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You are right. There is probably no place where the ELCA has said that masturbation is ok, although in one of the first drafts of the sexuality statement it did. Too bad that wasn't continued. Masturbation is a perfectly normal activity.

The ELCA is not about to split. Some congregations have chosen to leave the ELCA after the church wide assembly decision. But statistically, it is a small number.

I am not talking about speaking about how great the person is, although references to someone's comendable characteristics are certainly not a bad thing. The kind of humility that suggests that before God we cannot name the goodness experienced in us or someone else is false humility, in my...

Let's face it. When you gather for a funeral you gather because someone in particular has died. You are not gathering just because death in some generic sense is real, although it is. So a funeral, it seems to me, should include remembrance of the deceased. That remembrance doesn't need to...

The narratives about the so-called Last Supper are so layered with theological matters that it is very difficult to discern what the historical Jesus would have thought about what bread and wine shared before the night of his death meant.

Paul, too, would not have known about "real presence." That, too, is an imposition on his thought and world view.

Generally, I am with you, Angelus. But I really doubt that the historical Jesus taught "real presence." This is a category imposed upon a Hebrew text. Do I believe that the concrete has the ability to communicate the extraordinary? Yes, I do. That is the nature of a sacrament. But to think...

I am not a fan of Wright, but that's okay. I agree with the latter comment. We come at the Scriptures through our cultural glasses and, yes, our religious ones. The Greek glasses have really colored our view of Biblical passages.

settles that, I guess. It must be tough to be so right.

agree

The interesting thing about ideologues is sometimes that they can be so grumpy, so contrary, so mean spirited.

ugh! That is why you belong to the kind of Lutheran church that you do and I don't. Lutheranism is about the gospel. Doctrine is a matter of helping us remain faithful to the gospel. You know and I know that we will never agree. That is okay. I only post what I do so that those who are not...

thanks for that helpful response. I would encourage you to look at the work of Daniel Erlander (Baptized We Live) to grasp what I am getting at. You are used to a Greek wasy of looking at the world. My point is that Biblical realities are for the most part shaped by Hebrew ways of looking at...

I would highlight that Lutherans emphasize our Hebrew origins. For us the nature of the Bible is not the issue. The issue is how that book addresses us, the fact that it is "living word." Arguments always ensue (over the Bible and over communion, for that matter) when the conversation focuses...

I knew using the term "ordinary book" would unsettle some of you. But I think that Lutherans specialize in ordinariness. We have a penchant for the idea that the extraordinary (God) can be communicated through the concrete and the ordinary.

Thanks. I am glad that you appreciated my insights.

The Christian claim is not that God authored the Scriptures but that through them the Spirit continues to speak to the church. Inspired is the word we use.

What I do during office hours is prepare for sermons, classes that I teach, a bunch of administration, coordinate the work that I do for community organizations.

I generally get up at 5:30 Exercise for two hours or so. Head to the office by 8:30-9:00. Am generally in the office in the morning. And often out and about in the afternoon. Since the church I serve is relatively large I have to supervise staff, lots of programs, and do a lot of counseling...

It is in that it was written by ordinary people who dealt with ordinary concerns. Because they had experienced the reality of God in some profound way they used big language and stories to communicate this bigness. The Bible certainly did not drop from heaven one day. It evolved over many...