Search results for ""Author Brian D. McLaren""

Dubbed 'a heroic gate-crasher' by New York Times bestselling author Glennon Doyle, Brian McLaren explores reasons to leave or stay within the church and if so, how ...Do I Stay Christian? addresses in public the powerful question that surprising numbers of people - including pastors, priests and other religious leaders - are asking in private. Picking up where Brian's warmly received Faith After Doubt (2021) leaves off, Do I Stay Christian? is not McLaren's attempt to persuade Christians to dig in their heels or run for the exit. Instead, he combines his own experience with that of thousands of people who have confided in him over the years to help readers make a responsible, honest, ethical decision about their religious identity.There is a way to say both yes and no to the question of staying Christian, McLaren says, by shifting the focus from whether we stay Christian to how we stay human. If Do I Stay Christian? is the question you're asking - or if it's a question that someone you love is asking - this is the book you've been waiting for.'Brian's new book on remaining Christian knocks it out of the ballpark in terms of framing and naming the questions. I cannot stop reading it. Thank you, Brian!'Fr Richard Rohr, OFM, founder of the Center for Action and Contemplation, author of The Universal Christ

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'For all those who have understood that doubt and free thinking are failings of your faith, Brian's book will help you live fuller and breathe easier.' Glennon DoyleSixty-five million adults in the US have dropped out of active church attendance and about 2.7 million more are leaving every year. In the UK, surveys indicate that religious belief is also declining - and yet a surprising number of people still pray. Faith After Doubt is for all those who feel that their faith is falling apart.Using his own story and the stories of a diverse group of struggling believers, Brian D. McLaren, a former pastor and now an author, speaker, and activist shows how old assumptions are being challenged in nearly every area of human life, not just theology and spirituality. He proposes a four-stage model of faith development in which questions and doubt are not the enemy of faith, but rather a portal to a more mature and fruitful kind of faith. The four stages - simplicity, complexity, perplexity and harmony - offer a path forward that can help sincere and thoughtful people leave behind unnecessary baggage and increase their commitment to what matters most.'In this important book, my friend and colleague Brian McLaren helps you find a deeper and wiser faith that is enriched by doubt instead of threatened by it.' Fr Richard Rohr

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Christians and Muslims together make up about 57% of the world's population today, and by the end of the century they will constitute about 66% of the world's population. More than any other single factor, the wellbeing of our children and grandchildren may depend on how well Christians learn to relate to Muslims - and Hindus, the next largest faith, not to mention Buddhists, Jews, people of indigenous faiths, and the nonreligious. We know how to have a strong Christian identity that is intolerant of or belligerent towards other faiths, and we know how to have a weak Christian identity that is tolerant and benevolent. But is there a third alternative? How do we discover, live, teach, and practise a Christian identity that is both strong and benevolent towards other faiths?In this provocative and inspiring book, author Brian McLaren tackles some of the hardest questions around the issue of interfaith relations, and shares a hopeful vision of the reconciliation that Jesus offers to our multi-faith world.

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What does faith look like when cynicism seems more plausible?What does hope look like when hope seems irrational?What does love look like when hate becomes more popular?In recent years, author and activist Brian McLaren has sensed a widespread emotional shift among growing numbers of people. More and more friends, colleagues, students, and readers confess their sense of futility, their feelings of frustration bordering on despair. They feel that human civilization has passed certain tipping points and that a tide of doom is inexorably rising. This feeling creates a deep inner divide, a tension between a sincere and hopeful commitment to action for the common good on the one hand, and on the other, a feeling that no actions can prevent the arrival of an undesirable or even dystopian future.Life After Doom is a sober analysis of how things stand in relation to climate breakdown, and a deeply insightful exploration of the challenge of

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'If you're new to the faith and seeking a good orientation, here you'll find the introduction I wish I had been given. If you're a long-term Christian whose current form of Christianity has stopped working, here you'll find a reorientation from a fresh and healthy perspective. If your faith seems to be a lot of talk without much practice, I hope this book will help you translate your faith to action. And if you're a parent trying to figure out what you should teach your kids and grandkids, I hope this book will fit the need.' We Make the Road by Walking is a year's worth of reflections on the Bible, each one easily read aloud in ten to twelve minutes. Working with the framework of the church year, they provide a Genesis-to-Revelation overview of the Bible that can be used in a variety of ways: a year of church services, a year of weekly dinner-dialogue gatherings, a year of classes or online interactions, a series of retreats, or simply a rich reading experience.Join Brian McLaren as he explores what it means to be alive in the way of Christ - reading, praying, meditating, discussing and acting our way through God's word to us, the Bible.

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I've had my fill of superficial religiosity. But deep religion, authentic, naked spirituality - that's what I'm thirsty for, and so, I think, are you.In our busy lives we often sideline prayer and spiritual practice, or wrap the subject up in a tangle of guilt-driven showmanship and 'self-motivation'. Stripping away the jargon that we can often get caught up in, NAKED SPIRITUALITY presents the core concepts of prayer in a fresh and accessible way.Brian D. McLaren has spent years working with these concepts in his own life and shares candidly his own experiences and insights as well as challenge in this very applicable book. Using twelve words as a structure, he shows how we can connect with God in practical, doable and durable ways, and use that connection to serve others.

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Many people experience Christianity as a system of belief, focused on an exclusive Supreme Being who favours some and rejects others, and is defended by a set of change-averse, self-protecting institutions. In The Great Spiritual Migration, Brian McLaren proposes that this conventional understanding of Christianity is ripe for a conversion: from system of belief to way of life, from exclusive Supreme Being to the loving, healing, reconciling Spirit embodied in Jesus, and from an organised institutional religion that supports an unjust status quo to an organising movement-building religion that helps a better world be born. Drawing from his work as a pastor, speaker, ecumenical networker and activist, McLaren issues a call and offers a plan for radical change that can shift the direction of Christian faith to be more in sync with its founder, more life-giving for individual Christians and congregations - and more of a life-giving resource for the whole world.

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Dubbed 'a heroic gate-crasher' by New York Times bestselling author Glennon Doyle, Brian McLaren explores reasons to leave or stay within the church and if so, how ...Do I Stay Christian? addresses in public the powerful question that surprising numbers of people - including pastors, priests and other religious leaders - are asking in private. Picking up where Brian's warmly received Faith After Doubt (2021) leaves off, Do I Stay Christian? is not McLaren's attempt to persuade Christians to dig in their heels or run for the exit. Instead, he combines his own experience with that of thousands of people who have confided in him over the years to help readers make a responsible, honest, ethical decision about their religious identity.There is a way to say both yes and no to the question of staying Christian, McLaren says, by shifting the focus from whether we stay Christian to how we stay human. If Do I Stay Christian? is the question you're asking - or if it's a question that someone you love is asking - this is the book you've been waiting for.'Brian's new book on remaining Christian knocks it out of the ballpark in terms of framing and naming the questions. I cannot stop reading it. Thank you, Brian!'Fr Richard Rohr, OFM, founder of the Center for Action and Contemplation, author of The Universal Christ

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Praise for We Make the Road by Walking: 'innovative and refreshing' - Christianity magazineIn his 2014 book We Make the Road by Walking Brian McLaren gave a basic orientation on what it means to be 'a new kind of Christian' through 52 sermons, working within the framework of the church year and providing a Genesis-Revelation overview of the Bible. It was designed to be used in church services and small groups, and was praised by New Testament scholar Paula Gooder and enthusiastically adopted by many. Seeking Aliveness is a repurposing of this material for use by individuals, breaking up the text into daily devotions, along with the original suggested Bible readings and with a prayer, thought or action point for each day. Brian's original writing is transformed beautifully into a daily read, for admirers of the original book as well as a new audience. 'An ideal resource' - Church Times

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What is the overarching storyline of the Bible?Is God violent? What is the Gospel?Can we find a way to address sexuality without fighting about it? At the opening of the twenty-first century, Christianity in the West is more fractured and beleaguered than ever. Groundbreaking author Brian McLaren suggests that if we are to get beyond doctrinal statements towards the life to the full that Jesus promised us, we need new paradigms for thinking and believing - and he invites us on a radical quest for a new kind of faith. Using ten key questions, McLaren boldly proposes what a future Christianity could look like. Radical yet orthodox, outspoken yet generous. This is a wise, compassionate book for all who are looking for an authentic, loving faith.

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