Richard: Long term - “your kingdom come, your will be done” - God’s creative renewal/redemption of individuals, communities, and our environment I AGREE! I tend to think that the kingdom of God is an even more critical subject than the church at this point in time.

 ”Short term - get Evangelicalism back on track” RICHARD: WHY? Why waste our energy getting Evangelicalism back on track? Why not try to get Catholicism back on track? Or better yet, why not just follow Jesus into the new wineskins? I honestly don’t see the point. “The personality/pattern of God is sometimes called the Kingdom or Reign of God. This personality/pattern is characterised by creation through differentiation, harmonisation, and integration. God may have set backs, but in an emergent/viral way will overcome all the anti-patterns of separation, enmity, and subjugation by redeeming/reintegrating them.” Richard: this is fascinating? Where do you get this way of describing the activity of the KofG?Clipon: “God is male and female. But God The Mother has been so long denied that God is more mother now than father” huh? That one zinged completely over my head. Where do you get that?  ”The Christian experience is a mystical one. Like the mystics before us we can through meditation, prayer and spiritual discipline find Union w/Christ.”  Yes, I am tacking with you know… I can agree with this. “We are not the only people who have had an experience with God.” I can also agree with this… it is time that we recognized how big the kingdom is… it is much bigger than Christianity. There are all kinds of people on a faith journey, and perhaps most of them do not call themselves “Christians.”  ”The earth is Gods first incarnation.”  You lost me again. I will have to ponder this.

Pluralist: this is helpful to me. I have the book, but have not begun to read it yet…in the Ph.D program there is not time. Theology has to wait until semester breasks.

Ok, time for a general comment. With all due respect, you guys seem very cerebral in this blog. For a group of guys friendly to post-modernism, most of the posts in here seem very linear, rational and modern to me, in terms of vocabulary and logic. Perhaps most of you are actually theologians and I have stumbled into your discussions. I am a Ph.D student of Latin American History myself, but many of your posts are daunting for me. Nevertheless, keep it up, and I will try to keep up.

Joseph Holbrook