Straight From Pastor Ey

In the name of political correctness (or gender equality), there are those who push that either we also call God the Mother, not just God the Father, or go for the generic God the Parent. They even accuse the Bible especially the Old Testament of chauvinism or biased towards male persons. In his insightful “Discovering God as Father,” Rev. Dr. Narry Santos clarified, “‘Mother’ is never used in the Bible as a name for God. On the other hand, ‘Father’ is used in Scriptures as a metaphorical [figurative] name. Because the name ‘Father’ is metaphorical and not literal, it does not speak literally of God’s having a male or masculine nature. However, because ‘Father’ is a name and not merely a metaphor, it is not interchangeable with ‘Mother.’ Thus, there is no need for God the Mother.” (Jeremiah’s Dilemma Quarterly, Issue 3, August 2011) I’m afraid that reason why there are attempts to “de-father” God is due to abusive or absentee fathers. Sadly, there are people who refuse the fath...

Some time ago, Yahoo!’s Odd News featured an alleged image of Christ mysteriously appearing on a Wal-Mart receipt: “[In] his most recent appearance, Jesus is showing that even the son of the Big Man has economic issues on the brain… Jacob Simmons and Gentry Lee Sutherland had just returned home from church (interesting connection, no?), and found what looked like the face of Christ BURNED into the receipt.” Yet, depending on who’s looking at the image, opinions vary whether it looks like Jesus or Charles Manson or Bin laden. One comment reads, “Kinda creepy. Why does everyone assume it’s always Jesus?” Noting that heat can create that image on a receipt, Odd News lead anchor Greg Proops quipped, “Ironic that heat can create a picture of someone dedicated to keeping people away from warm places… The retail giant offers a lot of coupons and many consider Jesus [as] the ultimate redeemer.” (Ibid)  Diana Duyser with her "miraculous" cheese sandwich. Image source:  htt...

Vyckie confessed to feeling slightly guilty for she already missed going to church for four straight Sundays. But she is not your typical, active churchgoer. She is an atheist. She “deconverted” years ago because of, in her own words, “the Bible and Christian doctrine which I finally recognized as ridiculous and even abusive.” (Source: exchristian.net ) She clarified though that she is only criticizing the faith and not the faithful. “So when I write or speak about the evils of Christian fundamentalism and biblical literalism, I’m talking about words, ideas, beliefs, thoughts which affect and influence the flesh-and-blood people who listen to these abstractions and take them to heart… I didn’t leave Christianity because of any failure of the people. For the most part, I found the Christians I knew to be sincere, generous and supportive.” (Ibid) So, even if she loathes Christianity, she loves being with her Christian friends. “I’m still going to church because that’s where my social ...

When CNN’s Belief Blog (which focuses on the “faith angles” of news) marked its first year, its religion editor Dan Gilgoff posted the “ 10 things the Belief Blog learned in its first year ” article. The first thing Gilgoff saw was that, “Every big news story has a faith angle.” (I already discussed it in the first two parts of “Faith Angles” ) The second thing that he noted was that, “Atheists are the most fervent commenters on matters religious.” They would pour out “an avalanche of alternately humorous and outraged atheist responses on virtually everything the Belief Blog publishes. They’re more evidence that atheists are coming out of the closet to trumpet their disbelief, argue with the faithful and evangelize their godlessness. ” They are so aggressive that they put up ads that promote atheism such as “God-LESS America” (which is a play of “God Bless America” ) and “Atheism is patriotic.” In fact, there’s an indie film, “ The Ledge ,” that will be screened in New York an...