David Firth

“When I asked about this, my mother replied that there were Jesus’s rules and there were Methodist rules. The first set, apparently, were inviolate; and the second, not so much. She said that Methodist rules were “old-fashioned.”
― Diana Butler Bass, Freeing Jesus: Rediscovering Jesus as Friend, Teacher, Savior, Lord, Way, and Presence

“For one thing, Gutenberg didn’t invent movable type—a Chinese artisan named Bi Sheng did, using clay and ash, three and a half centuries before Gutenberg was born. For another, information wants to be free, but so does misinformation. The printing press empowered such religious progressives as Erasmus and John Calvin; it also empowered hucksters, war profiteers, terrorists, and bigots.* Nor did the printing press eliminate the problem of gatekeepers. It merely shifted the problem”
― Andrew Marantz, Antisocial: Online Extremists, Techno-Utopians, and the Hijacking of the American Conversation

“I’ve heard Christians shrug off sins committed by American politicians because King David assaulted women too. Anytime the Bible is used to justify the oppression and exploitation of others, we have strayed far”
― Rachel Held Evans, Inspired: Slaying Giants, Walking on Water, and Loving the Bible Again