Kindle Notes & Highlights
This monk treated me the way I wanted to be treated: with respect, hospitality and genuine welcome to be fully myself. He had no secret agenda to make me into a Buddhist.
Maintaining a non-rivalrous posture doesn’t mean that we turn into wishy-washy people who lack conviction. We bear witness to that which we believe, but we also recognize that it is not our job to either judge or change others.
without the kind of certainty that leads me to try to dominate or conquer another;
The Gospels do show a conquering motif to Jesus' ministry, though I think one might argue we are to leave the conquering to Jesus, while we're just supposed to bare witness and love
If Christianity lacks the tools and equipment to counter the harm and oppression done in the name of mammon, American exceptionalism, white supremacy, patriarchy and heteronormativity, then our spirituality remains impotent. It is a sounding gong, a clanging cymbal.
We can hold systems to account without making false accusations or hoping to gain any power lost by that system. Our hope lies in Jesus and the foolishness of the cross; we do not aspire to worldly power.
Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God.
Removing the barrier of judgment requires genuine humility, an ancient Christian value. When we start with humility, we move from speaking out of a place of certainty to speaking out of a place of confidence.
We follow Jesus and can be declarative about this path, but only under the auspices of, “But I could be wrong.”
In theory, this should be an easy barrier to overcome within a Christian framework, because the heart of our faith is just that: eat from the tree of life (Jesus), and not the tree of the knowledge of good and evil (judgment).
When we become aware of our dependence on God and others, we grow to understand that we are not the masters of our own fates nor knights in shining armor—for either non-Christians or the oppressed.
If Jesus accepted foreign gifts, who are we to turn away the offerings of other cultures and faiths?
Could we go so far as to say that anyone who refuses to scapegoat and sacrifice others for the sake of group peace—anyone who stands up for the outcast—is a follower of the God-Who-Is-Love, regardless of what they call the spirit by which they live? Yes. I’ve recognized the Holy Spirit in people who do not call it by the same name I call it. I look for love as the marker of who walks a similar path to mine.
First, if the Holy Spirit is at work among all people, it only serves Christians to learn the perspectives of others.
Scripture does not say “go and dominate,” or “go and conquer,” but rather, “go and make disciples.”
On this quest, we seek to find the image of God in every human, because every human bears the marks of love, regardless of how unredeemable they may seem. And we humble ourselves, knowing we cannot save anyone; that we do not know everything; and that it is not our job to judge. We embrace the path God presents us, and live with gratitude, joy and in peace with all people.
Without a vision of God who is, in very nature, nonviolent, human beings will always have a guard up in relation to God.
Pedagogy of the Oppressed.
