Naked Spirituality, Brian McLaren, But I'm Spiritual

Naked Spirituality, Brian McLaren, But I'm Spiritual

This second chapter is also part of the introduction. Interestingly I find that McLaren likes to draw out his introductions. I find they are often the best parts of his books!


This post is a continuation of my very rough summary of Brian Mclaren's book 'Naked Spirituality' previous chapters are ::

McLaren looks at the classic line 'I'm not religious but I'm spiritual' and has a few thoughts on it.
I really liked when he looked at the etymology of the word 'religion'. 'lig' meaning to connect or gion together like you see in the word ligament. Re as again and again. Religion is therefore joining us together again and again. Connecting us with God again and again. 'Good' religion helps us in this process.
McLaren uses the term 'de-religion' for practices which do the opposite to re-connecting us with God.




Spiritual Experiences and Spiritual Experience.

Kirby, speaks about homosexuality at the Parliament of World Religons

An interesting speaker at the Parliament of World Religions was Michael Kirby, former Australian high court judge. Kirby is an interesting choice because of his own homosexuality as well as his position within the Australian legal system.

Quoting from the age::

He urged religious people to read biblical texts in the context in which they were written, saying his 35 years as

a judge had taught him the importance of analysing words.

''You cannot take words out of context. You cannot take words in isolation … especially holy books that are written in terms of parables and in terms that are often poetic,'' he said.

Mr Kirby said Leviticus 20:13 was usually cited by Christians who condemned homosexuality, yet other passages of Leviticus that condemned men and women to death for adultery were no longer taken literally.

''There are many theologians now who say we have to re-read this, we have to read it in context. You've got to read it in the context of adultery being a death sentence for straight people,'' he said.

''Why don't all those people who are being nasty in religions to gays ever quote verse 10 [condemning adulterers to death]? If we are going back to the rules in Leviticus, we've got to be neutral and we've got to raise them all.''

He also went on to quote scientific studies that there was a 'Genetic' component to sexual orientation.

'If it's genetic, it means it is part of a great design,'' he said. ''In the end, in a battle between interpretations of scripture and science, science will always win.''

I'm not sure about the last quote. I see it problematic for there are many genetic issues facing humans. But yes Homosexuality does face bigotry unlike any human genetic disposition, if that is the point he is making. (I would like to have seen the full transcript for this)

Overall I think Mr Kirby is right. We as Christians have read the scriptures selectively especially in relation to sexuality. When overall Jesus spoke more about the dangers and corruption of money...