A friend of mine says that in the world of religion we often have ignorance on fire and intelligence on ice.
BRIAN D. MCLARENI was relaxing in my parents’ swimming pool with my brother, Peter. I asked him how the engineering business was going, and he reciprocated: ‘How’s the ministry world going?’
More Brian D. McLaren Quotes
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Too often we see the Bible through whatever lens we get from our culture.
BRIAN D. MCLAREN -
I googled some pictures of sundials to check that it was the tall shadow casting bit (it is) and then discovered that Saint Sulpice in Paris has a rather fascinating large gnomon- which I shall endeavour to see on my next visit to that fair city. Thanks for such a great word, which I shall try to remember.
BRIAN D. MCLAREN -
A sacred and almost unspeakable pleasure, but the consumer wrongly thinks that one finds this pleasure by having more and more possessions instead of possessing them more truly through grateful contemplation. And here we are, living in an economy that perpetuates this tragedy.
BRIAN D. MCLAREN -
…the tragedy of consumerism: one acquires more and more things without taking the time to ever see and know them, and thus one never truly enjoys them. One has without truly having. The consumer is right-there is pleasure to be had in good things.
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You are cleansed from guilt, and you are becoming a cleaner, healthier, more whole person.
BRIAN D. MCLAREN -
Our networks of dialogue and action thus extend beyond Christian communities to persons of all faiths, as well as to communities that are not themselves faith-based. We welcome allies and allegiances wherever we find common cause.
BRIAN D. MCLAREN -
Joyfully celebrating the killing of a killer who joyfully celebrated killing carries an irony that I hope will not be lost on us. Are we learning anything, or simply spinning harder in the cycle of violence?
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A generous orthodoxy, in contrast to the tense, narrow, or controlling orthodoxies of so much of Christian history, doesn’t take itself too seriously. It is humble. It doesn’t claim too much. It admits it walks with a limp.
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I don’t think we’ve got the gospel right yet.I don’t think the liberals have it right. But I don’t think we have it right either. None of us has arrived at orthodoxy.
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So we must realize this: the suicidal framing story that dominates our world today has no power except the power we give it by believing it. Similarly, believing an alternative and transforming framing story may turn out to be the most radical thing any of us can ever do.
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The Church has little idea how unorthodox it is at any given moment. If a church can’t yet be perfectly orthodox, it can, with the Holy Spirit’s help and by the grace of God, be perpetually reformable.
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A shared reappraisal of Jesus’ message could provide a unique space or common ground for urgently needed religious dialogue – and it doesn’t seem an exaggeration to say that the future of our planet may depend on such dialogue.
BRIAN D. MCLAREN -
Ask me if Christianity (my version of it, yours, the Pope’s, whoever’s) is orthodox, meaning true, and here’s my honest answer: a little, but not yet.
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When any sector of the Church stops learning, God simply overflows the structures that are in the way and works outside them with those willing to learn.
BRIAN D. MCLAREN -
The cross is almost a distraction and false advertisement for God.
BRIAN D. MCLAREN







