TWENTY-THIRD SUNDAY AFTER PENTECOST 2016 LUKE 18:9-14
Dear God. Thank you that I’m not like him over there. Lord, you have been so good to me. You made me a reasonable, thoughtful person. Thank you that I’m not one of those unthinking Christians –those Fundamentalists with their simplistic faith and their pre-Modern way of reading the Bible. Like him. Look at him, Lord. Such judgmental opinions, such arrogance, such pride in his own goodness. That’s the problem with his type of Christian, so full of themselves, so self-righteous. Like those pastors and priests with their petty rules and hateful dogma, who think that obeying the dead letter of religion is more important than people. Yes, Lord, thank you that I am not like him over there. I welcome outsiders, strangers, people who look and talk nothing like me. I’m not like him, that Christian, who makes alliances with politicians, giving up the purity of his faith in order to gain brief and meaningless power in this world.

And thank you, Lord, that I’m not like her over there. Oh, she thinks she is so openminded and good and loving and inclusive and welcoming. But she is just as selfrighteous and judgmental as him. For she, Jesus, has forsaken you. She denies your uniqueness. Thinks you are just one of many ways to God. Why she doesn’t even belong in a church. How can she call herself a Christian when she gives such honor to other religions? She’s so open-minded that her brain has fallen out. She’ll let anyone in the church. And as for morals, hers are no different from your average heathen. She is so into tolerance that she is dining with the devil and persecuting me who actually believes in something. Tolerance? She is the most intolerant person I know.

Yes, Lord, thank you that I’m not like either of them (Read the full Sermon here: Thank you God that I'm not like him.pdf )