and the beliefs he holds dear.
read moreI am the current president of the Progressive Christians society at University of Essex (Colchester).We were ratified last academic year, and we’ll start formally next year. Unfortunately according to Student’s Union regulations we need to find 15 …
read moreOn December 20, 2013, conservative biblical scholar Dr. Michael Brown appeared on the (now defunct) CNN’s Piers Morgan show to debate the homosexuality issue as it related to the comments that were made by one of the stars of the television show Duck Dynasty, who stated in an interview that homosexuality is a “sin.”
read moreBetween sex as sin and sex as sport is an embrace of sexuality as a good gift. Between the teachings of “just say no” and “whatever turns you on” is a platform where we are free to …
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