David P. Gushee > Quotes

“Better is one day in the company of those bullied by Christians but loved by Jesus than thousands in the company of those wielding scripture to harm the weak and defenseless.”
― David P. Gushee, Changing Our Mind: A call from America's leading evangelical ethics scholar for full acceptance of LGBT Christians in the Church

“Make your church a context where parents know that the right response to their teenagers is never to reject them as human beings, never to throw them out.”
― David P. Gushee, Changing Our Mind

“Human life is sacred: this means that each and every human being has been set apart for designation as a being of elevated status and dignity. Each human being must therefore be viewed with reverence and treated with due respect and care, with special attention to preventing any desecration or violation of a human being.”
― David P. Gushee, The Sacredness of Human Life: Why an Ancient Biblical Vision Is Key to the World's Future

“If what we are talking about is blessing an anything-goes ethic in a morally libertine culture, I stand utterly opposed, as I have throughout my career. But if what we are talking about is carving out space for serious committed Christians who happen to be gay or lesbian, to participate in society as equals, in church as kin, and in the blessings and demands of covenant on the same terms as everyone else, I now think that has nothing to do with cultural, ecclesial and moral decline, and everything to do with treating people the way Christ did.”
― David P. Gushee, Changing Our Mind

“The sense that card-carrying American evangelicalism now requires acquiescence to attitudes and practices that negate core teachings of Jesus is fueling today’s massive exodus.”
― David P. Gushee, After Evangelicalism: The Path to a New Christianity

“Please protect me through the dangers and confusion of my transient life on earth, ensuring that in all things I strive for eternal life in Heaven.”
― David P. Gushee, Yours Is the Day, Lord, Yours Is the Night: A Morning and Evening Prayer Book

“I just called the slaveholder version of Christianity "false." I believe that. But note that in situations of conflict participants view reality differently. The more intractable the conflict, especially where both sides have the capacity to hurt each other, the more difficult it is to determine who is "victim" and who is "oppressor." Think about how nothing is quite as predictable and fruitless as hearing estranged spouses blame each other for being abusive or oppressive. Liberation theology dealt with this perceptual gulf in conflicted situations by speaking of the "epistemological privilege of the poor/oppressed." This meant: the view of the truth of a conflictual situation is clearer from the underside than from the position of power. But this assumes that we know who is on the underside and who holds the power. I am not saying that the exodus-liberation-deliverance motif is invalidated; I am saying that few situations present themselves to us in such clarity as Exod. 1-2 enslavement and infanticide do.”
― David P. Gushee, The Sacredness of Human Life: Why an Ancient Biblical Vision Is Key to the World's Future

“If evangelical gatekeepers can swallow keeping children in cages, mocking the Sermon on the Mount, and following leaders in thrall to Trumpist bigotry, why would anyone respect their discernment, value their praise, or fear their critique?”
― David P. Gushee, After Evangelicalism: The Path to a New Christianity

“American evangelicalism now requires acquiescence to attitudes and practices that fundamentally (aha!) negate core teachings of Jesus”
― David P. Gushee, After Evangelicalism: The Path to a New Christianity

“save our souls from being so blind that we pass unseeing when even the common thornbush is aflame with Your glory,”
― David P. Gushee, Yours Is the Day, Lord, Yours Is the Night: A Morning and Evening Prayer Book

“Yet whether a culture condemns or accepts homosexuality, heterosexuality prevails and homosexuality survives.”
― David P. Gushee, Changing Our Mind: Definitive 3rd Edition of the Landmark Call for Inclusion of LGBTQ Christians with Response to Critics

“It is a loop between church, Spirit, and Bible, and it is enough.”
― David P. Gushee, After Evangelicalism: The Path to a New Christianity

“Blest be the God of love, Who gave me eyes, and light, and power this day, Both to be busy and to play. . . . My God, Thou art all love. Not one poor minute escapes Thy breast, But brings a favor from above; And in this love, more than in bed, I rest. Amen. —GEORGE HERBERT (1593–1633)”
― David P. Gushee, Yours Is the Day, Lord, Yours Is the Night: A Morning and Evening Prayer Book

“It says something really terrible when the least safe place to deal with sexual orientation and identity issues is the Christian family and church.”
― David P. Gushee, Changing Our Mind: Definitive 3rd Edition of the Landmark Call for Inclusion of LGBTQ Christians with Response to Critics

“In general, evangelical fear of liberal learning has contributed to what Mark Noll properly described as “the scandal of the evangelical mind”—which is, in Noll’s immortal phrase, “that there is not much of an evangelical mind.”
― David P. Gushee, After Evangelicalism: The Path to a New Christianity

“Give me an upright heart which no unworthy purpose may tempt aside. Bestow upon me also, O Lord my God, understanding to know Thee, diligence to seek Thee, wisdom to find Thee, and a faithfulness that may finally embrace Thee; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. —THOMAS AQUINAS (1225–1274)”
― David P. Gushee, Yours Is the Day, Lord, Yours Is the Night: A Morning and Evening Prayer Book

“It may not be quite enough to find a nice inclusive Episcopal church led by Progressive White Cleric to replace the lily-white rocking megachurch led by Conservative White Guy in Jeans on Stage.”
― David P. Gushee, After Evangelicalism: The Path to a New Christianity

“Calm me, O Lord, as You stilled the storm; Still me, O Lord; keep me from harm. Let all the storms within me cease. Enfold me, Lord, in Your peace. Amen. —CELTIC PRAYER”
― David P. Gushee, Yours Is the Day, Lord, Yours Is the Night: A Morning and Evening Prayer Book

“O Lord, take full possession of my heart, raise there Your throne, and command there as You do in heaven. Being created by You, let me live for You; being created for You, let me always act for Your glory; being redeemed by You, let me give to You what is Yours; and let my spirit cling to You alone, for Your name’s sake. Amen. —JOHN WESLEY (1703–1791)”
― David P. Gushee, Yours Is the Day, Lord, Yours Is the Night: A Morning and Evening Prayer Book

“Distrust of higher education has been an enduring feature of fundamentalism and evangelicalism.”
― David P. Gushee, After Evangelicalism: The Path to a New Christianity

“It is also not as simple as saying that Christians accept the moral laws offered in the Old Testament, just not the ceremonial, cultic, dietary, or civil laws—because, as Old Testament scholar Martin Noth wrote, “Here in the Old Testament … there is no question of different categories of commandment, but only of the Will of God binding on Israel, revealed in a great variety of concrete requirements.” [24] Any differentiation of authority in terms of categories of Old Testament legal materials is foreign to the materials themselves. And no clear delineation along these lines is offered in the New Testament. It is also not as simple as saying Christians may not accept all the laws offered in the Old Testament, but we do seek to practice the principles behind them, as Gordon Wenham, among others, has suggested. [25] While this move is often compelling, other times the principles are not clear, and still other times they are clear but we cannot accept them as Christians. Consider the principle of collective responsibility and therefore collective punishment of the entire population of a town for its prevailing religious practices, or the principle that the “unclean” (like menstruating women) should be excluded from community.  If we say that Christians may not accept all the laws or the principles offered in the Old Testament, but we are committed to belief in the core character of God as revealed there, such as the idea that God is holy and demands holiness, this is better. But this does not resolve the question of whether all same-sex relationships violate the character of a holy God.”
― David P. Gushee, Changing Our Mind: Definitive 3rd Edition of the Landmark Call for Inclusion of LGBTQ Christians with Response to Critics

“I am saying that Christians have many resources for listening to God’s voice and discerning God’s will. But given human limits—even as humans with Jesus in front of us, the Bible open before us, and the Spirit within us—I am rejecting any inerrant path to infallible doctrine.”
― David P. Gushee, After Evangelicalism: The Path to a New Christianity

“evangelicalism—at its core, at its immovable power center—never was more than fundamentalism with lipstick on.”
― David P. Gushee, After Evangelicalism: The Path to a New Christianity

“Our God, You open Your hand, and fill all things living with plenteousness; to You I commit all those who are dear to me; watch over them, I pray, and provide all things needful for their souls and bodies, now and for evermore; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. —NERSES (4TH C.)”
― David P. Gushee, Yours Is the Day, Lord, Yours Is the Night: A Morning and Evening Prayer Book

“They fear it will soon happen again, right here in America, and they are readying themselves for a new era of persecution.”
― David P. Gushee, Changing Our Mind: Definitive 3rd Edition of the Landmark Call for Inclusion of LGBTQ Christians with Response to Critics

“It seems ironic to acknowledge that a Catholic Mass almost certainly contains more Scripture than the average evangelical service.”
― David P. Gushee, After Evangelicalism: The Path to a New Christianity

“Every generation has its hottest of all hot-button issues, the issue that becomes the litmus test of everyone’s orthodoxy and provokes conflicts sometimes leading to schism. In earlier generations it was slavery, or segregation, or apartheid, or Nazism, or abortion, or temperance, or Sabbath or tongue-speaking”
― David P. Gushee, Changing Our Mind: Definitive 3rd Edition of the Landmark Call for Inclusion of LGBTQ Christians with Response to Critics

“meanings” of the Bible so many people point to in their attempts to oppress other people.”
― David P. Gushee, After Evangelicalism: The Path to a New Christianity

“non-discrimination laws with exemptions for religious employers.”
― David P. Gushee, Changing Our Mind: Definitive 3rd Edition of the Landmark Call for Inclusion of LGBTQ Christians with Response to Critics

“O Jesus, keep me under the standard of Your cross. Let me not just look at You crucified, but have You living in my heart. Amen. —BERNADETTE OF LOURDES (1844”
― David P. Gushee, Yours Is the Day, Lord, Yours Is the Night: A Morning and Evening Prayer Book