Maybe in the case of Christianity there is no sacred text, because it is not the text that is sacred but the one about which it is spoken.

From: Figuring the Sacred by Paul Ricoeur (Fortress Press, 1995).

First, worshipers want to know how their contributions make a difference. Congregational leaders should highlight the specific ways that worshipers financial gifts are changing lives in the congregation and the community. The emphasis should be on ministry rather than on supporting programs.

via Leading Ideas: A Resource for Church Leaders.

About half of American worshipers regularly give 5% or more of their net income to their congregation. However, this statistic obsures important differences by denomination and faith group. Two out of three worshipers in conservative Protestant churches give at this level. Only half (52%) of mainline Protestant worshipers give at the 5%-or-more level. Worshipers in Catholic parishes are the least likely to regularly give 5% or more (only 36% do). An astounding 44% of conservative Protestant worshipers give 10% or more to their local church.

via Ten reasons why we give

When I go through my papers from the course Spirituality and Prayer, I get stuck thinking about the duel between contemplation and action. Where is the church to be on that spectrum, of course the right answer is both/and not either/or but that is not satisfactory for my brain at the moment.

Status of Þjóðkirkjan is changing from being “protector of peace (pax Romana)” to “sustainer of inequality”. It seems clear that the thousand y-old idea of “one sidur” is becoming impossible to enforce, and it is inevitable that new rituals and new ways of gathering will come to being. However, the society still has to find alternative ways to ritualize their moments of significance (with or without Þjóðkirkjan).

It is not that the church’s theological absolutes are no longer trusted, but that the old modes in which those absolutes have been articulated are increasingly suspect and dysfunctional. That is because our old modes are increasingly regarded as patriarchal, hierarchic, authoritarian, and monlogic.

In some sense I like this thought from Brueggemann from his article Preaching as Reimagination. The problems are two. The church has great issues with separating between theological absolutes and the proper practices it has, and secondly I think theological absolutes are under more public scrutiny than often before.

But we do not want you to be uninformed, dear siblings, about those who have fallen asleep, so that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope.

One must wonder whom Paul refers to “others do who have no hope.” I think it is hardly possible to claim that all outside the realm of the Christian world are without hope. At least if the hope is related to an afterlife. One way to deal with the hopeless others is trying to explain that hope means something more specific or something different than hope, however I am not going there.

The other way to make sense of this is if “the others” is not an attempt by Paul to refer to everyone outside the circle of Christians. If that is the case we are left to figure out who they are this specific group of “the others” in verse 13. We can assume that they were a group known to the Congregation in Thessaloniki. I think Abraham J. Malherbe is on to something in his commentary, when he refers to De Witt, and claims that the others without hope are possibly Epicureans (Malherbe 283).

I would consider this especially intriguing in light of another reference to that group earlier in the fourth chapter where Paul seems to take their philosophy at a face value. If we accept that “the others who do not have hope” are in fact Epicureans, Paul seems to be making the argument that we should behave like them in our daily life, but when it comes to dying and grieving, we part company.
—
Bibliography: Malherbe, Abraham J. The Letters to the Thessalonians: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary. New York: Doubleday, 2000.

* This note is from an exegetical paper on I. Thess. 4.13-18

When contemplating Article VII in the Augsburg Confession it is important to keep the cultural setting in mind. The issue of community of believers was simply a none issue and therefore not mentioned. Should it be an issue today? That is probably open for debate.

12.053 kröfum var lýst í bú gamla Landsbankans upp á 6.459 milljarða króna. Heildarforgangskröfur námu 2.857 milljörðum króna. Búist er við að um 90 prósent fáist upp í forgangskröfur, sem að mestu eru vegna Icesave-innlánsreikninganna í Bretlandi og Hollandi. Ekkert fæst upp í almennar kröfur.

Þá var 8.685 kröfum lýst í þrotabú Glitnis upp á 3.436 milljarða króna. Áætlað er að kröfuhafar fái á bilinu 20 til 23 prósent upp í kröfur, eða á milli 690 til 860 milljarða króna.

Heildarfjárhæð lýstra krafna í Kaupþing nam 7.316 milljörðum króna miðað við gengi Seðlabanka Íslands þann 22. apríl 2009. Heildarfjárhæð lýstra krafna er hærri en skuldir samkvæmt efnahagsreikningi miðað við 30. júní sl. Skýringar á að heildarfjárhæð lýstra krafna er hærri en skuldir má rekja til oflýstra krafna vegna innstæðna sem Kaupþing hefur þegar greitt, tví- og þrílýsinga vegna ýmissa innstæðna og skuldabréfaútgáfu bankans og krafna sem falla utan efnahaggsreiknings, s.s. skaðabótakrafna og ábyrgðarkrafna. Auk þess væri ítrustu kröfum jafnan lýst. Samanlögð fjárhæð vegna framangreindra atriða næmi a.m.k. 2.900 milljörðum króna.

The vocation of the church is not to convert the world, but to transform the world, so that every person in it has a better chance to live fully, to love wastefully and to be all that he or she can be

via On Faith Panelists Blog: Faith-Based Initiatives – John Shelby Spong.

IntroducingNT.com is the companion Web site to Introducing the New Testament: A Historical, Literary, and Theological Survey by Mark Allan Powell. Here you will find a wealth of material designed to enhance your use of the book, whether you are a student or a professor.

via Introducing the New Testament – by Mark Allan Powell.