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2025-10-26T11:09:27-07:00

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

Freedom in Humility: God Loves Us Even When We’re Imperfect

Last updated on: October 26, 2025 at 11:09 am By Tricia Gates Brown

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If anything distinguishes ancient life from modern life—with our constant connectivity via the internet and our unrelenting barrage of news, it is the number of messages coming at us each day. Strangely, these messages simultaneously feed our arrogance and make us increasingly insecure about ourselves. How do they manage this?! Maybe the arrogance is a defense mechanism against messages rendering us less than. But God loves us even when we’re imperfect. A Tale of Two Prayers: The Pharisee and the... Read more

Progressive Christian

Relationships and Religion

Family, Parenting and Religion

2025-10-17T15:10:29-07:00

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

God Chooses Powerlessness

Last updated on: October 17, 2025 at 3:10 pm By Tricia Gates Brown

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I often hear people question the existence of God because of theodicy, which is the challenge of reconciling the omnipotence of God with the existence of evil. The logic of those so questioning—at least as I’ve heard it—goes something like this: How can a loving God, who is presumably almighty, exist when terrible evils occur? Some who veer into such questioning are quite close to me. But I admit, this classic question or conundrum has never made sense to me.... Read more

Progressive Christian

Women in Religion

History and Religion

2025-10-17T15:11:07-07:00

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

The Secret Life of Chronic Illness

Last updated on: October 17, 2025 at 3:11 pm By Tricia Gates Brown

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If you or someone close to you has a chronic illness, defined as “a health condition lasting a year or more, limiting daily activities and requiring ongoing medical attention,” you know what I mean by a secret life. If you don’t know, well, it’s because it’s a secret. Most of us with chronic illness talk about our illness infrequently for reasons I’ll describe below. I have my highly productive life that most people see, then I have the life that... Read more

Progressive Christian

Relationships and Religion

Health, Fitness and Religion

2025-10-17T15:11:46-07:00

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

Learning to Live Together ‘Some Other Way’

Last updated on: October 17, 2025 at 3:11 pm By Tricia Gates Brown

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In 2003, during a period of change in myself and my life, I wrote and recorded a song called “Some Other Way.” Recently, a friend wrote to thank me for this song (and others on the same record), which sent me back for a listen. I hadn’t listened to or sang the song in years. “Some Other Way” acknowledges the experience we sometimes have of changing and of needing our lives to change in order to fit the new person... Read more

Progressive Christian

Politics and Religion

History and Religion

2025-09-08T09:28:49-07:00

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

Moving Toward Freedom: Finding Liberation On Walden Pond

Last updated on: September 8, 2025 at 9:28 am By Tricia Gates Brown

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When I moved from Oregon’s Willamette Valley to the north Oregon coast in 2004, it was a leap. I parachuted out of a life that no longer accommodated into a 10-month sojourn of dis-illusionment, dismantling, and radiant transformation in a tiny Oceanside, Oregon duplex on a cliff overhanging the Pacific. The move began as a freefall. No one pushed me; I jumped. Fortunately, after a few unsteady years, I landed in 2007—feet on the ground—in a small river valley cottage... Read more

Progressive Christian

Recreation, Outdoors and Religion

Careers, Workplace and Religion

2025-08-25T09:56:06-07:00

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

The Sizzle of Curses and the Balancing Act of Karma

Last updated on: August 25, 2025 at 9:56 am By Tricia Gates Brown

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Lately I’ve been thinking about curses. As in cursing people. This sounds violent, I know; but hear me out. Because I think those of us denying the felt urge to curse someone, or a desire for the balancing act of karma, are not quite honest or aware. One doesn’t have to look long at the news to feel the curse building. The urge to curse someone for doing terrible things doesn’t mean necessarily wanting to do terrible things to them.... Read more

Progressive Christian

Women in Religion

Relationships and Religion

2025-08-14T12:42:15-07:00

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

Beauty is in the Impermanence

Last updated on: August 14, 2025 at 12:42 pm By Tricia Gates Brown

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Home for me is northwest Oregon—the kingdom of wild blackberries. Every summer, come August, briars along many NW Oregon roads and forest paths explode with delicious, juicy-sweet berries offered up so wantonly that billions (trillions?) of the berries go to waste each year. Many of the berries are inaccessible—so barbed and tangled the briars. Up to a few decades ago, I gathered blackberries every August in a large bowl; even learned to make blackberry pie at eighteen. But I eventually... Read more

Progressive Christian

Health, Fitness and Religion

Food and Religion

2025-08-05T10:35:29-07:00

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

What Does it Mean Today to Take Up Your Cross?

Last updated on: August 5, 2025 at 10:35 am By Tricia Gates Brown

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Even people who are not followers of Jesus often acknowledge that he was a spiritual genius, even a healer. He had a beautiful, vivid, hopeful way of articulating God’s dream for the world. But throughout most of history, spiritual geniuses and wonder workers, those offering an alternative measure of worth, in the world haven’t fared very well with those in power. A confrontation always seems to arise between those who measure things according to a materialistic, this-life-is-all-there-is rubric, or a... Read more

Contemplative

Relationships and Religion

History and Religion

2025-07-21T13:27:08-07:00

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

Our Value Comes From Our Being, Not From Our Doing

Last updated on: July 21, 2025 at 1:27 pm By Tricia Gates Brown

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In last Sunday’s lectionary reading (Luke 10:38-42) we get to glimpse a friendship—that of Jesus with the siblings Mary, Martha, and Lazarus. We know from other stories in the gospels that these siblings were close friends to Jesus, and he sometimes visited them at their home in Bethany. And I think most of us can relate to having a guest come into our homes, especially an important guest. We want to run around hosting them, but we also want simply... Read more

Progressive Christian

Relationships and Religion

Careers, Workplace and Religion

2025-07-17T10:32:52-07:00

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

Stand Up! The Most Important Scripture We Get Wrong

Last updated on: July 17, 2025 at 10:32 am By Tricia Gates Brown

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A friend once told me, “I wish Christianity wasn’t such a wimpy religion! You know, turn the other cheek, go the extra mile, blessed are the meek….” She was tired of it. But the fact is, Christianity is not a wimpy religion (though I contend it’s about nonviolence). It is, quite often, poorly taught. Luke 6:27-38 and its parallel in Matthew are among the most important bits of scripture we get wrong. In light of the misunderstanding, many Christians choose... Read more

Progressive Christian

History and Religion

Education and Religion

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