Satan

I was challenged recently to consider some of the words used in our baptismal liturgy, particularly the series of questions that starts:

Celebrant: Do you renounce Satan and all the spiritual forces of wickedness that rebel against God? 

Non-Resistance To Evil #2

Jesus’ teaching on non-resistance to evil is hard.

Trinity: The Soul Of Creation – Session 8 Q&A 13b

Richard Rohr: If holy affirming is first of all life, then the holy denying is almost inevitable, otherwise we would idolize the holy affirming. It keeps everything flowing. We can’t have it forever. Everything passes away. This everything that passes away is also reborn in God.

William Paul Young’s “Great Sadness”

In his novel The Shack William Paul Young struggles with the human experience of tragedy.

Facing Evil

My Jeremiah post on evil a week ago today generated a number of fruitful responses to the conundrum of a God who “shapes evil” against people.

Evil According to Irwin Shaw

In the sermon Irwin Shaw puts in the mouth of the vicar Noah encounters in his novel, The Young Lions, the preacher, starts with a stirring call to love as the embodiment of the message Jesus brought.

“unnatural selection”

Some challenging thoughts “from brokenstones”:

A Ditch Worth Dying In

The number of ditches worth dying in seems to diminish as I age. There are just fewer battles worth waging.

What is “Just Plain Evil”?

“Colorado Shooter: Insane or Just Plain Evil?” by Eliza Shapiro , Christine Pelisek Jul 25, 2012 4:45 AM EDT

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2012/07/25/colorado-shooter-insane-or-just-plain-evil.html

Is “Just Plain Evil” a legal definition? Is it a helpful definition? Or were the editors of “The Daily Beast” trying to make a theological point when they created the headline for Shapiro and Pelisek’s article on the legal strategies to be employed in the trial of James Holmes?

Evil

Questioned about the origin of evil, Eckhart Tolle draws a useful analogy to speak about the nature of God and God’s relationship to creation.