Alan Jones Quotes
Seven Quotes by: Bishop Alan Jones of Grace Cathedral of San Francisco Episcopal priest and dean. The Church's fixation on the death of Jesus as the universal saving act must end, and the place of the cross must be reimagined in Christian faith. Why? Because of the cult of suffering and the vindictive God behind it.
Book: by Alan Jones entitled: Reimaging Christianity, p. 132 Published: August 2008.
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I am no longer interested, in the first instance, in what a person believes. Most of the time it’s so much clutter in the brain. ... I wouldn't trust an inch many people who profess a belief in God. Others who do not or who doubt have won my trust. I want to know if joy, curiosity, struggle, and compassion bubble up in a person’s life. I’m interested in being fully alive. There is no objective authority.
Book: by Alan Jones entitled: Reimagining Christianity (Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons, 2005) pp 79 and 83 Published: August 2008.
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The mystical traditions all agree that in our helplessness we come closer to the real well of life deep within us ... renewal and transformation could begin by our waiting for our own secret to reveal itself in the pregnant silence–in the silence of the Virgin concerning the secret of God…in the silence we, too, by the grace of the Spirit give birth to ourselves–to the true self that is both secret and known, the self-in-God. Loved and in communion with all things, the soul is born in and out of the secret silence of God, This silence at the heart of mysticism is not only the meeting point of the great traditions but it is also where all hearts might meet.
Book: by Alan Jones entitled: Reimaging Christianity pp 172, 174 Published: 2005.
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The Roman Catholic writer James Carroll certainly thinks so {taking instruction and inspiration from those who are openly hostile to Christianity}. He believes that we have made the sacred mistake of putting the cross at the center of Christianity in the wrong way. Carroll insists that Catholics must not only "reverently and silently" remove the cross from Auschwitz but, far more fundamentally, must remove the cross from the center of Christianity. The Church's fixation on the death of Jesus as the universal saving act must end, and the place of the cross must be reimagined in Christian faith. Why? Because of the cult of suffering and the vindictive God behind it.
Book: by Alan Jones entitled: Reimagining Christianity p 132 Published: November 2004.
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The other thread of just criticism addresses the suggestion implicit in the cross that Jesus' sacrifice was to appease an angry God. Penal substitution was the name of this vile doctrine. I don't doubt for one moment the power of sin and evil in the world or the power of sacrificial love as their antidote and the peculiar power of the cross as sign of forgiveness and restoration, but making God vengeful, all in the name of justice, has left thousands of souls deeply wounded arid lost to the Church forever.
Book: by Alan Jones entitled: Reimagining Christianity p168 Published: November 2004.
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The goal of the converted life is to find God in all things and is based on the conviction of the unity of reality. Everything is connected” (p. 200). ... Jesus and Buddha have this in common with all great spiritual teachers-- to make human beings more conscious of themselves.
Book: by Alan Jones entitled: Reimagining Christianity (p. 194) Published: November 2004.
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In the beginning, before there were any beginnings and endings, there was no place that was not already God! And we call this unimaginable openness, "Ain Soph" - Being-without end. Then came the urge to give life to our world and to us. But there was no place that was not already God. So "Ain Soph" breathed in to make room, like a father steps back so his child will walk to him. Into the emptiness "Ain Soph" set vessels and began to fill them with divine light, as a mother places bowls in which to pour her delicious soup. As the light poured forth, a perfect world was being created! Think of it! A world without greed and cruelty and violence! But then, something happened. The bowls shattered. No one knows why. Perhaps the bowls were too frail? Perhaps the light too intense? Perhaps "Ain Soph" was learning. After all, no one makes perfect the first time. And with the shattering of the bowls, divine sparks flew everywhere! Some rushing back to "Ain Soph," some falling, falling, trapped in the broken shards to become our world, and us.
Source here on the Internet. Dated: 5th December 1993.
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Please note: Quotes are displayed in reverse date order. Undated quotes are listed last.