Interesting

Found this on one of my favorite blogs by a fellow progressive pastor, Shuck and Jive -- it's an article about a clergy colleague/friend of Jim P -- I've never met him myself but Jim often sends forwards from him to other campus ministers so I know of him:  http://www.newsobserver.com/2010/08/02/609889/pastor-sticks-up-for-modern-view.html


Because of this article, and the TUFTS study it mentions, Mark also made the Presbyterian Layman (it's kinda like PCUSA's version of the National Enquirer in that it publishes inflamed/inflaming stories about things that piss them off and in this case, for us liberals anyway, it's a privilege and honor to be mentioned in it -- it means we are doing our jobs).  I'd link that for you here too, but I don't want to scare you, my sweet innocent readers. Plus I don't want them to think that the hits it gets today means people like them.  I will link you to the TUFTS study tho.  You can google the Layman if you are feeling brave.


Anyway, what's interesting about the timing of all this is that today I had a meeting with a student (as I too, am a Campus Minister) and we were talking about his faith journey.  He was wondering if his spiritual journey was authentic in the sense that he wondered if he was "on the right path."  He has a roommate who is challenging him (and damning him to hell for various things) which made him start to doubt himself.  I won't go into specifics other than to say that he is a charming, kind, loving soul who has nothing to worry about. I shared with him my liberal/progressive agnostic leanings, which brought him comfort.  And told him that if we are more about love than hate, and are compassionate toward others, we can be pretty certain our path is just fine. When he left I felt like I had been helpful to him, and was grateful for the reminder that what I get to do is sometimes really cool.  (Yeah sometimes it's a pain in the ass too, but today it was cool.)

So then I came home and read the article about a minister who seems a lot like me in many ways, and enjoyed the synchronicity that what I shared with the student was similar to things Mark says in the article.  For instance, Mark admits he does not believe in a supernatural God with supernatural powers.  "The cosmic guy in the sky is not a credible image of God," he said.  I said much the same thing to my student, only I said, "old white-haired man in the sky" instead of cosmic. 


Somebody call the Layman!


P.S.  I also read this when I got home: