Seeker

Where is God? People sometimes ask that question when bad things happen. The underlying question is 'why doesn't God do something to stop it?' I think that's a question that never has a fully satisfactory answer. I tried and failed in 'Bird-watcher sets cat among pigeons' among other posts about suffering. The best I can do is to find ways to live with the question,with all its accompanying tensions and paradoxes. This post is about 'where is God?' That's also a hard question to answer, unless your god is one you have managed to neatly package to fit in your pocket. In which case, to use John Bertram Phillips' term, 'Your God is too small'. Where is God? At its simplest, that question may be posed by a child or someone expecting a literalistic answer, as if God is only located in a particular place, like 'in heaven'. When one of our children was about 4 he wondered about the idea of God being everywhere and wanted...

Paradoxes of Christmas Rich Poor Heaven Earth Full Empty Love Hate Hope Fear Faith Doubt Spiritual Physical Divine Human Light Darkness Christmas is so full of paradox. Some of these are expressed beautifully in the first 14 verses of the first chapter of John's Gospel which is usually read at Christmas. Pete Broadbent has posted a reflective poem on John 1: 14 as follows: In the contradiction of the gods of Mammon and the lords of Misrule In the pavement legalities of occupation and assertion, injunction and counterclaim At the interface of tourist and worshipper, occupier and passer-by He pitched his tent among us. In another place and time, where the Eagle standard spreads its wings In the tyrant rule of Herod, toying with Magi and butchering children At the Royal City – subject today to another occupation He pitched his tent among...