So, God, Mohammed, and Buddha walk into an AA meeting...

For all of the attempted humor of the title here, the truth is that, again, real life is stranger than fiction.

First, ht to Mr. Silva and Christian Research Network for telling me about this. Very interesting, especially in light of the undisciplined five-year-old who insists on throw tantrums here for the past few days.

Is God ‘A Recovering Practitioner of Violence’?

And...

Is God ‘A Recovering Practitioner of Violence’?

The first link is to CRN. The second to a blog called zoecarnate. This excerpt if from z, though some or all of it can be found on CRN, too.

More explosively than his challenging theses, it was at this conference that Brueggemann posits that “God is a recovering practitioner of violence.” As Geoff Holsclaw summarizes – “By this he means that God used to think violence was a good idea, but then gave up on it. However, like all addicts, He has relapses. Of which the cross is either the final deliverance, or another relapse.” Of course this is potentially disconcerting, as we don’t like to imagine the repentance of God – and yet, this is precisely what is suggested in Jesus’ baptism in the Jordan (thanks, Jack Miles!).

So, we have emergents taking seriously the concept that God is an addict to violence, and that while he's trying to get over it, he does have relapses.

I remember hearing something some time ago, along the lines of "In the beginning God created man is His own image, and since that time man has tried to return the favor".

When emergents have to throw God under the bus, the game is over. When emergents need a God who can't control His own actions, they may as well adopt atheism. And when their God is equivalent to the drunk staggering down the street, they have left all ideas of His Lordship in the gutter.

And if you it's just empty rhetoric that I say these people consider themselves "smarter than God", think again. That is exactly what they say.