- "Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly." Martin Luther King, Jr.
"The reality is not that I lack respect for the law; it’s that I have greater respect for justice. Where there is a conflict between the law and the higher moral code that we all share, my loyalty is to that higher moral code."
Tim DeChristopher
“This is what you shall do; love the earth and sun and the animals, despise riches, give alms to every one that asks, stand up for the stupid and crazy, devote your income and labor to others, hate tyrants, argue not concerning God, have patience and indulgence toward the people, take off your hat to nothing known or unknown or to any man or number of men, go freely with powerful uneducated persons and with the young and with the mothers of families, read these leaves in the open air every season of every year of your life, re-examine all you have been told at school or church or in any book, dismiss whatever insults your own soul, and your very flesh shall be a great poem and have the richest fluency not only in its words but in the silent lines of its lips and face and between the lashes of your eyes and in every motion and joint of your body.”
Walt Whitman
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Tag Archives: Christianity
More Thoughts on God, the Universe, and Religion
The following thoughts were inspired by two posts from two different blogs, found here and here. Both authors’ ideas were instrumental in helping me find the words I’ve been looking for to further clarify my own spiritual beliefs. I offer them both my most sincerest appreciation. For years I called myself an atheist, an agnostic, a non-theist, a pantheist, and probably several other terms I’ve long since forgotten since I first made my break with the conventional Christian traditions I … Continue reading
Want A Better World? Start Turning Over Tables and Whipping Money-Changers
“It’s obvious to me that the powerful religious elite preferred to read scripture from the Top-Down, meaning that they interpreted scripture in ways that would protect their societal and religious privilege. Jesus, however, employed a Bottom-Up method of scripture interpretation. He read scripture in ways that empowered those on the edges of society… the oppressed… the “unclean”… the forgotten. I’ve come to see this as the challenge of today’s theologians and ministers. I think there should be more of an … Continue reading
How Jesus Freaks Drove Me to Eat the Sacred Mushroom
This post was originally published a few months ago on another blog. I added it to the archives here a few weeks later, but it never made the front page, until now… (Mom, you might want to skip this one) As a child I was a natural skeptic. I can recall being in Sunday School at the church my mother attended, not more than five or six years old at best, and thinking how absolutely absurd some of the things … Continue reading
Thought Provoking Quote of the Day
“In the neo-evangelical world of cheap prosperity and cheap family values, the name of Jesus gets bandied about like an over-inflated beach-ball. Many who utter his name obviously don’t read his life story. According to the Gospels, Jesus spent his adult life as a homeless wanderer who was particularly sympathetic to the poor. He doesn’t refer to them as evil, but he does have very harsh words for the privileged establishment. Such words harsh the euphoria built upon our own … Continue reading
The Best Thing You Can Lose Is Your Religion
Regular readers of this space already know I’m not a religious person. I have little use for organized religion of any sort, save perhaps to use for target practice. Organized religion, in my experience, is nothing but a means for a few people to control a lot more people and live an easy life, often in the lap of luxury. I sampled many flavors and found they all taste like the unwashed north end of the proverbial southbound mule. While … Continue reading
