The Raven Foundation

Many find similarities between ancient myths and the Bible to be a reason for doubting the Bible's validity.

There are similarities between the ancient myths and the Bible.

But is the Bible just another ancient myth?

Pastor Adam explores this topic in this episode.
https://adamericksen.org/podcasts/is-the-bible-just-another-ancient-myth/

Jesus subverted religion by revealing God doesn’t desire sacrifices or a scapegoat, explains Pastor Adam. God offers us love and peace through his son Jesus.

How Jesus Subverted Religion - Pastor Adam Ericksen Jesus subverted religion by revealing God doesn't desire sacrifices or a scapegoat, explains Pastor Adam. God offers us love and peace.

When asked “What is the point of prayer?”, Adam explains that in Matthew 6, Jesus says God knows what we need before we ask. But that doesn’t mean God knows what we want. Jesus demonstrates how to pray by saying the Lord’s Prayer. In that prayer, what we need to thrive is stated – daily bread, forgiveness of sins, resistance of evil, and deliverance from tribulations. Listen to this full episode of One Question with Pastor Adam at https://rb.gy/89ql6v.

In 2 Timothy 4:3, Paul explains that there is no Gentile or Jew, slave or free, because we are all united in Christ. Teachers who interpret Scripture as being opposed to members of the LGBTQIA+ community are not following the guiding principle Jesus lifts up and Paul lifts in Galatians, that we are all one in Jesus.

Listen Adam explain in "False Teachers, Itching Ears, and LGBTQ Inclusion". at https://rb.gy/i74ppw.

When Pastor Adam is asked "Is the Church becoming too political?", he explains in order to have a religion that isn’t connected to politics, we would need to stop reading the Bible.

The Jewish people believe their story begins when God hears their outcry against their oppression in Egypt. As Moses leads the people out of Egypt, God warns them not to return to Egypt, but also avoid to the structures of oppression they are fleeing. Often the oppressed become oppressors, which God warns against.

While it is very tempting to vilify our opponents, Jesus instructs us to love our enemies.

Pastor Adam declares the Bible should never be elevated above Jesus or God. Noted Catholic theologian Karl Rahner, SJ stated the Bible points beyond Jesus to God. The person of Jesus reveals the nonviolent, loving, and merciful nature of God. Jesus models a radically nonviolent ethic. When we as Christians use violence, we have sinned.

The early church stated the best way to interpret the violent stories in the Old Testament is as allegories and the worst way to interpret Old Testament stories is literally.

Listen to this engaging episode at https://adamericksen.org/podcasts/we-are-not-biblians-we-are-christians/

Christianity Isn’t About Following a Bunch of Rules. It’s About Joy.
While Christianity often emphasizes the importance of following the rules, Pastor Adam explains Christianity is really about joy.

Christianity Isn’t About Following a Bunch of Rules. It’s About Joy. - Pastor Adam Ericksen While Christianity often emphasizes the importance of following the rules, Pastor Adam explains Christianity is really about joy.

Pastor Adam explains the main criteria for someone calling themselves Christian is to follow Jesus and not get caught up in rivalry. People who seek to divide people by declaring who is a Christian and who is not often lack a strong sense of self. The act of comparison is usually designed to enhance one’s own position. Listen to the whole episode at https://adamericksen.org/podcasts/what-is-the-criteria-for-being-a-christian/.

Keith and I went to a Cubs game on Monday -- Cubs win! So we got to sing the victory song with 35,000 other joyful Cubs fans. Singing "Go Cubs Go" is part of the reward of being a Cubs fan and I sang and swayed and pumped my fist in the air and enjoyed being part of the crowd.

But honestly, I can only abandon myself to the joy of sports celebrations if I don't focus on how the losers feel. Luckily baseball has such a long season that any given game doesn't cause too many tears -- until the playoffs of course. But mostly there isn't a permanent class of losers in sports, winners and losers change places and the uncertainty of which place your team will occupy is part of what keeps us coming back.

In sports there is no permanent class of losers. That's why sports can be a break from real life, from the reality of social structures that lock some people out while others celebrate.

My takeaway from the win/lose see-saw of sports is that it's not the losing that hurts, it's being stuck in the position of loser so that others can celebrate. Just ask any Cubs fan who endured the 108 year drought between championships -- it was no picnic. You can think about any of our social divides this way by asking who has the power and who is locked out and where is the hope.

Social healing will happen not when losers are winners and the winners lose, but when more and and more people, no matter their power or status, pour onto the field and into the stands to sing and sway together. That's a cause for celebration.

In his latest article, Pastor Adam explains the US doesn’t have a border crisis, we have a border opportunity. He cites Scripture to prove it.

The United States Doesn't Have a Border Crisis. We Have a Border Opportunity. - Pastor Adam Ericksen Pastor Adam explains the US doesn't have a border crisis, we have a border opportunity. He cites Scripture to prove it.

In this podcast, Pastor Adam explains that in Machiavelli‘s most famous book, "The Prince", the author recommends political leaders commit acts of brutality, murder, and deception to maintain power. A key method Machiavelli recommended was to scapegoat and accuse the other. Current politicians use Machiavellian methods without ever acknowledging they are not following the politics of Christ. In fact, they wrap themselves in the cloak of Christianity for political advantage. https://adamericksen.org/podcasts/machiavellian-politics-vs-the-politics-of-christ/

In the wake of recent political violence and calls on both sides of the political divide to end such violence, Pastor Adam reveals the myth of redemptive violence guiding proposed solutions. https://adamericksen.org/podcasts/what-does-the-bible-say-about-violence-and-self-defense/

The photo of Donald Trump with his fist raised in the moments after the attempted assassination instantly became iconic. It was reported that he could be heard saying “Fight” as the secret service was rushing him to safety. Political violence is being rightly condemned by all sides and I unabashedly add my voice to those. But embarrassingly, I felt an almost reflexive hope that the shooter’s motive would allow me to condemn “them” and deflect responsibility from myself.

Did you feel it, too? I think it’s rooted in a need to be reassured that we are on the right side of something as clearly wrong as political violence. The problem is that the obsession with being right is the very thing that motives violence, not reduces it.

What will reduce violence? My friends at the Metta Center for Nonviolence taught me about the two hands of nonviolence. Nonviolence actively resists injustice and at the same time seeks connection. Resistance is symbolized by a hand raised, palm outward in a gesture that says “stop”. The other hand reaches out, palm upward to show a desire for relationship. The video on the Metta Center homepage explains that “We can reach out to others even as we put a stop to their harmful activities.”

A raised fist has often been a symbol of resistance to injustice, a defiant indignation that the oppression is intolerable and must stop now. Not yesterday, right now. It communicates the urgency of the struggle perfectly well to those of us who can be oblivious to the harm we are causing. It has landed like a wakeup call to me more than once, especially as a teenager seeing raised fists during the struggle for civil rights and the anti-war protests of the Vietnam era.

But working with local leaders living nonviolently in violent contexts has taught me that the closed fist runs the risk of undoing one pattern of oppression by replacing it with another. It does little to ensure that the victims will be able to resist taking on the role of oppressors. Only the two hands of nonviolence can do that by never divorcing resistance to injustice from the recognition that no one’s life is expendable.

I’m not sure I’ll ever get to the point where that would be my first instinct. But I’m grateful to those who have loved me enough to extend the open hand until I was able to grab on.

If you think you know what Christian Nationalism is, why it’s a problem, who’s to blame for it and why we have to stop them, I get it. The undeniable link of Christian Nationalism to white supremacist logic is particularly galling on the Juneteenth holiday which reminds us of the hard-headed, cold-hearted resistance to ending slavery of “good” Christians.

But here’s the catch: one thing I’ve learned the hard way is that the more certain I am that I know who and what the problem is, the more likely I am to be engaged in scapegoating. As René Girard has taught us, to have a scapegoat is not to know you have one. We can see other people’s scapegoats for what they are: innocent victims of self-righteous witch hunts. But our own scapegoats look to us like monsters, devils, and wicked people who must be opposed by good people like us. I’ve had my scapegoats go from guilty to innocent so many times now, that I am very cautious about jumping on bandwagons, even ones as obviously in the right as opposing Christian Nationalism.

But that caution can come across as cowardly. As if I am afraid to stand with victims or speak to truth to power. I get that, too. I recently led a class at my mainline, liberal church on Christian Nationalism and I caught flack for not calling out particular people, organizations, or religious movements as the problem. Instead, I pointed out that Christian alignment with national identity goes back to Constantine. It’s been a problem long before there was anything remotely like America, Evangelicalism, or our particularly form of racial superiority. That approach frustrated any unity or sense of righteousness we might have gotten if I’d just presented an “us vs. them” account. It left some feeling a little disappointed. Frankly, I felt that way, too.

I taught the class that way because I was fairly certain that even though Christian Nationalism is wrong, which I believe it is, it still may be functioning as a scapegoat for me. In other words, by being against it I can avoid any complicity I may have in the problem. Until I can get to the point of honestly saying “we” instead of “they”, as in “we are wrong to conflate Christian identity with our national identity”, I feel caution is my best option.

So, good news – I think I’ve found a way to get to “we” thanks to my good friends at Theology and Peace. Their annual conference has always been a safe place for me to confess my temptation to scapegoat, so naturally I brought up my concerns about Christian Nationalism. Wesley Dunbar didn’t hesitate to offer me support and a resource to get to “we”. The minute he shared the book title, I felt I was more than halfway there: “Baptizing America: How Mainline Protestants Helped Build Christian Nationalism”. Wow! Just with that subtitle, the authors Brian Kaylor and Beau Underwood were breaking down the divide that we Christians love to set up – I mean, how else are we to know which of us is the true church and which are the heretics?

I haven’t read the book yet, but I plan to. If it delivers on the promise to help me avoid scapegoating AND address the dangers of Christian Nationalism, I’ll let you know. Wes, happy to hear from you about the book and from anyone who has found a way to move from “they” to “we”.

Adam and Biblical scholar Kate Common discuss her book, "Undoing Conquest: Ancient Israel, the Bible, and the Future of Christianity." The conquest narrative in the Book of Joshua is one of the most troubling parts of the Bible. But what if it never actually happened? https://adamericksen.org/podcasts/undoing-the-bibles-conquest-story-with-dr-kate-common/

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