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A review by donnawr1
The Great Spiritual Migration: How the World's Largest Religion Is Seeking a Better Way to Be Christian by Brian D. McLaren
4.0
Brian McLaren is a favorite author and although this isn't my favorite book of his (mostly because the issues he addresses are less relevant to my life), he is so full of wisdom that you can't help but find wonderful ideas. This book seems more personal about how he went from a conservative, evangelical, fundamentalist Christian to someone who is helping to redefine Evangelical Christianity in the US today. He is open about harm the church has done in society and tries to refocus us on what Christianity is all about, rather than just a system of beliefs. One chapter is entitled "From a Violent God of Domination to a Nonviolent God of Liberation," which gives you a flavor of his themes. Here are some favorite quotes from the book:
Of the many radical things said and done by Jesus, his unflinching emphasis on love was most radical of all. Love was the greatest commandment, he said. It was his new commandment, his prime directive—love for God, for self, for neighbor, for stranger, for alien, for outsider, for outcast, and even for enemy, as he himself modeled. The new commandment of love meant that neither beliefs nor words, neither taboos, systems, structures nor the labels that enshrined them mattered most. Love decentered everything else; love relativized everything else; love took priority over everything else—everything.
Many of us suffer the shame of self-hatred or self-rejection, while others suffer from self-centered conceit or pride. Both inner maladies spread like an infection, and both can be healed when we learn to love ourselves for God’s sake.
The primary concern for many of us Christians is our churches. We see how they’re wrinkling and shrinking, how they’re aging and experiencing numerical decline. We know how important church has been in our lives and we want to save our churches from going the way of the phone booth, cassette tape, or landline. But whenever I find myself in conversations about ‘saving the church,’ I can’t help but recall Jesus’s words: if you want to save your life, you will lose it, but if you lose your life for my sake, you will find it. Jesus’s words make me wonder: could our desire to save our precious religious institutions and traditions actually hasten their demise? Could it be that the Spirit of God is calling the church to stop trying to save itself, and instead to join God in saving the world? Could pouring out itself for the good of the world be the only way for the church to save its own soul?
Of the many radical things said and done by Jesus, his unflinching emphasis on love was most radical of all. Love was the greatest commandment, he said. It was his new commandment, his prime directive—love for God, for self, for neighbor, for stranger, for alien, for outsider, for outcast, and even for enemy, as he himself modeled. The new commandment of love meant that neither beliefs nor words, neither taboos, systems, structures nor the labels that enshrined them mattered most. Love decentered everything else; love relativized everything else; love took priority over everything else—everything.
Many of us suffer the shame of self-hatred or self-rejection, while others suffer from self-centered conceit or pride. Both inner maladies spread like an infection, and both can be healed when we learn to love ourselves for God’s sake.
The primary concern for many of us Christians is our churches. We see how they’re wrinkling and shrinking, how they’re aging and experiencing numerical decline. We know how important church has been in our lives and we want to save our churches from going the way of the phone booth, cassette tape, or landline. But whenever I find myself in conversations about ‘saving the church,’ I can’t help but recall Jesus’s words: if you want to save your life, you will lose it, but if you lose your life for my sake, you will find it. Jesus’s words make me wonder: could our desire to save our precious religious institutions and traditions actually hasten their demise? Could it be that the Spirit of God is calling the church to stop trying to save itself, and instead to join God in saving the world? Could pouring out itself for the good of the world be the only way for the church to save its own soul?