A Forum for Lent: Exploring the Prophetic Imagination
Stuart and Cynthia invite you to spend Lent with them this year, in a special Sunday Forum beginning February 11, exploring the image and promise of the prophetic imagination. We should name out loud that this is a tumultuous year for us as a country and, indeed, as a world. We should also name out loud that we have such richness and potential within our broader Tradition to ground ourselves in a practice of prayer that takes seriously God’s creative presence within our lives.
Our practice of faith should enable us to live more fully in the world, facing the tensions of consumerism, distraction, and manipulation that are pernicious in our society today. Our hearts call for hope in the face of despair. To encourage our hearts, we need to nurture an awareness of God’s presence within our practice, to have a fuller engagement at our fingertips. We need to nurture our imagination so that we discern God’s presence in the lessons of our tradition, our history, and our present world.
Building on the Rev. John Cromartie’s forum discussions on flourishing and living life fully, we invite you to explore Walter Brueggemann’s seminal book The Prophetic Imagination with us this Lent as a way to engage a fuller and deeper reflection of faith. This book has been a key text for the church for forty years, and Brueggemann draws on the witness of the Old Testament prophets as they remained grounded and vigilant within the pressures of their society–as we see in key texts in our sacred scriptures.
As Brueggemann says in the book, his thesis is: “This task of prophetic ministry is to nurture, nourish, and evoke a consciousness and perception alternative to the consciousness and perception of the dominant culture around us.”
We encourage you to purchase a copy of the 40th anniversary edition of the book as we delve deeper together during this Lenten season. We have much work to do, and it is time to do it.
Blessings,
Stuart
This Lenten Forum will meet from 9:30 – 10:30 AM on Sundays, beginning February 11.