When Leaders Fall…
To be clear, this post isn’t a reaction to some new scandal and I’m not making any veiled references to some unsavoury incident soon to shock and dismay the Christian community. It is true that there have been so many moral failures that we should be disturbed – but even if you immediately attach a name to what I am about to write, I am not thinking about any one person – just a disturbing trend that impacts us all, no matter which flavour of the Christian faith you adhere to. Come to think of it, it’s not simply Christians who are impacted, for when we talk...
Read MoreBecause Biography is not Identity: From what we do to who we are…
In a throw away line in a podcast shortly before his sudden death, philosopher-poet-theologian John O’Donohue observes that, “biography is not identity.” Think about it. We spend so much time trying to impress people about what we do, or the achievements we can list on our CV, and far too little time focusing on the inner landscape of our life. In his book The Road to Character, David Brooks differentiates between what he calls resume virtues and eulogy virtues . The first focuses on the virtues that leave people saying “wow, I’ll employ you”, the second...
Read MoreCoram Deo: Living in the sight of God…
While I am by no means a Latin expert, there is a Latin phrase I love. Given you’ve seen the title of the post, it won’t come as a surprise that it’s “coram Deo”, which essentially claims that all of life takes place in the sight of God. We live and move and have our being before God’s face. Nothing is unknown to God, nothing a surprise to God. Should God ever get into a discussion about us we can be assured that nothing the discussion partner says will see God’s hands fling up in surprise with a startled, “Oh my goodness! I hadn’t heard...
Read MoreAmor Fati: From things happen to me to things happen for me…
The Stoics have a lovely expression, “Amor Fati”. In essence it means love your fate, or at the very least, embrace your fate. Probably originating with Epictetus, the slave who became one of the founders of stoicism, it was popularised through the work of Nietzsche who in Ecce Homo writes: “My formula for greatness in a human being is amor fati: that one wants nothing to be different, not forward, not backward, not in all eternity. Not merely bear what is necessary, still less conceal it… but love it.” Love your fate. Why? Stoics differentiate between what you...
Read MoreLimiting Beliefs: Things that hold us back
I was recently talking to someone who felt God had let them down badly. The marriage hadn’t gone well even though they felt they had done everything right. Of course they had indulged in a few little squabbles and minor bouts of selfishness, but nothing that seemed to justify the marriage ending in such a gut wrenching way – for it was a very messy and painful end. “So how am I ever going to trust God again?” was the plaintive question at the end. Disappointment with God – feeling let down and that God hasn’t kept the agreed contract (I follow the...
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