Turning 50 is a divider that cuts through life with the sharpest edge. It calls for contemplation and reflection more than it conjures up visions and dreams of the future. When my father turned 50 he lightheartedly announced that he was now in the “death half” (döhalvan) of life. It is the time when (hopefully)…
It would be quite a rude thing to say in any situation but this came from somebody who is really close to the family. Not from someone who has read a blog post or two or a flimsy Facebook friends but we have never met acquaintance. This is from someone who where among the first…
It’s that day again, that day when it is mandatory to be romantic, to excel at gestures that convey care and romantic love. It has been branded the Hallmark holiday, but why do we so intensely love/hate Valentines day? First of all let’s recognise that it has nothing to do with love. Valentines is the…
There are many that would balk at the notion of spiritual discipline as discipline in itself has almost become a bad word in todays society. We talk about disciplining our children as a bad thing (especially in the Scandinavian countries) as we equate discipline with violence or physical force. Other will embrace the idea of…
We are just shy of two months out of the closet. Two months of reactions to us publicly announcing that we have left the sacred path of monogamy and decided to practice ethical non-monogamy. There has of course been many reactions all the way from: you are leading people to hell, to wow, that is…
There are so many paths one can take in life and everyone must choose their own path. There are career paths, spiritual paths and relationship paths. Personally I think that all paths are valid, however I think it is important that each path is chosen carefully and intentionally. One of the many reasons that I…
After more than half a decade of deconstruction I face this question. It all started with deconstructing our worldview and how we view god. Moving on to deconstruct our traditions and our ways of being Christian. This is not weird and is done all the time. In progressive circles the hermeneutics of different Christian…
It’s a funny phrase isn’t it. We say that we fall in love like it was an open manhole cover on our way to work. Like we have nothing to do with it, like it is completely out of our control. We seem to think that love over powers us and strong-arms us into submission…
I am cleaning the house and dancing around the apartment with the monster we call a vacuum cleaner singing cheesy love songs. I find myself singing along to Billy Joel’s “Just the way you are” thinking it’s a song about accepting the other radically, unconditionally. I said I love you and that’s forever And this…
Another week has past since I posted “Our sacred journey” and there have been countless of private messages and questions, ranging from: “How dare you?” to “Congratulations, now tell me how I can get there.” Although in every conversation there is this dancing around the question: But are you having sex with others, outside of…
Yesterday was a bit of a coming out process for me. The minute after I hit the publish key on my blog post was filled with a sense of immense release and freedom followed by “Oh my god, what have I done?”. For a moment I thought maybe not so many people would read it…
So if you have been reading my blog for a while you know that over the last couple of years I have deconstructed my faith and the Christian tradition me and Hanna have belonged to. This has included deconstructing our sexuality and the institution of marriage. This has led to the transformation of our faith…
Continuing this trek exploring the masculine and feminine the time has come to look at the immature and mature feminine. First a caveat: I am not a woman so while it is entirely possible for me to be in my immature or mature feminine it is not how I am wired. Robert Bly writes that…
This post was originally posted in september 2012 and taken of the blog that same month as requested by the Salvation Army national leadership. I am now reposting it as it was an important step on the journey. This post in itself was an experiment in being open, authentic and vulnerable. The post pushed a…
If you, like me sometimes close down your heart. Either knowingly or unknowingly. You also need to open back up. Personally I think this becomes a daily spiritual practice of opening up and staying open. This can feel scary if you close down your heart because of heartbreak or other emotional trauma. Many people once…
I posted a short update to Facebook a few days ago that was accused of being to new agey. Why? Because instead of thanking god for what is happening in my life right now I said: isn’t it great when the universe conspires to give you your deepest desire. Have I started worshipping the universe?…
In recent conversations the topic of pleasure has come up time and time again. It seems that from a Christian point of view we are as a community ambivalent about god’s view on pleasure. It seems that somewhere deep down we do believe that although god is good and want good things for us, we…
An unnamed ancient eastern mystic have penned that you “…should always stay at the beginning”. The beginning of a new relationship is sweet and filled with endorphin induced bliss. Equally when we first meet/fall in love with Jesus we are equally blissed out. All our attention is on this new found love, we breathe it,…
After years of deconstructing both my worldview, my faith, my theology, my sexuality and every other aspect of my faith I have come to this conclusion (among many others to be sure), marriage is meaningless. Marriage has meant many different things in many different times and many different cultures. Most of the time marriage has…
Not so long ago I sat in a room with a group of young Christians, no longer teenagers but rather young adults. We where talking about the bible and Jesus. Was it possible that Jesus could have sinned and what does it mean that Jesus felt every human emotion, did he then lust? Masturbate? The…
There was this praise song on my favorite worship album, it always bugged me. “Take me, I am yours”, the woman sang with such throaty passion that it sounded almost sexual, indecent. I mentioned it once to a friend who told me, it’s just your perverted mind that hears it like that. I never broach…
Jesus is not good at just doing his job. At the wedding in Canaan he doesn’t just make a few bottles of wine, he miraculously produces 600 litres. When feeding the five thousand with a boys lunchbox he also goes the extra mile and there are 12 baskets of left overs afterwards. So I am…
The question is, do you know what you have lost? Have you like me settled for what is? Yesterday in the stress of coming home, getting ready, and (for me) getting ready for a trans-continental trip. Tempers flared as the kids acted up testing our patience and our love. After a long silence I found…
On Friday I took the girls to see Shrek – Forever after. The girls where excited about going to the movies and even more so how the glasses they where wearing would make Fiona come right into the movie theatre (3D is a marvellous thing) The movie starts with this beautiful family day and Fiona…