Notes From Off Center - Latest Comments in go where god is, not where you believe god ought to be.

Re: go where god is, not where you believe god ought to be.

Angela Harms — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 20:35:00 -0000

Bell's choppiness is a challenge for me, too, but I push through it because I love what he's saying.

@andrewtatum I meant it in the nicest possible way. Seriously, my gratitude toward him is immeasurable.

Re: go where god is, not where you believe god ought to be.

andrewtatum — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 17:42:55 -0000

Great post! As a youth minister, I often become painfully aware of my own attempts to "take God where I believe God ought to be" instead of helping the youth in my church & my community experience God where God already is (namely, everywhere). I am consistently challenged by your posts! Keep em coming!

Re: go where god is, not where you believe god ought to be.

andrewtatum — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 17:40:14 -0000

Is Berger utilizing Michael Polanyi in this? Or is "plausibility structure" simply a general sociological / philosophical term that I've only, until now, encountered in Polanyi?

Re: go where god is, not where you believe god ought to be.

andrewtatum — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 17:37:14 -0000

Rob Bell? Heresy?

Re: go where god is, not where you believe god ought to be.

Amy Moffitt — Wed, 23 Sep 2009 19:18:22 -0000

I simply love this post, Drew. I think the church is a wonderful thing because it provides much needed social connections that our local communities don't easily provide, and because, when it's done well, it can provide gentle and loving prayer support and comraderie on the difficult path of a life lived in humility in the Presence of God... but I no longer believe that church offers some sort of special access to the Presence of God... unless He chooses to show up there.

Re: go where god is, not where you believe god ought to be.

Drew Tatusko — Wed, 23 Sep 2009 19:00:42 -0000

i can't really do bell all that well. very choppy stuff. if god is contained in human religious structures, then god is not real. god truly is dead because we killed god. what i have found to my delight is that this is not true. religions clip the wings off of the divine hoping that the bird will stay caged like a pet. fortunately this bird keeps growing the wings back and escaping from our grasp.

Re: go where god is, not where you believe god ought to be.

Drew Tatusko — Wed, 23 Sep 2009 18:58:27 -0000

i don't think we become post-religious as much as differently religious. peter berger uses the term "plausibility structure" to describe a social structure in which certain kinds of belief and expressions of belief are more plausible than in other structures. what many post denominational or ex-churched christians are looking for is a religion that is a better plausibility structure for the reception of revelation as they have experienced it. it is what defines the post boomer generations. we deeply yearn for traditions that do not seem to exist. i think we are in the process of creating them and building our own plausibility structures now hence the ambiguity and sense of disconnectedness.

Re: go where god is, not where you believe god ought to be.

jeffstraka — Wed, 23 Sep 2009 18:03:17 -0000

I am reading John Shelby Spong's latest book: Eternal Life: A New Vision: Beyond Religion, Beyond Theism, Beyond Heaven and Hell. One line (I am half way done) struck me deeply: "Truth is not religion's ultimate agenda; security is." I, too, am becoming "post-religious".

Re: go where god is, not where you believe god ought to be.

Angela Harms — Wed, 23 Sep 2009 17:42:52 -0000

Wow. This matches my experience so well. I left church at 13, because people required me to believe things that just seemed crazy. I was a Secular Humanist (Atheist/Agnostic) for years. Came back to God, but every attraction to Jesus got smacked down by Christianity.

It was finally Rob Bell's Velvet Elvis, with its beautiful heresy, that convinced me that I don't have to let "them" define what it means to love God & Christ. :)

I love what you've been doing. Can't wait to see what's next, friend.