More God

I stole Barbara Brown-Taylor's new book,An Altar in the World off Oense's desk while he was in Sierra Leone the last few weeks with my dear friend Joel as they explored what long term church partnerships might look like (check out their blog for pictures and a brilliant blog about...the Canucks in Sierra Leone?).

"When I hear people talk about what is wrong with organized religion, or why their mainline churches are failing, I hear about bad music, inept clergy, mean congregations, and preoccupation with institutional maintenance. I almost never hear about the intellectualization of faith, which strikes me as a far greater danger than anything else on the list. In an age of information overload, when a vast variety of media delivers news faster than most of us can digest--when many of us have at least two email addresses,two telephone numbers, and one fax number--the last thing any of us needs is more information about God. We need the practice of incarnation, by which God saves the lives of those whose intellectual assent has turned as dry as dust, who have run frighteningly low on the bread of life, who are dying to know more God in their bodies. Not more about God. More God". (An Altar in the World, pg 45).