We need to be politically engaged, but peculiar in how we engage. Jesus and the early Christians had a marvelous political imagination. They turned all the presumptions and ideas of power and blessing upside down.

I wondered if there were other restless people asking the question with me: What if Jesus meant the stuff he said?.

Certainly the institutional church is ill. It's hemorrhaging young people at an astronomical rate.

I think a lot of people view the death penalty as a debate class or something. The cost and what's at stake is really, really a big deal.

We have to use our discontentment to engage rather than disengage - our hope has to be more powerful than our cynicism.

What the Black lives matter movement is doing is they are making it personal. They are making it hash tagged, exposing the racial injustice that continues to haunt our country in a way that you can't ignore. There is power in injustice becoming personal.

There are congregations on nearly every corner. I'm not sure we need more churches. What we need is a church. I say one church is better than fifty. I have tried to remove the plural form churches from my vocabulary, training myself to think of the church as Christ did, and as the early Christians did. The metaphors for her are always singular - a body, a bride. I heard one gospel preacher say it like this, as he really wound up and broke a sweat: "We've got to unite ourselves as one body. Because Jesus is coming back, and he's coming back for a bride not a harem.