o, the weather outside was frightful...

...but the worship was so delighful.

sorry for the late update, only the day before the next service, but we somewhat beholden to technology and it appears that our trusty computer is in the process of shuffling off the mortal coil! so, we have been scrambling to get a new computer to do this sort of thing as well as help with the actual immersion service.

so, enough excuses...here's what we talked about in last week's blizzard.

huddled close to each other to stay warm we continued to talk about how the bible is to be used for our daily lives. people last week were deeply offended by some of the passages that were selected [notably the ones pertaining to women remaining silent in church] and were baffled with the rules telling people not to wear clothes with two different types of material woven together.

so, how do we separate what we use from what we discard?

one of our people wrote in with the idea that we have to be careful when we use the bible literally because we run the risk of making it say something, or do something, that was never intended by the authors of the book. she spoke about myth and how stories can be used to convey deeper truths for the readers. she then added that she did not believe that the bible is untrue in any way, just that it uses literal devices to communicate deep truths to its readers. but she is also concerned that people will the dismiss any part of the scriptures that he or she may not agree with and this is just as foolosh/dangerous. the bible is not our play thing and the ultimate goal of interpreting it is not that we clarify it but that it clarifies us.

another course of argument was that the morality of the bible was okay for that time period but should be reviewed through today's lens. there was some disagreement here. one person thought that stealing to feed one's family was okay but, according to the old testament, that person should be killed. the argument was made that stealing to feed one's family is acceptable. that was countered by a soft spoken woman who thought that if we didn't steal then we opened up the door for others to help. be it aid agencies or just friendly neighbours she thought that we need to trust more in god and let him take care of us.

as you can tell there were so many points and some held that the bible is translated differently in a post-resurrection world. this brought up the question whether or not that excluded jewish people from accurate interpretation of the bible since they did not believe in jesus' divinity.

so, to wrap up, i hope this is a jarbled and passionate in the post as it was on the evening of..for many perspectives were shared and many viewpoints were explored.

at the end...well, we're not at the end and even though we are talking about god's sense of humour this week it will not be suprising to see some more of this topic sneak in.

by the way: we decided to interpret the bible through the lens of jesus...in other words: we treat women the way jesus did, we eat and live life the way jesus did [at least we try] and we understand that jesus came to show us that the faith, the bible, and everything we do, is fundamentally about a relationship with god. instead of worrying about rules and regulations we are to be concerned with people and the marginalized and look for god among them.

however, it is probably best to leave this post open for now...because the topic is still something we are struggling with so please come and join in the struggle!