Seeking Authentic Voice

 A reflection on the readings for Proper 24B: Job 38:1-7, (34-41); Mark 10:35-45 I was fascinated this week to watch a video that originally aired on the science channel with Dr. Andrew Newberg, the Director of Research at the Myrna Brind Center for Integrative Medicine at Thomson Jefferson University Hospital and Medical College. Dr. Newberg has studied the neuroscientific effect of religious and spiritual experiences for decades. In the video Dr. Newberg explains that to study the effect of meditation and prayer on the brain, he injects his subjects with a harmless radioactive dye while they are deep in prayer / meditation. The dye migrates to the parts of the brain where the blood flow is the strongest, i.e,. to the most active part of the brain. He was then able to observe the brain in action while the person prayed or meditated. The red portion of the scan indicated greater activity in areas of the brain. In this case, increased activity was observed in th...

I have been intrigued by the news this week about a tiny piece of papyrus, suggesting that Jesus had a wife. Everyone is commenting on it. Is it real? Is it a forgery? Thankfully I found a link on Facebook to a webinar hosted by two New Testament Scholars at General Theological Seminary in New York City which put the debate into perspective for me.   Professors Dierdre Good and Katherine Shaner move through the aspects of the papyrus with great intentionality using established methodology to determine the authenticity of ancient manuscripts. For example some of the indicators that authenticate this document as a late 4 th century piece of Coptic/Egyptian Christian writing are: the way the papyrus is made, the torn edges of the document, the decay, holes and grain of the papyrus,   the ink, and the style of the Coptic language used. Francis Watson, Professor of Theology and Religion at Durham University in the UK has stated that this document is a forgery. Other schol...