We Love You Ken Silva

Ken Silva, creator of Apprising Ministries (ministry formed in response to the Great Emergence, which he believes to be unChristian), needs to receive some lovin’ from those of us he deems to be heretics. I think Jonathan Brink said it well in his recent post “We Love You Ken Silva”. This does not come naturally [...]

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How can we spark new life in Christian communities?

Go here for a video put together by the good folks at Sparkhouse of some of the presenters and participants at Christianity 21.

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“This is the new Pentecost.”

I don’t know how to describe what happened today other than to say ‘Holy’. Today was Holy.
As far as the ‘what happened?’ goes, Doug and Tony spoke briefly and then we thanked all of the individuals who helped make the weekend happen. Then after a song from Heatherlyn (who had one [...]

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Closing Thoughts on the Second Day

So after the sessions were over, some people went home, others went to one of two restaurants nearby for dinner. I went to one called McCoy’s and had a wonderful dinner with 5 other participants, 3 of which were from Canada. It was a great conversation, with everything from sharing our stories, communal [...]

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Voices VI

And now we’re gonna start the 6th session, the last of the day. It’s been another great day so far. I think I probably made better connections yesterday than today, but both have been really wonderful. I feel like I’m reawakening my love for God, love for the church, and for others [...]

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Voices V

Lunch was delicious! Chef Shack got their generator working, so we had pulled pork or bison burgers. I went and joined Shane Clairborne and his friend Dee Dee for a discussion of their new magazine Conspire. Got to meet some other attendees and had some great chat.
Now the next session should [...]

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Voices IV

We’re about to start the 4th session here shortly. I only slept for about 4 hours last night, so I’m a little tired. I was too excited for sleep yesterday. Hopefully I’ll be fully awake here soon.
Julie Clawson and Kelly Bean are tag-teaming their sessions, like Nadia and Phyllis did yesterday. [...]

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Voices III

Just made it back to the church at 9 in the morning. It’s freezing cold out, and there’s snow. Yes, snow.
Diana Butler Bass is opening the morning session. She has a Ph.D in church history, and wrote A People’s History of Christianity, which is you haven’t read it is very [...]

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Closing Thoughts on the First Day

So that wrapped up the sessions for the day. Afterwords I spent some time talking to some of the attenders/participants, and then tracked down Jay Bakker to say hello. That was really great – he seems like a very genuine, authentic guy. No pretense or posing or arrogance, just a sense of [...]

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Voices II Part 2

Jenell Paris is going now, with a talk called “Sex is (Not) a Big Deal.”
Our discussion on sexuality revolves around the question ‘Is homosexuality a sin?’
She says this is a complicated question, partially theological and partly cultural. She also thinks its bullying, a way of dividing people into camps.
“Heterosexuality is [...]

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