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Thoughts

What I learned about being a father last year

January 6, 2013 Leave a Comment
fatherhood

Christmas is a lot more fun with kids. Fatherhood doesn’t really begin in the delivery room.  What happens in there is more like getting hit between the eyes with a steel hammer with lots of blood and water thrown in… Continue Reading →

Thoughts

Theology quote of the day

January 5, 2013 Leave a Comment

To believe is human, to doubt divine. ~ Peter Rollins

Thoughts

Did heaven and hell betray Christianity?

December 14, 2012 1 Comment

If we found out that our neighbour visited someone who was ill, or fed someone who was hungry, simply because they were going to receive a monetary reward for it, we would never look kindly on that act.  We would… Continue Reading →

Thoughts

Patriotism and discrimination

November 30, 2012 Leave a Comment

From the Twittersphere: “One day we’ll see legal dis­crim­i­na­tion by *place* of birth as evil as dis­crim. by other fea­tures of birth –gen­der, orientation, color.” — Charles Kenny (@charlesjkenny) June 25, 2011

Thoughts

Dostoyevsky vs Zizek

November 21, 2012 Leave a Comment

Dostoyevsky: If God does not exist, then everything is permitted. Zizek: If God does exist, then everything is permitted.

Thoughts

My religious status on Facebook (continued)

November 14, 2012 Leave a Comment

Changing status to: Hopeful skeptic (Thanks Nick Fielder).

Thoughts

Gays and the church

November 11, 2012 Leave a Comment

When I hear people in the church talking about how they really aren’t anti-gay people, it’s just that they want what is best for them, or that they aren’t promoting discrimination towards gays, only they want to keep the institute… Continue Reading →

Thoughts

Red States and Blue States

November 7, 2012 Leave a Comment

This American Life had a great show this week on relationships ruined by political views. While listening to stories of estranged families and ruined friendships because one person voted Romney or Obama I couldn’t help thinking how similar this sort… Continue Reading →

Thoughts

Hurricane Sandy

October 30, 2012 Leave a Comment

Stay safe friends and family.  We’re thinking of you…

Thoughts

Parenting II

October 29, 2012 Leave a Comment

I have seen the future. It involves eating at less expensive Italian restuarants. It possibly also involves bits of food being thrown around in public.

Thoughts

Not John 3:16

October 26, 2012 Leave a Comment

Saw this while checking out a Brian McLaren book online:  “For God so loved the church that he gave to himself his only Son, as a penal substitutionary sacrifice, so that those elect few who believe in this atoning doctrine… Continue Reading →

Thoughts

Don’t Fade…

October 25, 2012 Leave a Comment

“Lead me well, don’t clear my way It’s fascinating how the pallor can stay upon your face When you are light like a little boy Flying kites and shouting to the world You’re shouting to the world your joy Don’t fade, you’re staying here with… Continue Reading →

Thoughts

Welcome little one

October 22, 2012 Leave a Comment

Welcome to planet earth, little Zoe.  You’re surrounded by our love.

Thoughts

Against an unshakeable faith

October 13, 2012 Leave a Comment

I often hear people talking about having an unshakeable faith as though it were a good thing.  Maybe it is the gap now between where I am in my own life and the place where formal churches seem to be… Continue Reading →

Thoughts

Bob Dylan on the source of our sorrows

September 20, 2012 Leave a Comment

From fixtures and forces and friends Your sorrow does stem That hype you and type you Making you feel that you must be exactly like them. ~ Bob Dylan

Thoughts

Lies we tell our 40 year old selves

September 12, 2012 11 Comments

Ben Walsh speaking the truth on what happens to 21 year olds when you show them a big pile of money. This Wall Street intern has it exactly backwards: But eventually, you start to expect more. You’re definitely seduced. You think, “If… Continue Reading →

Thoughts

My religious status on Facebook

September 5, 2012 1 Comment

Updating to: Believes in the question: “is there a God?”

Thoughts

Lessons from a mighty beard

September 2, 2012 Leave a Comment

I’ve been delving into the Stoics this year and can’t help but feel the influence on my views on Christianity. I’m very sympathetic to the idea of being an agnostic about the afterlife. I don’t think that it should have… Continue Reading →

Thoughts

A pragmatic definition for the religious need

August 15, 2012 Leave a Comment

I think this definition of the spiritual need or insight in humans is about as good as any I’ve come across. For some it is not based on reason and for many it is not even about experience. But the… Continue Reading →

Thoughts

When God speaks to other people

August 12, 2012 Leave a Comment

I sometimes look at other people’s Facebook statuses when they talk about God speaking to them and I can’t make up my mind whether I’m envious of having that sort of intimacy with God or whether I think they’re just… Continue Reading →

Thoughts

Stop listening to the White Queen

August 7, 2012 Leave a Comment

There’s a line in Lewis Carroll’s “Through The Looking Glass” in which the White Queen advises Alice to practice believing six impossible things before breakfast.  I’ve recently decided not to embrace that technique for a while. Sometimes we get frustrated… Continue Reading →

Thoughts

I’m getting older

July 29, 2012 Leave a Comment

I learned this over the last few weeks: If you’re trying to allow your life to be influenced by Taoism and Stoicism, you really shouldn’t be too upset by the onset of male pattern baldness.  Marcus Aurelius would be very… Continue Reading →

Thoughts

Kester Brewin on God’s greatest trick: convincing us He exists

July 27, 2012 Leave a Comment

Via Pete Rollins I discovered Kester Brewin recently.  Phew!  If you think Pete is a little edgy, Kester pretty muchs pours gasoline all over orthodox theology and lights a match.  I’m a big fan of brave theology.  I tend to… Continue Reading →

Thoughts

The problem of evil – a modern take

July 4, 2012 4 Comments

The problem of evil traditionally goes a little something like this: If God is good and all powerful, then why do really, really bad things happen? Surely a good God would stop that suffering? If there is a God, He… Continue Reading →

Thoughts

Toxic Christianity

July 3, 2012 1 Comment

Spiritual abuse… highlighted by Matthew Paul Turner.  I’d prefer not to come across as moralising but this is toxic Christianity.  This is what makes recovering from some versions of Christianity just so hard to do. I’ve not quite seen an… Continue Reading →

Thoughts

Andrew Sullivan: Forget the church, follow Jesus

June 27, 2012 Leave a Comment

Andrew Sullivan with a piece on leaving the Church in order to follow Jesus: “Organized religion itself is in trouble. The Catholic Church’s hierarchy lost much of its authority over the American flock with the unilateral prohibition of the pill… Continue Reading →

Thoughts

A fundamentalist belief system

June 12, 2012 2 Comments

I heard Pete Rollins once tell a little anecdote that is a great illustration of the difficulty of relating to fundamentalism. He once said he sat down with a local fundamentalist pastor to try and sketch out the differences between… Continue Reading →

Thoughts

Looking back on evangelicalism

June 10, 2012 Leave a Comment

If you move away from modern evangelicalism, there’s a label applied to you: backslider.  It’s a nasty little term that assumes you have moved into darkness and that the evangelicals still hold the truth. But when you look back at… Continue Reading →

Thoughts

Immanuel Kant in Zombieland

May 24, 2012 2 Comments
Immanuel_Kant_-28painted_portrait-29

Note: This piece was written for Partially Examined Life and appears in its full context there.  It is an expansion on an earlier entry written on this site about zombie ethics. A common difficulty with the philosophy of ethics is that… Continue Reading →

Thoughts

I believe God calls some people to unbelief

May 18, 2012 Leave a Comment

I believe God calls some people to unbelief so that faith can take new forms. ~ Christian Wiman

Thoughts

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