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POPS'It's the culture, stupid!' Europe “All that has made European culture and civilization great – the Europe of the thousand cathedrals, the Europe of the custodians of the artistic treasures, of literature and Christian music, the Europe that expressed real solidarity and service to the poor through the emphatic force of Christian charity – found their origins in the Bible,” Oceania Putney, 62, noted the striking cultural contracts in his region, from the highly Western and secular ambience of urban Australia and New Zealand to the staggering variety of indigenous tribal groups in more rural areas and across the islands of Oceania. In Papua New Guinea alone, he noted, there are 847 distinct languages, and overall there are as many as 1,200 different tongues in Oceania.
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POPSMore "good news" from Pfleger Wow. I think you have here an insight to some tremendous hatred. If this is the social gospel, it is far more insidious than I previously thought. This is disturbing.
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POPS"Social Gospel" At The United Church Of Christ >>>>>>>POLITICAL CARTOON<<<<<<<<<<<< Pastor Jeremiah Wright, who has become part of the national political dialogue in recent days, is viewed favorably by 8% of voters nationwide. A Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey found that 58% have an unfavorable view of the Pastor whose controversial comments have created new challenges for Barack Obama’s Presidential campaign. http://ucctruths.blogspot.com/
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POPSThe unexpected monks We've been talkibng about having a synchroblog on the new monasticism, and suddenly it seems to be popping up all over the place. Hat-tip to Paul Grabill for this link.
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POPSUS Catholic have It. Right last 9 Elections!!!
This sort of social thinking and preoccupation with social solidarity and a "preferential option for the poor" are woven into the fabric of even casual parish life. It's this background that has tended to make Catholics swing voters: uncomfortable with the sort of litmus-test left that once kept Pennsylvania's pro-life Democratic governor, Bob Casey, from speaking at a national convention, as well as the talk-show right that assumes opposition to abortion means approving the war in Iraq. There's also an increasing awareness among the Catholic hierarchy that America's political right has consciously used the abortion issue to cut the church off from most of the positions it traditionally holds in American society. That may be one reason that, in its last statement on the political obligations of Catholic voters, the Vatican warned: "The Christian faith is an integral unity, and thus it is incoherent to isolate some particular element to the detriment of the whole of Catholic doctrine
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POPSThe HiJacking Of Jesus "A very large church in New York where I've spoken before did not want me to come and talk about this book. They said that after several guest ministers spoke against the Iraq War, people had left the congregation and threatened to resign their membership. These issues have become really matters of keeping your job." The religious right feels threatened by the Social Gospel of Jesus for a number of reasons. One, IMO, is that they are more concerned with an afterlife than they are with practicing what Jesus said. What could be more Christ-like than universal health care?
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POPSAiming For A More Moderate Image It's definitely a step in the right direction but will it go like this quote from the article: "Then it becomes about anger and pride. It becomes the negative motivation of trying to say what we are not.: I personally commend former President Carter for trying to promote social justice. I DON'T think it's a "lost cause". I just doubt that some Southern Baptists are going into this with an open mind. But Jimmy Carter is never going to give up and that is what makes him such a special person.
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POPSThe Theology of American Empire
Continuing: The liberals were starry-eyed fools, Niebuhr charged, because they trusted people to be reasonable enough to resolve international conflicts peacefully. They forgot the harsh reality of original sin. Niebuhr wrapped that traditional notion of sin in a new intellectual package and sold it successfully, not only to theologians but to the foreign policy elite. Since the 1940s, foreign policy has largely been reduced to an endless round of debates about how to apply Niebuhr's "realism." Policymakers who still tried to follow the Social Gospel path have been marginalized and stigmatized with the harshest epithet a Niebuhrian can hurl: "unrealistic.” Many policymakers, like much of the public at large, have come to find a strange comfort in the world as Niebuhr described it. They see a jungle where evildoers, who are all around, must be hunted down and destroyed. Though frightening, this world can easily become the stage for simplistic dramas of good against evil.
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POPSConservatives Do Not Have A Monopoly On Religion
These days the Christian Conservatives have worked really really hard to portray the left as secular enemies of the faith, and spread the myth that one cannot be a good Christian and a political liberal, that the left-wing agenda of using the government to care for the needy, defend freedoms and protect the weak is somehow in fundamental conflict with the teachings of Jesus. Now, I normally don't like to tell Christians how they should interpret their faith, and I'm not going to start now, but I think any Christian should seriously consider the following question: What in the teachings of Jesus would condone discrimination against social pariahs (like gays)? What in the anecdotes in the New Testament would encourage the savage me-first capitalism of Bush's Republican Party? As an outsider, I don't see the connection. Actually, I'd have a sincere interest in how Christianity has become so conflated with conservativism, so if anyone cares to explain their side, I'm all ears.
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POPS10 Reasons Why Liberals Hate Christians I ran out of Clippage. 10) Liberals are spiritually lost and blind to the truth of the gospel. I clipped this not at the source (I was kinda sceeert a goin' there), rather for an excellent Op/Ed over at <a href="http://hjhop.blogspot.com/2007/05/my-nipples-explode-with-delight.html">Happy Jihad's House of Pancakes</a> I love HJ. He can even make me smile at the close of a day like today. The scariest thing about these 10 items is I swaer I've heard them almost verbatim from another clipper. Ohhhh Willieeeeee.... Yoooo Hooooo.....
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POPS An Easter Sermon on Viral Marketing By the inimitable Robert Wright. The ultimate in viral marketing was Jesus’ ultimate sacrifice. Deemed a threat to the social order, he was crucified under Roman auspices. But the Romans forgot one thing: If you face a small but growing movement that threatens the imperial order, you shouldn’t attack the men in ways that help the memes.
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POPSA Democrat Knows That the Leaf Turns: Garrison Keillor A great read. Here's a bit more... "The rescue squad can get to you anywhere in St. Paul in four minutes or less. That is official policy...And the four-minute-or-less response represents the nature of our civil compact here in St. Paul: if you urgently need help, someone will be there before panic sets in. In the suburbs, thanks to Republicans and their code of personal responsibility, the coronary victim will have time to read the entire Gospel of St. Mark before help arrives. There is a message here: if lower taxes are your priority over human life, then we know what sort of person you are. The response to a cry for help says a lot about us as human beings."
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POPSCatholic Voters’ Many Choices — In Guides on Faith Issues From Religion News Service: Nuns' Voter Guide Challenges Church on Abortion WASHINGTON (RNS) Weeks before the November elections, a progressive coalition of Catholic nuns has issued an “open letter to Catholic voters” that challenges the church's teachings on abortion and gay marriage. -- Daniel Burke
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