Progressive Faith Sermons - Dr. Roger Ray
by Dr. Roger Ray
Sermons from the Community Christian Church of Springfield, MO.We are believers in Jesus Christ who accept all people without judgment and who desire to work and worship as a community striving for social justice.
Episodes
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My Faith Journey
This will be the last installment of my preaching career on line. I will still do some pulpit supply as needed and we will use our remaining resources to keep all of our years of sermons on line on our YouTube and iTunes channels. Indulge me in this last sermon to reminisce with you about my own...
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More than Just a Story
The best way to totally misunderstand a good story is to try to take it literally. The birth narratives in Matthew and Luke are not historical, not even close. They are mini sermons in the form of a story. While they are really bad history, they are actually really good sermons if we can dismiss...
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Holiday Casualty Count
An undeniable aspect of the current state of affairs in our world is that we have fewer friends than we used to and more and more families have estranged family members. There are a myriad of reasons for it but no matter what aspect of modern life you blame, the bottom line is still the same: we...
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Lucifer in LA
In the Marvel Universe, the Norse god, Thor, takes his place alongside of Iron Man and Spider Man without theological comment on the improbability of either human superheroes or gods from Asgard existing. Most of the time we easily can tell the difference between what is real and what is fantasy...
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The Hallowing of America
T. S. Eliot may have been painfully prophetic when he described our nation as being hollow folk with heads full of straw. None of the major religions represented in our nation have successfully created an influential conversation about character, honesty, or personal or corporate virtue. Maybe we...
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The Republican War on America
Americans are dying from gunshot wounds in America at a rate of about 47,000 per year. That number looks more like the casualty count on a battle field! In fact, it is about the same as the number of deaths in the Gaza Strip during the two years of the recently ended war with Israel. But for us,...
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Let the Mystery Be
Acknowledging that evidence and critical thinking are crucial to a credible faith, the other side of that coin is that there is a great deal that not only is not known but, in fact, cannot be known. The most amazingly smart and insightful astro physicists still look up at a star filled sky with a...
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How Do We Know What (we think) We Know?
How do we know what we know? Philosophy tells us that knowledge can be inherent, deductive reasoning, or it can be based on experience. What it cannot be is just imagination or personal prejudice. Science, which looks for knowable facts, depends upon something being at least 3 things: observable,...
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Just War Theory in 2025
We have hot wars in the Ukraine and Gaza. A border skirmish between Thailand and Cambodia, and an unknown potential for violence in Iran. Why do we find lasting peace so difficult in an age when the potential for devastating warfare is so great?
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The After-Church World
We have always had both priests and prophets but we are quickly growing beyond our need of priests who provide the rituals, religious texts, hymns, and institutions of organized religion. But the prophets, the ones who inspire us and challenge us to be and to do what it really means to be…
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A.I. and the Guaranteed Basic Income
Beyond the fear of A.I. taking over our nuclear arsenal and attacking us is the very realistic fear that A.I. along with automation and robotics, will quickly and dramatically end the need for human employees in very many parts of the economy. Left unchecked, the wealthy will reap a windfall from...
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Reason vs. Religion
230 years ago, in his Age of Reason, Thomas Paine implored his fellow Americans to break free of the mental prison imposed on them by monarchs and priests and to embrace a mental freedom found in reason. The pendulum has swung more than once since that time but clearly, we are living in a time in...
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Religion and Politics (Just Be Nice)
If we follow the norm of never talking about politics or religion in polite company, we become a society that doesn't know how to discuss the important matters of politics or religion in a polite way. In fact, our faith (beliefs about ethics) are quite relevant to our politics (public policy).…
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The Long Road Out of Prejudice
We inherit prejudices from our family of origin as well as the culture around us and in the media. The first time our irrational prejudices are confronted, it is unlikely that we will give them up. For most of us, overcoming gender, racial, sexual orientation, or religious prejudices was a…
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Hateful Self-Talk
Our mind can be our worst enemy, the invisible opponent who keeps us from staying in the battle with our visible opponents. We need to learn to pay attention to how our internal voice is talking to us. Does it tell us that we are a loser, does it call us stupid, or insist that we give up? If so…
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Radicalized by Basic Decency
For centuries the world's religions have constructed a mental prison in which they try to control the conduct of their adherents through threats of eternal torture or, for the very good, promises of eternal reward. However, once you awaken to the reality that these are empty promises and threats,...
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Mom, Dad, and the Kids: Staying Together in the 21st Century
Between Mothers' Day and Fathers' Day, let us consider what it is that holds couples together in this age of liberty when neither church nor society has much to say when a couple decides to call it quits. Are we trying hard enough to foster healthy relationships what create a healthy environment...
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100 Days of Idiocracy
We have now seen Donald Trump through the first 100 days of his second term and what we have witnessed has been a horrifying attack on our constitutional democracy. It is sad to have to admit that the clowns are now running the circus but what is more frightening is that our nation may not…
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Ideas are Immortal
By the end of the first century of the common era, the message of Jesus the preacher had been entirely transformed into a message about Jesus, turning the spokesperson of radical compassion into a magical symbol who hods out a promise of life after death. We have no reliable sources to tell us…
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Estrangement Among Family and Friends
Estrangement among family and friends is a sad occurrence which is becoming increasingly common in a society that continues to trend towards isolation and loneliness. Our decade is more polarized than most but even though we can rehearse the arguments to defend our distance from parents…
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The Great Divorce
The greatest moral failing of the modern world may be our quiet acceptance of what Dorothy Day called "our filthy rotten system." Every year the income gap grows wider and the gap in ownership of capital becomes more stark. If we cannot change course it is not hyperbole to predict that the USA is...
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Compassion is the Key
If we ask ourselves what it was about the historical Jesus that inspired the loyal following and explosion of writing on his behalf in the first century of the common era, beyond all of the talk about a kind of divine fire insurance, we find a message that is unique and powerful and nearly...
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The Bible vs the Bible
The Bible doesn't speak with one point of view nor does it teach a singular message. Religious people have to be willing to enter the debate which is found even within the pages of scripture in order to choose the right path towards a healthy spirituality. You can find harsh judgement and…
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To Live Without Love is a Mistake
Realizing that he had made a tragic mistake by ending his engagement to Regine Olsen, the Great Dane, Soren Kierkegaard, wrote in his journal, "To live without love is a mistake for which there is no reparation, either in this life or in the life to come." Successful coupling is more difficult in...
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Four More Years
This week's inauguration of Donald Trump was painful for most if not all of our listeners. Still, short of resignation, illness, or an implausible impeachment, his chaotic administration will be a threatening fact of life for the world for four more years. How then can we adapt ourselves to a...
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The Economics of Immigration
If Trump keeps his campaign promise to undertake a mass deportation of undocumented migrants in the USA, we should prepare ourselves for some economic and service industry hits and we are not going to like. Acknowledging that our immigration system is broken and than neither a coast to coast wall...
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Once More, Into the Breach
We are entering a new year with the single glaring feature of the return of Donald Trump to the presidency which will have far reaching implications both domestically and internationally. For most of us, this is a future to fear and yet, for good or for ill, we must face the reality we have been...
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Jesus: from preacher to God
How Christmas is celebrated has evolved a great deal through the centuries but most of us alive today inherited a very churchy version of Christmas that focused on the birth narratives in Matthew and Luke and the whole incarnational theology of the ancient church. Modern progressives find it more...
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Speaking Truth to Power
A prophet is not someone who predicts the future. A prophet is a person, religious or not, who accurately describes the present, even if no one wants to hear it. There is a saying in journalism that says journalism happens when you publish something that someone doesn't want published. Everything...
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Morality and Climate Change
Climate change is not merely a matter of either science or politics. Wealthy people don't tend to live in mobile home parks, after all, so the stronger hurricanes and tornadoes have a direct impact on those who are forced by economics to live in the least substantial housing. We must do more than...
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Voting in an Empire of Lies
It is not hyperbole to say that our election on Tuesday is probably the most important election in our life times. In fact, it is entirely possible that this could turn out to be the last free election held in the United States if the anti-democracy wing of the Republican Party gain the reigns of...
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No Way To Prevent This,' Says Only Nation Where This Regularly Happens
In light of the recent assassination attempts against Donald Trump, in which the infamous AR-15 assault style rife was used, it seems like a good time to raise the issue of passing much needed gun reform legislation. The majority of Americans want sensible gun laws passed and yet we keep...
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Gaza One Year Later: The Publicity War
We have arrived at the one-year anniversary of the Hamas terrorist attack on Israel and the war drags on and even threatens to escalate. The Israeli response has, for many, overshadowed the horror of the original attack. The world is asked to witness a problem with no evident solutions, endlessly...
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Misogyny in 2024? Unbelievable!
We cannot feign surprise at the outrageous and hypocritical misogynist attacks on Kamala Harris, but isn't it a shame that we are still having to fight this fight in 2024? Women have fought for a place at the table in law schools, medical schools, and in America's pulpits with a great deal more...
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The Ten Commandments vs The Beatitudes
When Louisiana's new governor, Jeff Landry, signed an order that every state classroom from Kindergarten through university classrooms would have to post a poster sized copy of the Ten Commandments, you probably heard a voice in your head saying, "What an idiot." But what if he wasn't just trying...
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Giving Capitalism a Conscience
All of the world's religions promote compassion towards the poor as a central spiritual value. However, it should be noted that the world's major religions all were born in times of great scarcity of resources. It was impossible to prevent poverty because there simply was not enough resources to...
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Assisting in Our Own Victimization
"Why do the innocent suffer? And can we consider as well how many who are clearly victims are also unconsciously coconspirators in their abuse? Just as Bob Marley sang, "Emancipate yourselves from mental slavery, none but ourselves can free our minds," we all must consider the ways in which we…
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Project 2025 as seen by a Pastor
In the hope that Donald Trump will win the November election, the conservative think tank, the Heritage Foundation, has composed a huge book of plans and resumes to transform our government called the 2025 Project. It is 900 pages long and too much for any one news show or religious podcast to...
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Religion and Politics – Natural Bed Fellows
What makes some topics controversial is because you can make a rational defense of either side of the issue. For example, you can mount logical arguments in favor of either socialism or capitalism but you cannot have a reasonable debate about whether the Earth is round or flat. Unfortunately, we...
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Liars: Erasing Your Own Soul
The news has been uncommonly full of conversations about who lied and about what. Hunter Biden lied on his application to buy a hand gun. Michael Cohen lied about lots of things, specifically around the hush money payment made to an adult film actress to remain silent about her sexual encounter...
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What is a Cult and are You in One?
The gloves are off, at least in the left leaning media, as we now hear the Trump base regularly being referred to as a "cult." That's strong language that should not be used lightly but does the "shoe fit?" This message asks us to consider the diagnostic criteria for identifying any movement as a...
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Your Jesus, My Jesus, and the Jesus of History
Most progressive church goers have been exposed to academic criticism of the New Testament, especially as concerns the nature of the historical Jesus. After all, the Jesus Seminar has been around for 40 years, giving us those wonderful books by Marcus Borg, John Shelby Spong, Karen Armstrong, and...
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Faith Without Certainty
When we watch a movie like Star Wars, we immediately know that it is fiction. No one tries to hitch a ride on the Millennium Falcon or tries to order a working light saber from Amazon. Sadly, however, many modern religious people read biblical myths as if talking with a snake in the Garden of…
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USA at War with Russia and Iran
Similar to the WWII generation, we are living in a time facing dramatic changes that may end up being good but which also have the potential of being catastrophically bad. As Eric Holder recently warned, there is no cavalry coming to save us. Storied institutions like the Supreme Court and the...
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Hyperbole, Hysteria, and Hypocrisy
The claim that the coming election is "the most important election of our lifetime," has been sadly over used and possibly worn out to the point that people easily ignore those of us who are urgently crying "wolf" about the November 2024 election. This message attempts to state the stark reality…
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Why No One in the Bible Accepted Jesus Christ as their Personal Lord and Savior
Two great periods of revivals saved the Christian religion from extinction in the United States. The Great Awakening, near the birth of our nation, and The Second Great Awakening that came along with the western expansion, the Civil War, and the end of slavery. Much of what modern American...
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The First Easter
Easter, as it has been taught to us through traditional modern sermons, is, as Bishop John Shelby Spong described it, simply "unbelievable." Stepping back from the "yippee, we're all gonna live forever" myth, this lecture tries to treat the first Easter in a historical context with a critical...
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This is Not Normal
THIS IS NOT NORMAL! Cultural values we worked hard to correct over the past century are slipping back into what is being allowed to become normative language, thinking, and voting. North Carolina's GOP nominated candidate for governor, Mark Robinson, who enjoyed more than 60% of the vote in the...
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Redemptive Suffering
The sad news of Alexey Navalny's death in prison brings to mind many who have chosen personal sacrifice as a way to raise awareness in the public's mind or to confront the evils of governments through the centuries. Navalny takes his place along side the likes of Nelson Mandela, Martin Luther…
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How Much Does it Cost Me?
32 of the 33 developed nations in the world have universal healthcare. Why is the United States the only outlier? We spend more on healthcare than any of the other nations, why can't we get the distribution system to be more fair? We also have between five and ten times as many of our citizens in...
About this show
Sermons from the Community Christian Church of Springfield, MO.We are believers in Jesus Christ who accept all people without judgment and who desire to work and worship as a community striving for social justice.
Hosted by
Dr. Roger Ray
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