We are made from and for love
the intensity of divine love never varies
God loved us equally: before God made us/
as God loves us now/as God will love us in the life to come
healthy parents do not want their children
just to think rightly about Mommy and Daddy
they want a personal relationship with them
and for their children to thrive
similarly, God did not create us
just to think rightly about God (doctrine)
God created us to have a personal relationship with us
and wants us to be fully alive –
“The glory of God is man and woman fully alive”
– St Irenaeus
“I have come so they might have life
and have it abundantly” – Jesus
in How to Read the Bible and Still Be a Christian
John Dominic Crossan wrote “Accept the nonviolent Jesus
as the true image of the nonviolent God
and reject the subversion of Jesus and God
into violence”
similarly, gender subversion needs to be rejected
where “woman” in both religion and civilization
was associated with “matter” and “nature”
and “man” with “spirit” and “culture”-
this gender division was an ordering/organizing principle
which created hierarchical structures and relationships
but God’s Work like God’s Wisdom
turns the world upside down
our challenge is to join God’s Work
by challenging the status quo/
being as revolutionary/prophetic as Jesus
faced with the silence of God/
the silence of his own soul/
and the silence of the souls entrusted to him (novices)
Thomas Merton realized eighty years ago
the most practical thing would be to stop asking questions
but today he would encourage us to ask questions
about sexuality/gender/patriarchy.
Intelligent Christian Spirituality 