My Thoughts on the Storming of the US Capitol
By teaching their members to submit to strong-men leaders like Trump, even associating God’s favor and sovereignty with their dominating tendencies, these Christian leaders have whitewashed Trump’s authoritarianism with moral legitimacy. By teaching uncritical obedience (often by quoting Romans 13:1-4 and ignoring Romans 12:1-2), by prophesying divine favor, by shaming and demonizing opponents and by pardoning or minimizing Trump’s offenses, these Christian leaders have domesticated and groomed adherents so they can be deployed as loyal and adoring subjects in Trump’s service.
That’s why in video footage from this week’s insurrection attempt at the US Capitol (which was coordinated with similar displays at some state capitols), you’ll see zealous Trump-Christians carrying ‘Jesus Saves’ signs, and raising crosses and sporting T-shirts with Bibles on the front of them. Tragically, too many American churches have become aggregators for Trumpist organisers, rendering sincere but gullible believers tools in Trump's delusional power-grab....
You can read the whole post here:
One element of the "treatment" for white Christian nationalism is doubt, as I explain in my new book, Faith After Doubt.
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A Conversation with One of my Heroes
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Today is a big day for me …
Faith After Doubt is available today. I've worked on this book for a couple years, but really, it's been gestating for decades. As you probably know, it really helps a book (and its author) if interested folks buy it the week of its release, so if you feel your faith has taken a hit in recent months or years, I hope you'll consider ordering it today. Here are links: https://read.macmillan.com/lp/faith-after-doubt
Aaron Niequist, musician, worship leader, and seminarian, wrote these encouraging words about the book:
You know when you stumble upon the exact right book in your exact moment of need? Friends, I can’t overstate what is happening inside me while reading this book over the last couple days.
@brian_mclaren has been a friend and mentor for almost 20 years. His writing is brilliant, of course, but behind the scenes he is the real deal. And his honest journey out of a toxic faith into something more beautiful, whole, and loving has inspired me (and countless others) to not give up. Brian is one of the people who helped me stay a Christian when my faith was imploding...and continues to help me stay. This book is no exception.
A quick summary to give context to the quote. Brian suggests that our faith tends to unfold in four, overlapping, messy-but-common ways. Step one is Simplicity, marked by certainty, loyalty, and dualism. Step two is Complexity, marked by pragmatism, achievement, and growing. Stage three is Perplexity, marked by deconstruction, loss, and undoing. Stage four is Harmony, marked by nonduality, encounter without control, and above all else, Love. And Brian’s core insight is that DOUBT is the gift that propels us from one stage to the next. Doubt graciously reveals that our current view of reality is good but not enough, and invites us to “include and transcend” into a bigger and more beautiful faith. Doubt is not a danger to our faith; doubt is the holy deepener of our faith—if we let it.
Especially in such a pain-filled and destabilizing year like 2020, many of us are flush with doubts, disappointments, and deaths of every kind. Through this book, God is beginning to invite me out of despair and into a new kind of possibility. It even feels a bit like hope. Thanks be to God.
Thanks to all who have already sent encouraging words about the book. I pray it will invite every single reader "out of despair and into a new kind of possibility."
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Why We Love Children’s Books –
Maria Popova nails it:
Great children’s books move young hearts, yes, but they also move the great common heart that beats in the chest of humanity by articulating in the language of children, which is the language of simplicity and absolute sincerity, the elemental truths of being: what it means to love, what it means to be mortal, what it means to live with our fragilities and our frissons. As such, children’s books are miniature works of philosophy, works of wonder and wonderment that bypass our ordinary resistances and our cerebral modes of understanding, entering the backdoor of consciousness with their soft, surefooted gait to remind us who and what we are.
Maria has a new children's book available - you'll find details here:
https://mailchi.mp/brainpickings/the-snail-with-the-right-heart?e=2f42f77b10
You may also be interested in the children's book I co-produced with Gareth Higgins and artist Heather Lynne Harris. Maria Popova's words helped me understand why I have felt this was such a special project.
And this week, my new book Faith After Doubt releases. It's not a kids' book, and it has no pictures (although there are a few diagrams), but it's a book that I trust can be of help to many. Folks who received their copies early are already sending super-encouraging messages to me. Here are the US and UK covers:
And here's ordering information:
https://read.macmillan.com/lp/faith-after-doubt/
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Audiobook – Faith After Doubt – Here’s a sample …
The first four minutes of the book ...
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