{"id":8,"date":"2010-03-14T03:00:00","date_gmt":"2010-03-14T03:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/jazztheologian\/2010\/03\/interview-with-brian-mclaren-p6.html"},"modified":"2010-03-14T03:00:00","modified_gmt":"2010-03-14T03:00:00","slug":"interview-with-brian-mclaren-p6","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/2010\/03\/interview-with-brian-mclaren-p6.html","title":{"rendered":"Interview with Brian McLaren (p6)–the X Question"},"content":{"rendered":"


\n\"brianspeaking.JPG\"<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

Jazz Theologian<\/b>:  Malcolm X’s main critique of Christianity in America had to do
\nwith how race seemed to determine our habits more than Jesus.  Which of
\nyour questions in A New Kind of
\nChristianity<\/span> can lead us closer to the unity that Christ prayed for in
\nJn. 17 and why?<\/i><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n


\n<\/p>\n

McLaren<\/b>:  <\/span>The
\nfirst of the ten questions probably is key here [the narrative question]. I
\nsuggest that what many of us take to be the biblical narrative is actually the
\nGreco-Roman narrative, and that narrative is inherently dualistic. It creates
\nus vs. them, civilized vs. barbarians, insiders vs. outsiders, and that dualism
\neasily gets translated into racism and related -isms, white versus black,
\nsettlers versus native peoples, Americans versus immigrants, whatever. <\/p>\n

I’d also say that the third question is really key, the God
\nquestion: Is God violent? If we believe that God plays favorites – loves some,
\nhates others – chooses some, rejects others – makes some rich, lets others be
\npoor – then it becomes very easy to see our race (or nation, or denomination)
\nas blessed and everyone else as cursed. That connects us quickly with the
\nfourth question, the Jesus question, because if we believe that God is like
\nJesus, and we see Jesus constantly crossing boundaries to show love to the
\nother, then we see God as being the God who breaks boundaries too, rather than
\nthe one who creates boundaries.<\/p>\n

Then I think about the sixth question, the church question
\n… because we need to ask how we manifest and embody our view of the biblical
\nnarrative, our view of God, our view of Jesus, in our local churches. All of
\nour theology needs to be translated into real life in local faith communities
\n… that’s where it makes a difference, especially in our cities, where it is
\nneeded so much!<\/p>\n

Join the Groove…are we as Christians moving closer or further away when it comes to unity in the Body of Christ?<\/i><\/b><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Jazz Theologian:  Malcolm X’s main critique of Christianity in America had to do with how race seemed to determine our habits more than Jesus.  Which of your questions in A New Kind of Christianity can lead us closer to the unity that Christ prayed for in Jn. 17 and why?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":79,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-interviews"],"yoast_head":"\nInterview with Brian McLaren (p6)-the X Question - The Jazz Theologian<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/2010\/03\/interview-with-brian-mclaren-p6.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Interview with Brian McLaren (p6)-the X Question - 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Robert Gelinas on Composing a Jazz-Shaped Faith","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/#\/schema\/person\/5e3ecb360405bd8603a61c7115194e01","name":"Robert Gelinas","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/fbe\/fbe4a8ffc24002390e969652fba5c72bx96.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/wp-content\/wphb-cache\/gravatar\/fbe\/fbe4a8ffc24002390e969652fba5c72bx96.jpg","caption":"Robert Gelinas"},"description":"\"For more information visit: Jazztheologian.com Robert Gelinas is Lead-Pastor (and resident Jazz Theologian) of Colorado Community Church\u00e2\u20ac\u201da multi-cultural, interdenominational community of 3000+ followers of Christ in the Denver area. Author of Finding the Groove: Composing a Jazz-Shaped Faith (Zondervan) and the upcoming, Strange Fruit: The Cross as a Way of Life (2011). Founder of Project 127, a ministry dedicated to seeing the day when there are no children waiting for homes in Colorado's foster care system. Robert deeply desires to see the body of Christ mobilized to serve the least of these. The poor, the down and out, the disenfranchised and disabled, those deemed unimportant and the unborn. He believes that God loves all people yet he has a special heart for the poor and the poor in spirit, the miserable and the marginalized. A Contributing Editor for Leadership Journal and Urbanfaith.com. He acquired a B.A. in Bibilcal Studies from Colorado Christian University and a Master of Arts in World Christianity (Missiology) from Denver Seminary. Robert is married to the love of his life, Barbara, and they have six energetic children (3 boys & 3 girls--one bio, five adopted--two from Ethiopia). Friend of God...Passionate about the Body of Christ...Lover of this thing called jazz! Please visit Jazztheologian.com for contact info., speaking schedule, videos, Facebook and Twitter.","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/author\/rgelinas"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/79"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/jazztheologian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}