Note: I have placed a number of links to descriptions of the terminology in the first couple paragraphs just in case this terminology is new to you. Sorry for getting nerdy so quickly in this post. Don’t feel too compelled to understand the intricacies perfectly. I began walking this Christian path in 1980. It was … More Too Earthly Minded to be Any Heavenly Good, Part 1
I have been working on a book entitled Love Big or Go Home over the beginning of this year. It is a theology of mission based upon the idea that the Gospel is inherently nomadic, and that this nomadism informs how we approach the world. By saying this I do not mean to assume that … More Love Big or Go Home nears completion
Today, I was reading an article from the BBC about the recent letter from Burning Man CEO Marian Goodell. There is nothing new in this BBC article (except the letter from Marian), and in fact, the information is a number of years old. We were already talking about this stuff at my first Burning Man … More Burning Man, Growth Struggles, Cultural Course Correction…
Premier Christianity Magazine in the UK, and the Church Mission Society have posted a couple things from me in the last few days. The Church Mission Society posted an interview about Halloween, Burning Man, Witches, and festival work. I was a speaker at their conference about “Mission among People who are Spiritual but not Religious”, … More Halloween Blog Post and Interview in the UK
Burning Religion is certainly my most ambitious literary project to date, but it would not have been conceived without the long hard years of working as a pastor in the rather (in)famous little city of Salem, Massachusetts. Almost 20 years of monthlong Halloween entertainment and outreach projects, and befriending the Witchcraft community in Salem helped … More The Reformation of Halloween: Where Burning Religion Began
My last days of summer mission in the UK involved a week and a half of Welsh language in the National Eisteddfod. The Eisteddfod is a Welsh language, poetry, music, art and culture event. It is the largest event of its kind in the world, and brings over 100,000 Welsh speakers together each year. This … More Learning Welsh, Facing Poverty, and Meeting Pagans in Cardiff
This is the first time Easter has been on April Fool’s Day since 1956. In fact, this is only the 15th time Easter has been on April Fool’s Day since the advent of the King James Version of the Bible. A little known fact, is that the year Jesus rose from the dead, it was … More The Importance of the April 1st Easter Resurrection
After leaving the Ocala, Florida Rainbow Gathering, I was told to watch out going through Mississippi. The hippies told me that Mississippi was known for Missing Hippies. To the contrary, I am still here, and having a great time. Don and Amy Rylander have a Thursday evening gathering in a Coffee House in Brandon, MS, … More No Missing Hippie in Mississippi!
In a recent TED talk techno-sociologist Zeynep Tufekci talked about a developing dystopian culture being fed to us by the advertising on Facebook, YouTube, and other social media sites. She described following a series of YouTube videos about Donald Trump, and how they quickly led to a series of white supremacist videos, which grew in … More Avoiding the Distopian Future
The above video is a clip of the Brown family from Brownwood, TX. Below, Sandi and the girls share their stories about being involved in festival ministry in Salem, and at the Stonehenge Solstice. From Sandi: I have been involved in several different streams of Christianity, from Baptist to Charismatic, to now not really affiliating with … More Thoughts from the Browns about Festival Outreach
The English word “weird” comes down to us from an Anglo-Saxon and Germanic etymology. The Anglo-Saxon word “wyrd” was defined as destiny, and in the 15th century the English word “weird” was still defined as “destiny”, or “having the power to control fate.”[1] Today the word “wyrd” is used among the Nordic heathenry. They consider … More I am Looking for Wyrdos
When Christians talk about a Christocentric worldview, we typically mean that we have Jesus in the center of our little world, and that we are always focused upon the Person of Jesus. But could it be that thinking of Christocentrism in this manner holds inherent weaknesses that diminish our effectiveness as voices of hope to … More A Million Damning Acts – Navigating the Impossible #3
“God never asks you to do anything you are capable of doing.” I first heard these words a long time ago. It was at a Pastor’s Conference in Portland, Oregon. Roy Hicks Jr. was speaking. These words were the main focus of his message, but before he could describe the paradoxical nature of their meaning, … More Called to the Impossible: Navigating the Impossible #1
Words, words, words…we are inundated with words. They come as promises. They come as protests. They come as expressions of frustration. Most of us have fallen to one side or another of the debates and word-wars of politics and social issues. And I say “fallen” purposely. We are all either falling for something, or falling … More A Voice from the Dark – Prophets of Exile
In full disclosure, I am white Christian, and therefore would appear to be part of the power structure of conservatism, but I did not vote for Trump, and my own history shows me to be somewhat of a rebel to the system. If you don’t understand how Evangelical Christianity fell into what appears to be … More How Could the White Christians Do This to Us?
Burning Religion 