Caring for Marriage Named in List of Top 10 Marriage Blogs

Back in March I told you about Daily Marriage Emails, written by Lori Odhner (of Caring for Marriage) called “Marriage Moats.”

Caring for Marriage has now been listed at #5 in a list of "The Top 10 Marriage Blogs of 2010"! (The list is put together by Stu Gray of TheMarryBlogger.com.)

The listing is well-deserved in my opinion. Frankly I'm amazed that, even though it's been months since the program started, every day there's another email in my inbox with an interesting image and yet another thoughtful insight, quote, tool, or anecdote about some aspect of marriage.

Congratulations Lori!

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Sign up for “Marriage Moats” or view the archive of past emails.

Good Articles About Grief and Suicide

Nothing works to totally make sense of death and suicide but sometimes words and ideas can help. Here are a couple of articles that I found helpful and useful.

Here's an article that Rev. John Odhner wrote about what we can learn from the Writings/Swedenborg about suicide: "Reflections on Suicide". (You can also download a Word doc version of it here.)

And here's an article that Rev. Brian Smith wrote about the wounds that come from losing a friend: "Tearing".

And here's a post that Rev. Mac Frazier wrote about despair.

A Good Sermon about Bitter Waters

I was catching up with Rev. Coleman Glenn's blog (colemanglenn.wordpress.com) and read a sermon he preached 2 weeks ago in Toronto "Bitter Waters Made Sweet". It's a good one. Here's an excerpt:

And then you realize it: you’ve stopped focusing on the Lord. You’ve stopped focusing on your commitment. You’ve stopped taking the time to think about how to love the Lord, how to love the people around you. Maybe you’ve stopped reading the Word. Maybe you haven’t been going to church. You realize what’s been missing. And so with hope you open up the Word to your favourite passage, you attend a doctrinal class, you go to church. You recommit yourself to your goals. You’re ready to get back on the right path. You see the cool waters right in front of you, and you take a deep drink.

And there’s nothing there. The same words that in the past have inspired you fall flat. You read the Word, but it’s not joyful; it’s a chore. Your doctrinal class feels meaningless. Church is boring. The waters that looked so refreshing, so cooling, so life-giving, are bitter!

More New Church/Swedenborgian Blogs

Back in September I was celebrating the fact that I'm not the only New Church blogger and the New Church blogosphere (I use that word just to annoy the people who wrote this collection of definitions) has continued to expand since then.

I've mentioned MacFrazier.com, Dave Lindrooth's church growth blog (www.newchurchweblog.org), and my theological school classmate, Stephen Muires' blog (muires.wordpress.com) before. And they continue to be some of the most active New Church bloggers. (Far more active than me, in fact.) But they've also been joined by a couple of others that I want to tell you about.

Coleman Glenn's Blog

Rev. Coleman Glenn used to have a blog when he was in theological school and now he's started blogging again as a pastor at colemanglenn.wordpress.com. He's been blogging quite a bit—on an article from the New York Times about marriage, on the question of whether men and women can be "just friends", and, most recently, a fascinating discussion of the similarities and differences between New Church teachings and Arminianism.

Theologi-Keal

Solomon Keal, another guy I'm in theological school with, has started a blog called Theologi-Keal (theologikeal.blogspot.com). It looks like it's mostly a place where he posts the papers he writes for school (like one on "Why was Jesus a man and not a woman?") and so the posts are pretty lengthy but he also has posted some short reflections on community and what a pastor's flock eats, for example.

Solomon and his wife Tirah also have a marriage blog called Loving Marriage (healthymarriages.blogspot.com).

Swedenblogian

I had to mention this blog because it's got such a great title—Swedenblogian (swedenblogian.blogspot.com). The author of the blog describes herself as

a wanna-be expert on Swedenborg.
a big fan of his.
happily Catholic.
happily married.
a grandmother.
turning out to love getting old, for some odd reason.

Her posts are usually a pleasant length and often have a picture and a couple of interesting reflections on Swedenborgian ideas.

Heavenly Doctrines Quotes

I found out about this blog from Swedenblogian. It's called Heavenly Doctrine Quotes: Words from the Lord to help us discover His Way (hd-quotes.blogspot.com). It's very simple and pleasant. Each day whoever updates it posts a short quotation from the Writings/Heavenly Doctrines, formatted in poem form.

TheGodGuy's Weblog

Swedenblogian also reminded me of this blog. I've come across it occasionally when I've done a search for Swedenborg on Google blog search. The tagline of TheGodGuy's Weblog (thegodguy.wordpress.com) is "Love is the Ultimate Science" and that gives you a pretty good idea of the stuff he likes to talk about—love, science, religion, philosophy, psychology. TheGodGuy is Edward F. Sylvia. He's the author of a book called Sermons from the Compost Pile: Seven Steps Toward Creating an Inner Garden and a book coming out soon called Proving God: Swedenborg’s Remarkable Quest For The Quantum Fingerprints Of Love.

What I've read of his hasn't really grabbed me yet. (The main problem may be that I haven't read that much of it.) Maybe it's just not my particular blend of religion, philosophy, and science. Regardless, I'm glad that he's doing what he's doing and I hope you like it.

Others?

For more New Church blogs check out my blogroll and the posts I have categorized as blog. And, if you have or know of an awesome New Church/Swedenborgian blog that I've failed to mention, please leave a comment.

I don't know what's best

On Sunday Rev. David Lindrooth gave a talk at the Bryn Athyn Contemporary Family Service that has stuck with me. (I don't know if it was recorded. So far it's not available on newchurchaudio.org but if it ever becomes available it should be here.)

Luckily for you he also posted a summary of it on his blog: "A Church is Dead Without Innocence". He has a list of all the things that the Writings say aren't possible without innocence and then applies this to thinking about a church.

In the light of these statements, look at the church through the lens of innocence. What does the church without innocence look like? How does it operate? What are the risks for a church organization that gives “innocence” short shrift? -no regeneration -no wisdom -no good -no charity -no worship…. The cultivation of innocence is a defining factor in the church. No wonder Jesus said “let the little children come to me for such is the kingdom of heaven.”

The main thing that stuck with me, though, was a passage that he read from Heaven and Hell that talks about the angels' innocence. Most people who've had some New Church education or gone to a New Church congregation for a while could give you the New Church definition of innocence: "a willingness to be led by the Lord" (Heaven and Hell 341. This is a great phrase for summarizing what innocence is all about, but there's also another, more personal one that I got from Dave on Sunday: "I don't know what's best."

In Heaven and Hell 278 (the passage Dave read) it says that angels in a state of innocence

recognize that they themselves do not know what is good for them, the Lord alone knowing this.

How do I work on being innocent? A good place to start is to say "I don't know what's best; the Lord does." This can be applied to all sorts of things—"I don't know what's best for me and my life; the Lord does." "I don't know what's best for this person who's asking me for help; the Lord does." "I don't know what's best for the church organization; the Lord does."

Insights into Life

Stephen Muires, another student (or theolog) at the theological school has a blog (muires.wordpress.com). The tagline of his blog is "Insights into Life." A typical post is only a couple of paragraphs long but usually incorporates a fascinating short quote or two and then a few of Stephen's reflections on them.

If you're into New Age stuff and Swedenborg, this will probably be perfect for you. Stephen brings together quotes from New Age sources and Swedenborg in really interesting ways (e.g. this post and that post).

If you're into Swedenborg (or the New Church, rather) and not so much into New Age stuff, I would still encourage you to give Stephen's blog a chance. He finds lots of interesting quotes from the Writings and I'm guessing that he'll get you to think about even familiar passages in new ways (e.g. this post and that post).

Dave Lindrooth: "We need to love the hell out of people."

I highly recommend that you check out Rev. Dave Lindrooth's blog, Dave Lindrooth's Church Growth Blog: A gathering place for support and mentorship in New Church Evangelism (www.newchurchweblog.org). I haven't had a chance to explore everything on his blog so I can't give you lots of recommendations of what to look at but I recommend that you start by watching the 4 minute video on his most recent post, "Let's Ramp Up the Love in this Church".

Perspective on the Proprium

Just recently I was celebrating the fact that I'm not the only New Church blogger who updates regularly and now it's been almost a month since my last post. Sigh...

Anyway, I wanted to let you know that Rev. Clark Echols has recently posted a bunch of new stuff to his blog, Clark Echols' Swedenborgian Opinions (glendalenewchurch.blogspot.com). I've only had the chance to read one his new posts so far so that's the one I'm going to tell you about.

"Gold and Shadow" is a post about making sense of and dealing with what we have from the Lord and our selfish stuff. "Gold" and "shadow" are both terms from men's work and Clark relates them to the New Church concept of the proprium. (Incidentally, in the passage he quotes, he uses a new translation that uses the word autonomy for proprium; what do you think?)

I really appreciated Clark's perspective on how to deal with our darker, proprial stuff. Here's a teaser:

I realized the emptiness produced by a dilemma. On the one hand, if I label my shadow as a worthless piece of "refuse" (trash) I will have to lie to you in order to hide this part of myself because, of course, I want to look good and and I want you to like me (which you wouldn't if you saw what I was REALLY like). On the other, if I don't lie and show you that I am a worthless piece of refuse, again, I have come to believe, you will see me for what I am and will reject me and not like me.

The way out of the dilemma is to....

I'm not the only New Church blogger!

I don't claim to be the first New Church blogger. (Does anyone know to whom that honor belongs?) But when I started New Church Thought I was one of the only people with a New Church/Swedenborg related blog that updated it at all regularly. As a result I didn't see any particular reason to have a blogroll. Why give people a list of blogs that aren't going to have anything new for them to look at?

But, I'm happy to say that this is no longer the case and, to celebrate the fact that there are now other New Church/Swedenborg related blogs that are regularly updated, I have now added a blogroll. The fancy widget even tells you how recently the blogs were updated. Some of them were updated a couple of months ago but others were updated within hours. Here's to a lively New Church blogosphere!

What's Grant Schnarr Doing Now?

Have you been wondering what Rev. Grant Schnarr has been up to recently? One thing he's been doing is writing really interesting notes on Facebook telling the story of his life and reflecting on the ups and downs of his evangelization work. He's now started a blog (grantschnarr.wordpress.com) and put them on there too. See "To Be or Not to Be: A Swedenborgian" part one, part two, part three, and part four.

He's also been preaching around Bryn Athyn. He preached at Ivyland New Church a couple of weeks ago. He preached at the Cathedral 2 Sundays ago. And he preached this past Sunday at Bryn Athyn Contemporary service. (There isn't a recording up yet but you should be able to find it here soon.)

The sermon he preached at the Cathedral, "Lifeline", was about the internal meaning of the story of Jeremiah being thrown into cistern and then later raised out (Jeremiah 38:1-13). I've heard a number of people say that it was the best sermon they've heard in a while. I got a lot out of it. Grant is really good at expositional sermons. He goes back and forth between the literal story and the internal meaning in a seemingly effortless and usually compelling way. One of the simple things that he pointed out was that all the characters in the story are part of us, not just Jeremiah. And he talked about how certain parts of us want to push the truth out of sight but that we need to identify with those parts of us that will lift the truth back up into the light.

In that sermon and the one he preached at the contemporary service there was a refreshing, back-to-the-basics feel and focus. We don't always want the truth because the truth can be hard to deal with and because it asks us to change but it's totally worth it. Amen!

Grant is also planning something for the fall. On page 2 of the August 27 Bryn Athyn Post he's asking for help with an independent contemporary service he's going to be during the "Living Courageously" campaign at the Social Hall of the Lord's New Church.

He's also starting another blog sort of thing next Monday.

I wrote a book two years ago called Guardian Angel Diary, about a girl named Nicole who, being diagnosed with brain cancer, began writing to her guardian angel and listening hard, wrote what she heard as a reply in her head. Soon a conversation and a friendship developed which helped her to the end, or perhaps to the beginning. On Monday, September 7th, Nicole will begin her diary for all to see, at nicolebealert.wordpress.com.

Mac Frazier's Reflections on the Ocean and the Word

I've posted about a couple of things by Rev. Mac Frazier recently (his prayer challenge and his new blog) so maybe I shouldn't again for a while but I recently read a new post on his blog and I wanted to tell you about it. It's called "The Ocean" and is some short reflections about the ocean and the Word. Here's an excerpt from it. If you want to read more of my thoughts about it read the comments after the post.

I was standing on the edge of the surf, looking out at the waves, and beyond them at the seemingly infinite horizon. My four-year-old son’s little hand was gripping my right hand, and he stood there with me. Occasionally he would get a little more adventuresome and take another step deeper into the water, and I’d step with him. Sometimes he’d back out a few quick steps, and I’d calmly retreat with him. However deep he wanted to go, I would go, and no deeper. And holding my hand, he felt totally free to explore safely. And I got to thinking. ...

Neuroscience and Correspondences

In May I posted about a neuropsychologist's reflections on perception. I just read another intriguing post by that same neuropsychologist.

The post is titled "Quick! Where is Heaven?" and is an exploration of how neuroscience might support the idea that there are universal, underlying correspondences in everything.

One of the primary things Swedenborg talks about with respect to reading and understanding the scriptures is the idea of a “spiritual sense” and correspondences between things spiritual and things natural.

Certainly, from the beginning this idea was probably the most intriguing to me about Swedenborg’s Writings — the notion that embedded in the words of the Bible is a deeper meaning.

And that we “detect” that meaning in some way as we read, whether we know it or not.

But how could that be? Don’t different people use “symbols” and metaphors differently? And how can reading have an impact if we don’t consciously “get” the meaning?

She gets into a study of people's association of certain concepts with the directions up and down and into her own study of how people learn to do things based on underlying patterns that they can't explain. Fun stuff.

Mac Frazier is Blogging Again

Rev. Mac Frazier (photo) has started blogging again at MacFrazier.com. The tagline of his blog is "The personal opinions of a New Christian pastor entrepreneur geek punk."

His blog has a little bit of everything—his Twitter feed (mcfrazier), a video of a song he's working on, a page he's created to support Iranian liberty.

The things that most interested me, though, are the posts in the philosophy and church planting sections. Under philosophy Mac explains why he loves Edward Hopper's "The Nighthawks".

In short, I see my work in this painting. This is the church. This is the world. This is evangelism.

Under church planting Mac explains his life's purpose.

In a year and twenty days, I am moving to Austin, Texas. I am going to launch a church.

I have been praying, dreaming, planning, talking, thinking, and researching this move for years. This is where my life has been headed since the beginning. ...

Anyway, I was working on my plan this morning when it occurred to me that it might be useful for me to share on my blog the high level what, why and how of my dream. I started to outline something between a proposal and a manifesto, when I realized that maybe the best way to do it was as an FAQ list. So that’s what I’m starting. This is just the preamble; each question will be handled in its own blog post, over time as I get to them. For now, here are the articles I will probably write: ...

A Neuropsychologist's Reflections on Perception

"I Won't Believe It Until I See It" is the title of a fun post about perception by Dr. Karen, a psychologist with expertise in clinical neuropsychology who reads the Writings. She brings in a video of people passing basketballs, a quote from a sermon by Rev. Mike Gladish, Arcana Coelestia 5881, and some brain research. Enjoy!

It looks like Dr. Karen has some other interesting posts on her blog, Psychology of Swedenborg. Let me know if you read any of the other posts and recommend them.

The Heroic Fight Against Lust

I just read a great short post by Solomon Keal about fighting lust like a hero fights a dragon, titled "The Husband, the Princess, and the Dragon." It's realistic and inspiring.

A Student Translation Project

Joel Glenn, a 2nd year Bryn Athyn College student, is working on a translation of Apocalypse Revealed as an independent study. As he translates he's posting what his translation on a blog (apocalypserevealed.wordpress.com). Under About he writes,

Every week or so, I will be putting up the next few numbers that I have translated. I am starting at the beginning of AR and will be working my way forward from there, hopefully completing Chapter 1 by the middle of February. Whether you read a lot or a little, I would love to hear feedback from you.

About the translation: My goal is to produce a translation that people can read easily. This does not mean that you will understand AR without any effort. It does mean that if you are familiar with the Writings, and make an effort to understand what you read, the way I translate should not stand in the way. You should get something out of it without tripping over sentence structure and word choice.

Coleman Glenn on What it Takes to Come to an Honest Belief in God

Theolog Coleman Glenn recently wrote a post on his blog that I really appreciated. The post is titled Being Honest With Myself because a teenage girl in a youth group he was leading said, “I guess I think the idea of a God is comforting, and it would be nice, but honestly, if I’m praying or whatever, do I think there’s actually someone there? No. Not if I’m really being honest with myself.” Here are a few excerpts from Coleman's reflections on this:

I think everyone comes to a point where they realize that “if they were honest with themselves” – that is, if they looked at their heart – they would realize they didn’t believe in God. This doesn’t mean that everyone lets go of their intellectual faith, or their willingness to “stick with” their religion. But the fact is, faith only exists where there’s charity, and we don’t start with charity. We can have enough faith to keep following the path that will lead to real faith, but we come to a point where we realize that our faith is basically just historical. ....

The thing is, though, that until we’re regenerate, there are going to be times in our lives when we feel like if we were honest with ourselves we couldn’t say we believed in the Lord. Even after knowing the Lord, there are times when I don’t feel His presence – when if I was “honest with myself” I wouldn’t see Him. The beauty of it, though, is that the Writings pinpoint these moments with perfect accuracy.

Derrick Lumsden's Take on Believing Things That Can't Be Proven by Science

Ben Barnett has a blog called Create Cognitive Dissonance where he writes about the problems he sees with dangerous and destructive religious dogmas. The sad thing, in my opinion, is that he dismisses all religious beliefs as potentially harmful dogmas because they cannot be verified by science.

To his credit, Ben has invited people—particularly religious leaders—to write guest posts on his blog about what they believe. Rev. Derrick Lumsden, assistant pastor for the Westville New Church, has taken him up on it and written a guest post titled, “How Do You Prove What You See Clearly”, in which he argues for the validity and value of believing in things that cannot be verified through the five senses.

I recommend reading the post and the comments following it. Here's part of the post:

I accept my premise “not everything worth knowing can be known by the five senses or evidenced to them” because in my experience there is internal knowledge and internal senses–some way of knowing that comes from within. To have this sense is beyond anything that can be proven by the scientific method or shown conclusively to the senses.

And here's part of Derrick's follow-up comments:

If you are interested in the balance I have between the science, religion, and free thinking I will gladly tell you. Science teaches me about the physical world and religion teaches me about the spirit world. I trust science (as long as I am given the evidence to see it for myself) to tell me all about how this world works. I trust religion to tell me about how my soul works, what feeds it, and what harms it, just as I trust science to tell me the same about my body. And free thinking runs through out....

UPDATE: If this is interesting to you check out the comments on this post for further things to read.

Sylvia Odhner's Water Fountain Analogy

Isn't this a good analogy?

A Great Story of Coming to Believe

In “How I Came to Believe in the New Church” theolog Coleman Glenn reflects on the doubts and questions that he had and the interactions with other people and experiences with reading the Writings for himself that eventually led him to the point where he'd “just as soon doubt the existence of the physical world as doubt the truth of the Writings.”

I don’t know that I ever directly questioned the Writings - but I got to the point that I felt like the only reason I believed was that I had been raised in Bryn Athyn and it would be so devastating to me if I ever let go of the Writings....

...it wasn’t until I asked Andy Heilman that I got an answer that really changed how I saw things. He essentially quoted DLW, which says “Thought from the eye closes the understanding; thought from the understanding opens the eye” [Divine Love and Wisdom 46]. The point, he said, was that FIRST you had to trust the Writings; THEN you tried to see how it was true....

Blind faith vs. believing in revelation above external evidence is still something I try to figure out. Short answer: “blind faith” means believing in something that doesn’t make sense, or believing something that you don’t understand. The first is shallow, the second is impossible. Believing that Divine Revelation is Divine Revelation simply because it says so and because you just BELIEVE is something different, although it takes a process to get to it.... [T]hat process... and the tension between avoiding “blind faith” and believing something to be true apart from external evidence is one of the reasons that stories about how people come to accept something as Divine Revelation are so interesting to me....