John Shelby Spong

Faith-based blackmail

The United States Roman Catholic Bishops always have a hidden agenda, which is to impose their faith and value systems on the rest of the nation. They also operate out of a conviction that they possess the only true faith. I am not impressed by either of those principles.

By John Shelby Spong | November 17, 2009; 09:00 PM ET | Comments (11)

Ecclesiastical kindergarten games

In this embarrassing conflict the Pope seeks to gain an advantage by making Roman Catholic Christianity more welcoming to those Anglican clergy and members who cannot adjust to new truth and new consciousness, while the Archbishop grieves over the results of his own inept leadership.

By John Shelby Spong | October 22, 2009; 12:41 PM ET | Comments (56)

Why are We in Afghanistan?

The national interest of the United States is to place under pressure those who would destroy the United States. It is not to conquer and subdue the people of Afghanistan. Can one be accomplished without the other?

By John Shelby Spong | October 9, 2009; 09:34 AM ET | Comments (1)

The Best 'Case for God'

What I believe attracts the skeptic is a willingness on the part of religious people to wrestle with truth and to follow it no matter where it leads.

By John Shelby Spong | October 9, 2009; 09:28 AM ET | Comments (11)

Rage About the Transfer of Power

We are witnessing in our nation a dramatic shift in power. Such a shift always means that those who have in the past possessed power are seeing that power weakened and those who were formerly the powerless ones are becoming empowered. Rage always accompanies the transfer of power.

By John Shelby Spong | September 17, 2009; 01:43 PM ET | Comments (10)

Battle Over Homosexuality in Episcopal Church is Over

The battle over homosexuality in the Episcopal Church is over. The vote at the last General Convention was overwhelming.

By John Shelby Spong | August 6, 2009; 07:26 PM ET | Comments (105)

Marriage a Privilege Open to All

The State should not tell religious institutions who they should welcome, but not to welcome all of God's people violates everything I know about God and I would have no desire to be part of a discriminating religious body.

By John Shelby Spong | July 28, 2009; 09:16 PM ET | Comments (60)

Male Authority Posing as Divine Authority

The Christian Church has for far too long attempted to perfume sexist discrimination against women under the name of "Bible-based, Sacred Tradition." I wonder what part of the male anatomy bears the divine image?

By John Shelby Spong | July 21, 2009; 12:19 PM ET | Comments (69)

White, Anglo-Saxon Male Judgments

Will Sotomayor's life experience bias her judgment? No more or less than the life experience of white, Anglo-Saxon males have biased their judgment over the years.

By John Shelby Spong | July 15, 2009; 08:34 PM ET | Comments (11)

Gay Marriage, Religious Sensitivities and Civil Rights

In 25 years we will be embarrassed that we had to jump through these hoops to bring justice to our world for gay and lesbian couples.

By John Shelby Spong | June 24, 2009; 10:34 AM ET | Comments (3)

Parents Relying on Religion to Heal Sick Children

The peculiar abuse of withholding medical treatment on the part of pious but misinformed people, is simply one more tragic chapter in the dark side of religious history.

By John Shelby Spong | June 1, 2009; 02:58 PM ET | Comments (1)

Celibacy a Man-Made Rule that Can be Changed

A growing consciousness in the Western world will inevitably make openness to women clergy and homosexual clergy a part of the ministry of all churches in the future. I will rejoice in that.

By John Shelby Spong | May 14, 2009; 11:40 AM ET | Comments (7)

Evangelical Christian Day of Prayer

The National Day of Prayer has been little more than a right wing evangelical celebration of a single strand of America's rich and diverse religious heritage.

By John Shelby Spong | May 6, 2009; 10:05 AM ET | Comments (42)

Fundamentalism an Enemy to All Faiths

Claims to possess an inerrant Bible, to be governed by an infallible pope or to possess the ultimate truth are all merely forms of religious idolatry that has caused great suffering in the world.

By John Shelby Spong | April 27, 2009; 08:02 PM ET | Comments (8)

Losing Faith in Old Traditions

The problem with religion is that each system claims it has captured ultimate truth in its own propositional creeds and organizational structures, so that when those things fade or die great anxiety is loosed.

By John Shelby Spong | March 20, 2009; 08:32 AM ET | Comments (78)

A Victory for Truth

Thank God we now have a president who will remove both political ideology and religious bias from the pursuit of truth in the scientific arena.

By John Shelby Spong | March 16, 2009; 10:59 AM ET | Comments (3)

Economic Recovery Built on Fairness, not Vengeance

The attempt to aid the poor has been labeled "socialism." The result is that the greed of a few has come close to destroying the capitalist system that gives hope to so many.

By John Shelby Spong | March 9, 2009; 12:28 AM ET | Comments (1)

Muslim Leaders Condemn Beheading of Woman

We Christians have much to repent of in the way women have been treated and unfortunately the abuse of women by various parts of the Christian Church still goes on today - to our great shame.

By John Shelby Spong | February 26, 2009; 03:05 PM ET | Comments (0)

Sacred Texts

Those who want to control the Bible's message express primarily their own fear and insecurity.

By John Shelby Spong | February 21, 2009; 03:54 PM ET | Comments (0)

Holocaust Deniers

The embrace by the Vatican of the anti-Semitic Bishop Richard Williamson is an embarrassment to Christians everywhere.

By John Shelby Spong | February 11, 2009; 04:22 PM ET | Comments (0)

Faith-Based Initiatives

The vocation of the church is not to convert the world, but to transform the world, so that every person in it has a better chance to live fully, to love wastefully and to be all that he or she can be.

By John Shelby Spong | February 10, 2009; 08:10 PM ET | Comments (0)

Appeals for Peace Must Move Beyond Religion

Every administration has a new opportunity. President Obama will try. Will he succeed? The mutual interests of the Jews, the Muslims and the world cry out for it. The odds of the situation may be against him, but hopes of the world are soaring.

By John Shelby Spong | February 3, 2009; 10:00 AM ET | Comments (11)

A Transitional and Transcendent Moment

A prayer that is broad enough to include all Americans and that forces all into the recognition that each of us is but a small part of the world's population is certainly appropriate. To be appropriate to all, however, is to be compromising to no one.

By John Shelby Spong | January 16, 2009; 02:58 PM ET | Comments (16)

Hamas Leader's Claims about Israel

The idea that ultimate truth can or does reside in a single religious tradition is the primary place where religion in all its forms almost inevitably turns demonic. We understand it when confronted by the absurd Muslim claims, like those expressed by Hamas leaders. The time has come to recognize it when it comes perfumed with Christian vocabulary.

By John Shelby Spong | January 13, 2009; 05:32 PM ET | Comments (1)

Less Fear, More Faith

My hope is that the traditional forms of religion that have dominated the Bush Administration and that have found expression in the abuse of homosexuals, the denial of women's reproductive rights, the opposition to the insights of science, the negativity toward stem cell research and the suppression of competent and responsible end of life decisions will fade quietly from our public life.

By John Shelby Spong | January 2, 2009; 04:20 PM ET | Comments (29)

Splinter Episcopalians: Giving Gravitas to Trivia

The attitude reflected by this tiny group of dissident Episcopalians is so out of touch with reality as to be laughable. If they cannot adjust to a church in which women and homosexual persons are treated equally and are ordained to be priests and bishops, perhaps they ought to find another tradition that will accept their prejudices as something other than an inability to adjust.

By John Shelby Spong | December 22, 2008; 08:28 AM ET | Comments (76)

Character Counts, Religious or Not

I see no evidence that President Bush, our most overtly religious president, had an administration free of corruption, greed and even torture, so I do not think the religion of the candidate counts for much, except in negative directions. I fear zealots of any stripe.

By John Shelby Spong | October 2, 2008; 04:08 PM ET | Comments (17)

Religious Ideology or Rule of Law?

To impose religious ideology on a pluralistic society would destroy the very basis upon which this nation was founded. Will any politician be this dumb and actually play with this fire? I doubt it, but if they were to do so it would mean that sectarian religion could now dictate public policy

By John Shelby Spong | September 27, 2008; 05:41 AM ET | Comments (11)

Women as Second-Class Christians

Roman Catholics base their opposition to ordaining women on the antiquated idea that women cannot represent God before the altar. Is God male? Is there some part of the male anatomy that women do not possess that is somehow particularly Godlike?

By John Shelby Spong | September 4, 2008; 08:47 AM ET | Comments (45)

Good Show, Poor Theology

Evangelicals have a right to be involved in politics. They also have a responsibility to educate themselves on the issues. Thank God they are a minority of our population. If they were not, then America would be subjected to what John Stuart Mill called "the tyranny of the majority."

By John Shelby Spong | August 22, 2008; 10:34 AM ET | Comments (522)

Religion Begets Prejudice

The idea that being religious might make one less prejudiced is a fantasy. It appears to make people more prejudiced, or at the least, not to confront their prejudices.

By John Shelby Spong | August 4, 2008; 10:07 AM ET | Comments (27)

Chaplains Serve Soldiers

Saying prayers at meals that are mandatory is an imposition. This would be especially true if the prayers assume a particular view of God, which all prayers seem to do. The ACLU is absolutely correct to make this request.

By John Shelby Spong | July 28, 2008; 08:15 AM ET | Comments (13)

Communion for All the Hungry

For any religious tradition to claim that it alone controls access to God is the height of idolatry.

By John Shelby Spong | July 16, 2008; 11:53 AM ET | Comments (0)

More A-Theists Than We Realize

It is a pity that theological knowledge so seldom makes it down to the people in the pews. It seems from this Pew Survey, however, that it might be making it in the ranks of the atheists.

By John Shelby Spong | July 7, 2008; 07:57 AM ET | Comments (28)

Faith a Symptom or a Treatment?

Faith is something one lives, not something one says or something one does. If that distinction is not grasped then much of it is nonsense.

By John Shelby Spong | June 16, 2008; 09:50 AM ET | Comments (5)

Church Lags Behind, Again

Churches fought the suffrage movement that finally won for women the right to vote in presidential elections. Churches resisted desegregation until their opposition was dismissed for the racism it was. Churches are the last bastion of homophobia.

By John Shelby Spong | May 27, 2008; 04:15 PM ET | Comments (9)

Church Can't Accept (or Justify) Either

My sense is that just as black men were given the vote before women, so racism will be expunged before sexism. The Christian Church will be an authentic community of God’s people when both have been confronted and exorcised.

By John Shelby Spong | March 28, 2008; 07:39 AM ET | Comments (22)

Jesus for the Non-Religious

The Easter Jesus is the Jesus who can command the attention of a world that is not only weary of war, but weary of religion also, especially when it seems to be a cause of war.

By John Shelby Spong | March 21, 2008; 12:05 PM ET | Comments (147)

Spitzer's Compulsive Behavior and Ours

My first observation about the Eliot Spitzer affair is that compulsive sexual activity is a human disease like compulsive gambling or compulsive drinking. It should be treated psychologically, but human beings seem to enjoy making moral judgments.

By John Shelby Spong | March 13, 2008; 07:22 PM ET | Comments (5)

Church Must Change or Die

When knowledge collides with traditional faith change is inevitable. I welcome it and if the church cannot engage this intellectually driven change, then it probably should die.

By John Shelby Spong | March 3, 2008; 06:06 AM ET | Comments (54)

Fervor Can Move Us or Manipulate Us

Billy Graham elicits fervor. So did Adolf Hitler. The issue is whether the fervor leads the candidate and the nation in the right direction.

By John Shelby Spong | February 23, 2008; 07:42 AM ET | Comments (14)

Church Obsessed with Sex, not Morality

If a sexual relationship is life-giving, loving, committed and faithful, then it needs to be called good. If a sexual relationship is exploitative, dehumanizing of the partners, a violation of one’s word given to another, then it needs to be called evil.

By John Shelby Spong | December 14, 2007; 09:53 AM ET | Comments (7)

Pandering to the Right

I found Governor Romney’s speech on religion to be little more than pandering to right-wing religious enthusiasts. It may help in the primary process with southern and mid-western evangelicals, but should he get the Republican nomination, it will not help...

By John Shelby Spong | December 14, 2007; 09:50 AM ET | Comments (0)

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