outline

The Process

1. The Land Beyond Faith
   1. What is Faith?
      1. A Progressive View of Uncertainty
      2. Looking Before You Leap
      3. Miracles and the Inequality of Grace
      4. Prayer and its Contradictions
   2. Hope vs. Wishful Thinking
      1. The Passionate Unbeliever
      2. A Jazz Approach to Free Will and Predestination
      3. The Analytical Intuitive
   3. What is Theology?
      1. Spirituality without Patchouli Oil
      2. Mystic Currents and Current Mystics
   4. A Gods Eye-View
      1. On Design
      2. On Reality
      3. On Equality
2. A House for the Soul
   1. The Lonely Congregation
      1. Invading the Church’s Subcultures
      2. Community – To Build or To Remodel?
      3. Humans Anonymous
   2. The Soul’s Architect
      1. Multilingual Religion
      2. Deciding to Believe – the One Room Floorplan
      3. A Mechanism for Growth
   3. The Building Plan
      1. Location, location, location
      2. Clearing the Land
      3. The Nature of Cornerstones
      4. The Foundation Leveler
      5. Framing the All-Inclusive
      6. Brick by Brick, Stick by Stick, Stone by Stone
      7. Windows and Doors
      8. Religion without a Glass Ceiling
3. Deconstructing the Question
   1. The big Questions
      1. Listing
      2. Prioritizing
   2. The Archeology of Assumptions
      1. The Slippery Slope of Semantics
      2. The Shape of Dichotomy
      3. Analysis, the Accomplice of Intuition
   3. The Four Tests of Truth
      1. Equal Deservingness
      2. Inner Congruence
      3. The Web of Consistency
      4. Like-Fruits
4. Insight and Dialogue
   1. Insight
      1. Ten Tricks of Insight
      2. Paradox and Contradiction
      3. Suspending Disbelief
      4. The Naïve Skeptic
   2. True Dialogue
      1. Capturing the Conceptual
      2. Confucius says, “Fix language”
      3. The Unholy Trilogy: Guilt, Blame, and Fear
      4. Discussion Rules of Thumb
   3. Productive Dialogue
      1. What’s it all about, Alfie?
      2. The Purpose of Purpose
      3. Starting at the End

The Questions

1. Who or What is God?
   1. God Grows Down
      1. He’s Really Big
      2. Repositioning God
      3. God’s Sombrero
   2. Who God Is
      1. The Faith of Atheists
      2. God’s Little Pronoun
      3. Anthropomorphic God
   3. What God Does
      1. A God of Intervention
      2. Praise Be to Me and Other Fallacies
      3. O! God of Power and Might
   4. The Interesting Question of “What Is”
      1. God the Gestalt
      2. God the Ultimate Reality
      3. God the Acronym
      4. The Suffering God
      5. The Dancing God
      6. The Oblivious God
2. Who am I?
   1. The self and Self
      1. Self-delusion and the Success of Liars
      2. The Self-hyphens
      3. Ego, the Thimble for the Ocean
   2. Who am I not?
      1. Money and Worth
      2. Compassion and Objectified Fear
      3. Competition’s Master
   3. Creativity and the Emergent Self
      1. God’s Native Language
      2. A Bubble of Light
      3. A Custodial Relationship
      4. Fiction Skips Ahead, Carelessly Without Shoes
3. Death and What Comes After
   1. Death
      1. The Brilliant Strategy of the Deadline
      2. The Enemy: Death or Suffering?
      3. The Light of a Death
      4. Planned Obsolescence
      5. The Three Hot Buttons of Death
   2. Myths of the Afterlife
      1. Hell: Bad Management or Bad Design?
      2. The Furniture of the Islamic Heaven
      3. The Individuality of the Soul
      4. Spiritual Genetics
   3. The Afterlife, Beforelife and Besidelife
      1. True Perspective
      2. A Speck of Infinity
      3. Exponential Reincarnation
      4. The Precipitation of Souls
      5. Eternity is in the I of the Beholder
4. Where Does Evil Come From?
   1. What are Good and Evil?
      1. The Genesis of Self-Consciousness
      2. The Oxymoron of Animal Cruelty
      3. God Builds a Better Mousetrap: Free Will
   2. The Myth of the Bad Seed
      1. Roots of Evil in the Ground of Confusion
      2. Ego and the Cancer Cell
      3. The Parable of the Careless Farmer
      4. The Bastards of Cain
   3. The Irrelevance of Innocence and the Good News of Guilt
      1. Seven Stages of Guilt
      2. A Pillar of Salt
      3. Post-Apocalypse Planning
5. Who are We?
   1. In Culture
      1. Return of the Roman Empire
      2. The Luck of the Germans
      3. Designing a Plan to Subvert Slavery
   2. In Work
      1. Ten Perceptions on Work
      2. Just Deserts
      3. The Many Faces of Money
      4. The Strategic-Planning of the Steward
      5. The Parable of Unlimited Profit Margins
   3. In Community
      1. A Burden to Our Children
      2. The Courage to Show Up Empty-Handed
      3. The Bookstore Chapel and Church of the Farmer’s Market
      4. Drinking Mormons and Dancing Quakers
   4. In Relationship
      1. Unrequited Isn’t Love
      2. Love has no Opposite
      3. Intimate Recognition – To Love Me is To Know Me
      4. The Blood and Bone of Love
      5. Celibates, the Last of the Great Romantics
      6. Sex and the Holy Dark
   5. In Family
      1. Families in Eggshells
      2. Getting Unconditional Love Backwards
      3. Raising Brats with the Best of Us
      4. The Child in Myth: Fetishizing Children and Pets
      5. Sibling Rivalry in Scriptures
      6. Nurturing Extraordinary Kindness
      7. The Seed of True Humanity
6. The Miracle Question
   1. Survival
      1. The Curse of Fame
      2. Power vs. Influence
      3. Who Competition Serves
   2. Living Beyond Survival
      1. The Meanings of Life
      2. The Insult of Unhappiness
      3. Hippocrates Revisited
      4. Flexing the Gratitude Muscle
   3. The Collective Consciousness
      1. God’s Recycling Program
      2. Survival of the Kindest
      3. In Meaning We Trust
      4. Becoming God