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" Inequality for gay and lesbian people is no longer a debatable issue in either church or state. "
John Shelby Spong
Lesbian
People
Church
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" Let me say that I consider myself a deep believer in the reality of God. I might define God quite differently from the way some people in the Christian faith would do so, but I do not doubt the reality of that experience. "
John Shelby Spong
Faith
People
Myself
" It's just not easy enough to say that I pray and God will accomplish. "
John Shelby Spong
Easy
Enough
God
" When I grew up in the South, I was taught that segregation was the will of God, and the Bible was quoted to prove it. I was taught that women were by nature in inferior to men, and the Bible was quoted to prove it. I was taught that it was okay to hate other religions, and especially the Jews, and the Bible was quoted to prove it. "
John Shelby Spong
God
Women
Nature
" Plenty of people out there think of me as the Antichrist or the devil incarnate because I do not affirm the literal patterns of the Bible. But the fact is I can no more abandon the literal patterns than I could fly to the moon. I just go beyond them. "
John Shelby Spong
Moon
Devil
Bible
" The biblical texts that we Christians have used for centuries to justify our hostility toward the Jews need to be banished forever from the sacred writings of the Christian church. "
John Shelby Spong
Christian
Used
Church
" A lot of people hear me attacking their certainty. I don't have any interest in doing that. I'm interested in penetrating the meaning of certainty. "
John Shelby Spong
People
Meaning
Me
" Was Judas Iscariot a figure of history? I do not think so. There is no mention of him in any source before the 8th decade. "
John Shelby Spong
History
Him
Any
" The cross reveals that we're called to a deeper, fuller experience of what it means to be alive and open to new dimensions of life which our religious boundaries - creeds, atonement theologies - have kept us from experiencing. "
John Shelby Spong
Life
Alive
New
" Apologetic explanations do not develop unless there is a reality that has to be explained and defended. Jesus was undeniably a figure of history. "
John Shelby Spong
Jesus
Reality
Explained
" I can only give away the love that I have received. "
John Shelby Spong
I Can
Received
Only
" The ultimate meaning of the Bible escapes human limits and calls us to a recognition that every life is holy, every life is loved, and every life is called to be all that that life is capable of being. "
John Shelby Spong
Limits
Bible
Recognition
" I believe that is what the God experience does for us. It calls us beyond our limits into the fullness of life - into a capacity to love people we are not taught to love - and into an ability to be who we are. "
John Shelby Spong
Love
People
Experience
" Christianity is, I believe, about expanded life, heightened consciousness and achieving a new humanity. It is not about closed minds, supernatural interventions, a fallen creation, guilt, original sin or divine rescue. "
John Shelby Spong
Believe
Sin
Life
" I am a child of the 21st century. "
John Shelby Spong
Am
I Am
Child
" I want the traditional family upheld, but I don't want it upheld to the detriment of other people. "
John Shelby Spong
Other
Family
Want
" I never really liked the Gospel of John because I never could find the humanity of Jesus in it. I thought it presented Jesus as a visitor from another planet; in addition, John's gospel is and has been interpreted as a document that fuels anti-Semitism in the church. "
John Shelby Spong
Never
Church
Find
" The church is not going to survive if they are going to tell people that they have to twist their minds into 1st century pretzels. "
John Shelby Spong
Minds
Tell
Survive
" We've got to deal with the fact that the church has been violently prejudiced against gay people. We've murdered them; we've burned them at the stake; we've run them out of town for something over which they have no control. And that's immoral. "
John Shelby Spong
Church
People
Run
" Whatever diminishes life is evil, and whatever enhances life is good. "
John Shelby Spong
Enhances
Life
Good
" I believe God is real, but I believe God calls me beyond myself to take responsibility for my life and to try top work to allow other people to be themselves and to take responsibility for their lives. "
John Shelby Spong
Responsibility
Myself
Life
" Many of the characters who appear in the pages of the Fourth Gospel are literary creations of its author and were never intended to be understood as real people, who actually lived in history. "
John Shelby Spong
Who
Never
Real
" Almost any poll of regular churchgoers will reveal that their favorite book in the New Testament is the Gospel of John. It is the book that is most often used at Christian funerals. "
John Shelby Spong
Will
Used
New
" I think one of the things we've got to look out for is human beings claiming that they know how God operates. "
John Shelby Spong
Human
Think
Look
" God is a presence that I can never define but I could never deny. "
John Shelby Spong
God
Define
Presence
" Terrorism is a real despair. These are people for whom life has been so negative that they're willing to die if they can take down some of their enemies. "
John Shelby Spong
Negative
Die
People
" When I'm asked to define God, I'm almost wordless. "
John Shelby Spong
Define
Almost
Asked
" You learn that you either are going to have a police state where you don't have any freedom left, or you're going to build a world that doesn't create terrorists - and that means a whole different way of 'getting along.' "
John Shelby Spong
Create
You
World
" I admire our ancestors, whoever they were. I think the first self-conscious person must have shaken in his boots. Because as he becomes self-conscious, he's no longer part of nature. He sees himself against nature. He looks at the vastness of the universe and it looks hostile. "
John Shelby Spong
Boots
Universe
Think
" Oh the Christian church has encouraged enormous immaturity among the peoples who are its primary adherence. "
John Shelby Spong
Among
Who
Oh
" I believe that God is very real. I believe that I live my life every day inside the reality of this God. I call this God by different words. I describe God as the source of life and the source of love and the ground of being. "
John Shelby Spong
Live
God
Day