164
" Do you mean, do I believe that Jesus died for our sins?” She said, “Yes.” I then explained, as I have here, that historically, no, I don’t think that Jesus literally died for our sins. I don’t think he thought of his life and purpose that way; I don’t think he thought of that as his divinely given vocation. And then I continued. But I do have faith in the cross as a trustworthy disclosure of the evil of domination systems, as the exposure of the defeat of the powers, as the revelation of the “way” or “path” of transformation, as the revelation of the depth of God’s love for us, and as the proclamation of radical grace. I have faith in the cross as all of those things. "
― Marcus J. Borg , The Heart of Christianity: Rediscovering a Life of Faith
165
" Thus Jesus is a metaphor of God. Indeed, for us as Christians, he is the metaphor of God. Of course, he was also a real person. As metaphor of God, Jesus discloses what God is like. We see God through Jesus. We are accustomed to speaking of the death of Jesus as the “passion” of Jesus, and the stories of his death as the “passion narratives.” When we do so, we typically think of “passion” as meaning “suffering.” And it does mean that. But it has an additional meaning as well. The death of Jesus—his execution—was because of his passion for God and God’s justice. And because we see Jesus as the revelation of God, we see in his life and death the passion of God. He discloses both the character and passion of God. It is this figure who is also, for us as Christians, the Word of God, the Son of God, the Wisdom of God, the Light of the World. Now at the right hand of God, one with God, and the second person of the Trinity, he was in his historical life the character and passion of God incarnate. As a metaphor of God, he is the heart of God made flesh.21 Jesus is also a sacrament of God, a means through whom the Spirit of God becomes present. "
― Marcus J. Borg , The Heart of Christianity: Rediscovering a Life of Faith
169
" to use language from Frederick Buechner, we live our lives from the outside in rather than from the inside out.24 Our fall into exile is very deep. The biblical picture of the human condition is bleak. Separated and self-concerned, the self becomes blind, self-preoccupied, prideful; worry-filled, grasping, miserable; insensitive, angry, violent; somebody great, or only okay, or “not much.” In the dark, we are blind and don’t see. "
― Marcus J. Borg , The Heart of Christianity: Rediscovering a Life of Faith
170
" The biblical vision of our amazing contradiction is that we are created in the image of God, but we live our lives outside of paradise, “east of Eden,” in a world of estrangement and self-preoccupation. It is the inevitable result of growing up, of becoming selves. None of us, whether success or failure, escapes it. Thus we need to be born again. It is the road of return from our exile, the way to recover our true self, the path to beginning to live our lives from the inside out rather than from the outside in, the exodus from our individual and collective selfishness. To be born again involves dying to the false self, to that identity, to that way of being, and to be born into an identity centered in the Spirit, in Christ, in God. It is the process of internal redefinition of the self whereby a real person is born within us. "
― Marcus J. Borg , The Heart of Christianity: Rediscovering a Life of Faith
177
" Beginning in the seventeenth century, the universe was increasingly thought of as a natural system separate from God. God was thus removed from nature, creating a thorough “disenchantment of nature.”8Separated from the universe, God came increasingly to be thought of as only “out there.” The dominance of supernatural theism in modern Western Christianity has had serious consequences. When “out there” is emphasized and separated from “right here,” God’s relation to the world is distorted, and the notion of God becomes harder and harder to accept. “Out there” means something different for us than it meant when our premodern ancestors used this language. For them, “up there” or “out there” was not very far away. They thought of the universe as small with the earth at its center; the sun, moon, planets, and stars were mounted on a dome not very far above the earth. It is difficult to know how literally they took this language, but the basic notion of a small universe was shared by all. In that context, thinking of God as “our Father who art in heaven” did not make God very far away. But for us, “up there” or “out there” is very far away. If God is only “out there,” as supernatural theism suggests, then God is very distant, not intimately close. God becomes remote, absent. And the difference between a remote and absent God and “no God” is slender. So common is supernatural theism in our time that many people think its concept of God is the only meaning the word “God” can have. For them, believing in God means believing in a personlike being “out there.” Not believing this means not believing in God. "
― Marcus J. Borg , The Heart of Christianity: Rediscovering a Life of Faith
