Geoffrey Holsclaw
We don’t need to focus so much on balancing faith and doubt. We need to GET OUT OF OUR BRAINS and back into OUR BODIES. Or better, we need to realize that every brain is essentially embodied, flowing with emotions and embedded in relationships. Isn’t Enough Saying that we need a little more doubt […]
It’s OK to Go Back to a church, to community, to seeking, and trying—to trying to believe. To walk away to create distance for honest processing of disappointment, to admit that you don’t understand, to listen to others—that’s OK. And to return is OK too. Community is hard to leave. And it’s hard to return. […]
It’s OK to do those Jesus-y things while deconstructing faith. Because it is WHAT WE DO that activates WHAT WE KNOW. In other words, can we normalize continuing to follow how Jesus lived while we deconstruct, rather than putting on a practical agnosticism or atheism? Too often I’ve know people who have genuine questions and […]
Can we stop placing “deconstruction” on a continuum between conservative beliefs that are transformed/updated/revised into more progressive ones? Instead, there is modern fundamentalism in the West pretending to represent ALL OF CHRISTIANITY. And we need to deconstruct it in favor of the historical, ancient faith. The process of many exevangelicals is to fault conservative […]
For those who need to hear it, let’s normalize the experience of God’s absence. It’s OK that you DON’T SEE Jesus as you deconstruct faith. And that might be a good thing—in the long run. You used to see Jesus everywhere, in everything…leading, working, guiding, providing. But now Jesus is gone, absent, invisible, missing. […]
For those who need to hear it, It’s OK to be Exasperated With, Frustrated By, and Not Understand this thing called Christianity, this thing called Faith, even this person called Jesus. Angry. Sad. Frustrated. Bewildered. Let down. Downcast. These are honest emotions and honest reactions when the church, theology, the Bible, and God gives you […]
What is the “social construction” of reality? Is everything just relative and subjective? Is everything just made up? Or could the social construction of reality have something to do with being made in God’s image? This is what I’m thinking about as I finish up Lisa Feldman Barrett’s new book, Seven and a […]
Why do we experience culture shock? Why do people process the same event so differently? Why is code-switching so exhausting? It’s because different people, especially from different cultures, have different minds—and shifting between them is taxing. This is the main point of Lisa Feldman Barrett’s 6th lesson. I’m continuing with Barrett’s new book, Seven and a […]
Pray. Read your Bible. Go to church—twice on Sundays. And don’t sin. Be sure not to sin. These were my devotions (as they were called). I was raised independent Bible Church baptist. So we didn’t do that “spiritual discipline” crap. Only the Catholics did that stuff while trying to “earn their salvation”—so I was told. But […]