Elevating the Discourse with Eric Elnes

Down the Wormhole

Episode 84

In part 14 of our Sinai and Synapses interview series, we are talking with the Rev Dr Eric Elnes. He believes that we are in a sort of spiritual seismic shift that has not been experienced in 2,000 years, and is hopefully optimistic about the future of religion, spirituality, and humanity as we know it. We talk about weird new ways of doing church, what he learned from walking across the country, and what we can glean about God from the Higgs field. Make sure you don't miss this one!

The Rev Dr Eric Elnes is a biblical scholar, pastor, author, podcaster, and video producer. He is the founder and host of Darkwood Brew which has created and hosts more progressive Christian video resources than anyone else in the world. He is the newly settled pastor of First Congregational United Church of Christ in Portland Oregon and a leading articulator of Convergence Christianity. Find more at https://www.darkwoodbrew.org/

Support this podcast on Patreon at https://www.patreon.com/DowntheWormholepodcast

More information at https://www.downthewormhole.com/

produced by Zack Jackson
music by Zack Jackson and Barton Willis

Transcript

This transcript was automatically generated by www.otter.ai, and as such contains errors (especially when multiple people are talking). As the AI learns our voices, the transcripts will improve. We hope it is helpful even with the errors.

Zack Jackson 00:04

You are listening to the down the wormhole podcast exploring the strange and fascinating relationship between science and religion. This week we are exploring how that relationship gets worked out in real life with one of the current Sinai and Synapses, fellows, Sinai and Synapses is a two year fellowship committed to elevating the discourse surrounding religion and science and where the five of us first met. So without further ado,

Eric Elnes 01:17

Dozens and dozens, yes, but something that I think our listeners might be less familiar with, then even knowing that UCC pastor, is that phrase that I brought up convergence, Christianity, which I think is a term that they may not have heard, but a concept they have almost certainly felt or experienced in the world. So I wonder here if at the beginning, because I know, a lot of your work is colored by this concept and all that goes with it. So could you just take a minute here and unpack that a little bit for our listeners, you sure I can't. And what I'll say is kind of the tip of an iceberg. This goes way, way deep down the wormhole. So if I want to go talk about like how this is, I see this acting and other even other faiths, and beyond the little, you know, puddle of Christianity that we didn't have a habit, I'm happy to talk about that. But really, the whole idea of convergence came when I i and a bunch of progressive political progressive Christians, we walked across the country in 2006, to try to wave a flag say that you're helping people realize there are more than one way to be a Christian. And we had this platform called the Phoenix affirmations, which eventually kind of became kind of a theological backbone for a lot of progressive Christian churches. Kind of 12 points of affirmation about why what makes us excited to be for our faith outlook, we weren't bashing anybody. We're just trying to articulate things like, you know, we take the Bible seriously, but we don't read it literally. We don't. And we acknowledge there are other paths besides Christianity that are legitimate, even as we claim our own path, as Christians, you things like this in claiming environment, environmental responsibility, openness and affirmation of LGBT LGBTQ community things that you would or would not surprise you to find about progressive Christians. But we walked across the country thinking we were waving this banner, and we're going to lead the charge, or at least help help help lead the charge to a greater Christian witness in America, but in more generous spirit. And what we discovered was almost immediately our, our understanding of what was going on in our nation were completely wrong. Or at least at least needed to be significantly rethought because we kept running up and up into two kinds of people. One were people on the other side of the theological swimming pool than we are, you know, more of evangelical Christians who were as frustrated with their own camp as we were. And if he asked them, well, what are your hopes and dreams, they were looking for things like LGBTQ equality, they're looking forward, non literal Reading of the Bible, they're looking for not throwing everybody into hell who wasn't Christian. They're looking for the very things that progressive Christians stood for, really. But we also found from our own camp, progressive Christians who are having a huge problem with with our camp as well, but they weren't looking for a more conservative Jesus, for instance, they were just looking for Jesus, were so much progressive Christianity has basically said, and I very much count myself as a progressive Christian, but with so much progressive Christianity said, whatever, we think that the evangelicals have fundamentals of do badly, we won't do it all. So they do Jesus. Jesus, they do Bible badly, well, will, will not do the Bible. You have to do a prayer badly. We're not gonna talk about prayer and all these things, and there and there are people who are frustrated by that. It's like, I don't want to conserve Jesus. I don't want conservative prayer, but I want those things. I want these classic things, you know, and so and but so but we listen to those those what I would call people who are moving to be post evangelical progressives, and people were becoming you know, post liberal. All progressives. And so what they were looking for was actually found in the other side. So like those, those former evangelicals or becoming former evangelicals still had Jesus, and Bible and prayer only they had, they themselves have moved beyond the conservative, you know, layering of that. So they actually had a gift to bear to these post liberal progressives. And the post liberal progressives have gifts to bear before the post evangelical progressive, because they they were doing things like LGBTQ equality, and you know, pluralism and all these things. And we realized that you both camps, they've grown up to be suspicious one another. And both camps have no idea that the other camp exists. And so every year we asked ourselves, you know, have they found each other yet? Because we knew that if they didn't find each other, they would there just be like this heyday. It's like, Oh, my gosh, you got your chocolate in my peanut butter. I got my peanut butter, your chocolate. I was like, Wow, this is amazing. Yeah, it really felt like like, like, there were two groups of escaped slaves out in the wilderness that Moses, you know, was trying to wrangle together. And if they never get together, they would just like drop everything, the gifts they would that they brought out of Egypt that they could not bear to leave behind. They were the gifts that each other needed. And they could build a new tabernacle in the wilderness based on those gifts that come together as convergence. And so every year we asked ourselves did that, have they noticed each other? And every year? We had to say No, honestly, we'd like to say yes, but we know until this little festival happened in what year was that? About 20? About 2013 2012. In in, in North Carolina called the wild goose festival. And those people they just simply raised a flag saying, are you into spirituality, justice and the arts? If you are come, and what who the people who came were the exact people from those posts, you progressive post liberal progressives and post post evangelical progress they were they just came they they just came and they showed up and they discovered one another. And all what a party that was when they discovered one they're like, What? Wait, you come from an evangelical church? You're talking to this way? What you're coming from a liberal Tricia talking this way. Like, why, why, why why? This is so cool.

Zack Jackson 07:19

And even the performers too, and the speakers they seem Jennifer Knapp up there. That

Eric Elnes 07:24

was that was some special. Oh, she's awesome. Yeah, exactly. So in every year, it just, it's just built until finally other organizations started realizing this and, and I helped, you know, Cameron Trimble and Brian McLaren. We you put together something called the convergence network, just to try to make use of you know, to kind of bring that entity together. And eventually other organizations started to see this happening San Francisco Theological Seminary, you start start going on and made the Phoenix affirmations of primary working document for their cutting edge ministry, unit and, and Random House, even even Random House. They they'd actually been Reading stuff that was on the darker blue reps website. So you know, what, our marketing people have been Reading what you've been writing, and they're saying, This is exactly what we're saying to in our stats. And like, really, it was, yeah, yeah. What do you think's going on? Is it Well, I think it's might be called convergence, you know, and guess what they named their press. Convergence press. I hope you got a cut of that. And no, no, I didn't get a kind of a No, no, but but the point is, is is, is really that there is something going on that is statistically valid. But under the Trump era, it just kind of went all underground, and seemed like we took many steps backward. But I actually don't think we have in, in my Reading of US history, you know, as we're kind of talking about before the podcast began, if you really take a serious look at it, developments of the grassroots and religion tend to precede political developments by about 20 or 30 years, you think it's the opposite, because you look back and look at social developments that were held up by religion, but it really wasn't until the average Christian or person of faith kind of saw a new thing that suddenly there's a tidal wave change, and it works out. It's worse way out politically. And that happens with the abolitionist movement with women's suffrage with with a welcoming divorcees into the light in the mainstream life of society with racial justice all these LGBTQ cool quality even thought was gonna be the one exception to that but but even then, you could argue that it wasn't until the average even evangelical really kind of saw Wait a minute. Maybe God isn't condemning all these people to hell that suddenly there was this this massive SharePoint and we're still not there. You know, we're not start where we need to be. But there was a massive SharePoint, and that the reason why the Trump kind of era even happen is because some of these developments have sunk so deep into the fabric of human society now that the Old Dominion is reacting and is fighting For its life, there's so many developments that have happened to bring us together in this in not just religious convergences. I mean, convergence of faith and science convergence. You'll all have different religions even and not not like a super religion. But I mean, religions recognize the value of each other's pass into the diversity of faith pads actually makes us stronger rather than weaker. There's all kinds of convergences going on, right now that are leading to, I think, to some changes, so profound that literally, I mean, I'm willing to put it on on tape I years from now, I think we'll look back and say, what's happening now is significance as Jesus's own, you know, coming 2000 years ago, we're in a deep shift that, you know, philosophical talks about 500 years shifts that I think is just absolutely right on us, the tectonic shifts in society. They happen it's at least in western monotheistic society, which was the subject of her study, it tends to have a tectonic shift every five years, but then there's followed by season of like, extreme argumentation and violence until a new normal sets in, and I think that, you know, the last time this happened was, you know, the Renaissance than leading to the reformation, the big fight over what's real, and what, what Where's authority, you know, and what happened in the last century in, in western civilization, and really could argue throughout the world, but I'm just going to keep it from my area of expertise to makes the Renaissance look like child's play. I mean, literally makes the Renaissance look like child's play. I mean, in 1900, the first patent on record in the US Patent Office in New York City, was for a paperclip. And we ended the century literally cloning sheet. I mean, seriously. And then, of course, you think about your site, all the science, you would just geek out all day long about the scientific revolution took place in that century. But that's it was way beyond just the scientific. I mean, in 1900, there were 200 countries that legally had legalized slavery or forced labor in some kind. By 2017, that number was three, you know, in 1900 40%, of all children died by the time they were five years old. And now 4%. child mortality, in 1900 200 countries had the death penalty. And now there are under 90, in 1900, you know, only women had the right to vote and just one country in the entire world. Yeah, and now the numbers about 200 countries. And that's not even counting, like in 1851, we ordinating, the first woman, you know, and that's just been, you know, had a revolution. Since it was look at the history of, of the world. You know, that's just, you know, it's crazy the amount of progress we've made. You know, I mean, you just go on and on and on about this adult literacy. 1900 was 20% of the planet. Now it's 90% of the planet. Or 1900, those who lived into democracy accounted for 15% of the planet population. Now it's about 60% of the planet. And we just talked about LGBTQ equality, too. I mean, think about the revolutions happen. They're all these amazing competitors as yours. Yeah. Yeah. All these amazing convergences and, and all those those social changes did not happen in a vacuum. They're, they're real people who made them happen. People who gave her gave her a hoot about about the world. You know, just the fact that like Nicholas Kristof. He writes that article every year except for like, last year, he writes in why 2019 was the best year in human history. Why 2018 2017 2016? You know, the stats he brings out are just amazing. Like, in last decade, about 200,000 people per day emerged from extreme poverty. 200,000 people per day, 300,000 people over 3000 per day gained access to electricity. 300,000 per day gained access to clean drinking water, this is year after year, per day. In just 1919 alone, 650,000 people per day gained access to the internet. You know, so you're the the Renaissance looks nothing compared to this kind of revolution we are experiencing. And and so it also tells us like, okay, there's the tectonic shift is bigger, way bigger than the 500 year mark. I think I think we're, I think it's bigger than 1000 year mark, I think we're at about a 2000 year, kind of tectonic plate shift, which is also why we're in so much danger. Because every time the tectonic plate shifts, then the whole nature of authority and what's real just goes out the window and then there's a free, there's a free for all until there's a new consensus, you know, the only problem is is now that we've democratized the instruments of mass destruction and get increasingly artful the ways of killing each other every day. And now we got global climate change. Also, because twin threats, human, the human civilization has never experienced such an existential threat to its existence in all of human history as well. So if somehow we've got to jump the track of human history, we got to do it history doesn't expect in order to survive this kind of thresholds in time. So it's good news and kind of terrifying news. But to me, and I kind of go back and forth from year to year, which I think is, you know, which, which one is going to win out, you know, we're going to actually survive this or we're going to is it you know, are we truly kind of, in this Doomsday, kind of, like, civilizational collapse, I tend to aside with the former more than the latter and these days and, and have for the last few years actually been kind of went out of a deep funk about where this was headed. And think that actually we are building the capability to jump this track, not without pain, not without a certain amount of violence to be sure, probably our it's going to get a little harder before it gets better. But I think the pandemic actually has really provoked a lot of have is terrible and tragic, as has been, you know, I don't know hardly anybody who has not been touched in some significant way or had significant deaths occur or job loss and so forth. Some of the, the flexibility it's almost like been, it's it's low, it's been like a in Oregon, they have with snow as well, on any coast, they have what's known as a king tide, it's the it's when the the tides go way out, you know, and then and then any rocks that were under the water, you know, close to shore, that might be a danger, the boats, you know, are totally exposed. If now, if you knew what you're doing, you knew those rocks were there all the time. But But you can't Time goes out doesn't matter how much experience you have with the waters, you know, you see the rocks, and it seems like the pandemic has lowered the tide too. So we see the rocks that have been there for a long time that we should have dealt with a long time ago that we haven't, you know, racial justice, obviously, you know, is really showed us how how far behind we still are, you know, and and with respect to health, providing health care for all people about a living wage, we call these people frontline workers and we pay them, you're less than a living wage, seriously, you're all these these these rocks underneath the water, they've been really sinking a lot of boats. For so long. Now, we're all of society, if you have your eyes halfway open, you're seeing these things. You know, it's no wonder that Biden's suggesting this massive, you know, all these massive reforms, cost trillions of dollars, it's like, we finally have the political will to actually say, you know what, we better do something about this, while we still have the ability to do something about this. It's like, wow,

Zack Jackson 17:51

I love your spirit. I love the optimism in your voice at this podcast typically, typically goes somewhere in between the world is ending on Tuesday, and rainbows and unicorns are coming on Wednesday, where we're somewhere in between there, depending on who's on the show at the time. So I'm loving this energy, I'm feeding off of it. We're kind of hopefully, coming over a crest in the United States, in COVID. I mean, obviously, we look at the rest of the world. And we are nowhere near through this thing. But we're starting to feel a little bit better here. I know that some of our educational institutions are starting to go back to something that looks like normal, our churches and places of worship, or lots of them are starting to go back to something that looks like normal. You've talked to me a little bit off the podcast about how you're not sure you want to go back to normal, right? That there are some things that happened during this COVID time that that really stuck, that really exposed something that needed to be exposed and whether it's through technology or just rediscovering some of the essentials. What do you see what what has been made manifest that's good about this COVID time that you're gonna keep moving forward in this new church here a part of

Eric Elnes 19:09

sure I'm having another. Can I preface that with a quote by one of my favorite authors Arundhati Roy who wrote the the God of small things. This is just rocked my world and it really feeds into what you're, you're asking about. She wrote something about the pandemic. And she wrote this way. She said, What is this thing that has happened to us? It's a virus. Yes. In and of itself. It holds no moral brief, but it is definitely more than a virus. It has made the mighty Neil and brought the world to a halt like nothing else could. Our minds are still racing back and forth longing for a return to quote normality, trying to stitch our future to our past and refusing to acknowledge the rupture, but the rupture exists. And in the midst of this terrible despair, it offers us a chance to rethink the doomsday. machine we have built for ourselves, it offers us a chance to rethink the doomsday machine we have built for ourselves, nothing could be worse than to return to normality. Historically pandemics have forced human beings humans to break with the past and imagine their world anew. This one is no different. It is a portal, a gateway between one world and the next, we can choose to walk through it dragging the carcasses of our prejudice and hatred, our avarice, our data bank banks and dead ideas are dead rivers and smoky skies behind us. Or we can walk through lightly with little luggage, ready to imagine another world and ready to fight for it.

Zack Jackson 20:47

Man that'll preach.

Eric Elnes 20:49

Oh, wow. I've actually been using that quote like I've quoted it like five times in the last eight weeks.

Zack Jackson 20:58

I say that that author one more time for our listeners.

Eric Elnes 21:01

Oh, Arundhati Roy, she wrote the the God of small things is one of one of many great books she's written. Okay, thank you. Yeah. Indian author. Yeah. And so yeah, I really one of the one of the great awakenings that I personally he's I had in the pandemic was the glory of doing nothing.

Zack Jackson 21:25

Amen.

Eric Elnes 21:28

Nothing productive anyway. You know, I when the pandemic started, I was like the second person all of Omaha, Nebraska, I can't remember the habit. It was a souvenir I brought back from Spain before the Spain was on the hotlist and my carnation had just coincidentally had made this we had taken a little money to, to grow our church, we were on the try faith comments, were at a synagogue and a mosque and white churches all co located. This is my Omaha church, to move beyond interfaith dialogue into interfaith community. It's just super heady thing, you know, and, and we have taken somebody to then get the word out, hey, we're here, we're open come, and then some of the pandemic hits, and oh, how are we going to grow the church if we have no, we can't, can't even open our doors. And so we decided to, to use that money to buy time on television to broadcast our then electronic worship. And, and so for the first time, in my 25 years of ministry at the time, I literally had all my Sunday work was done by Friday at three because I had to have that worship stuff to the television station. So Sunday morning, my only commitment was literally to roll out of bed a little late to having slept in and make some sourdough pancakes for the family, turn on worship and watch it just be available to chat and then have the afternoon free and easy with my family or friends or if not too much friends in the pantry. But you know, and I realized that, you know, I've been a Sabbath follower, very diligent one for all of my adult life. But once I got into ministry, myself became Mondays because you work on Sunday. And so my wife was working my friends role work, my kids are in school. So I took Sabbath alone. But suddenly, I was take a Sabbath, like back in, like, when I was in seminary, where it's like I was with my families, like, this is like, Oh, I forgot about this, this is this is how it's meant to be, you're supposed to just have fun, and it's the play and pray and recreate and procreate if your character you know, just that's what you should be doing on the Sabbath, you know, and, and it really, for the progressive community that which I'm a part of, we get so fixated on healing the hurts of the world, what's wrong with the world, all the things that are broken with the world, that we're just always dog in that all day long? Every day, we're out there striving for social justice, and to make the world a better place. But we've forgotten that there needs to be at least one day where you fall back in love with the world. And you celebrate what's right with the world. And you don't do a freaking thing that to help anything other than just receipt you receive the world that day, rather than try to change the world. And I started realizing, you know, there's a reason why of the 10 most important thing God says the entire Bible known as the 10 commandments, keep the Sabbath holy in there just a few breaths away, but from do not murder. I mean, that's the level of importance that's placed on the Sabbath. And I realized that in my own community, we we are so activist and we get so angry about all of the things that are broken, that we assume there's no joy in us anymore. there and we're all in the know nothing is ever good enough. And we even begin to resent God or even doubt God, could he possibly exist because there's just so much broken. And it's like, if that's really your attitude, you really do need to check that you really do need to stop worrying. They'd go for a long walk in the forest, or sit beside a river for a day, you know, get out on the lake or do something out in nature, just to remind yourself of just how magnificent This world is, as well as broken up and messed up and, and stuff. But you got to connect to him once at least once a week just to you remember what you're fighting for, you know. And so yeah, post pandemic, I realized I want nothing to do with the church that supports everybody just working their tail off seven days a week, or and always being resentful about what's what's broken. I don't want to turn away from that. I mean, six days a week, we should be about that. We should be working at that at social justice and changing that hurts. But maybe my biggest responsibility as a minister is to help teach my own carnation how to do nothing at all. That's my biggest my biggest responsibility on Sunday is to actually help people understand you have a day, not just come to church for an hour, you know, and call your spirituality, you're done for the week. And for heaven's sakes, don't come to church to do more work. You know, but take a take a day, take some deep breaths, you know. And if you could find God in the mountains, you know better than you can find God in church, well, maybe we ought to change church to allow for that, you know, so one of the proposals you're trying to change is post pandemic, one of the proposals is literally for my carnation here in Portland, is that even when it's okay to get back together again, we're going to get back together on the second Sunday of the month. But every other Sunday, God bless if you want to go out in the mountains do that thing or but we'll we'll offer zoom worship, we'll do electronic worship. And and if you want help you be more intentional about finding God and mounts will provide you some helps, you know, there too, but you so go anywhere you want on Sunday, but make sure your butts in the Pew on the second Sunday, because we're really gonna have a good time of it. And we're going to pull out all the stops that we have special programming, special worship, the choir would have been rehearsing all month long for this, this one Sunday, and we're gonna have a potluck afterwards. By the way, that's going to make you the most foodie person to salivate. You know, we're going to invite people to bring their best stuff not pulled from KFC on the way in, pick up a bucket, you know, unless you're a bad cook, then please come through KFC and do that. But But if you have if you can bring a lot of food because we want not just to share it with others. But we have a lot of people who are homeless, we're right down Center City, in Portland, right downtown, we've got tons of homeless people all around. So once they find out there's a free meal they're going to want to come to and we're only going to invite them and say, Hey, come back next month and invite your friends too. So we want to have enough to send the homeless out with food as well and maybe actually start some relationships over you table fellowship with people too. But so that's that so that we actually help our whole congregation experience, Sabbath. I mean, some of our youngest families actually are some of the greatest supporters of this idea in our congregation, they're like, Oh, my God, because for us, it's like a heck of a lot of work to go to church. Like, we got three kids that are all complaining there, although they want different things all you got to get dressed all this and then you got to go. And you know, we start to follow the habit. And once you fall out of the habit, it's really hard to get back into the habit. But it's like you're talking about once a month, we could commit to that, you know, and and our young families are coming to worship more than they ever have, because they can turn on zoom, you know, on Sunday mornings, too. And the average congregation, not just young family, the average parishioner in my Parish, they live 30 to 40 minutes from our downtown church. And so there they've actually been getting to know each other better during the pandemic than they have in years and years. Because they're able to meet on zoom, they're able to after after worship, we have breakout rooms again and breakout rooms they talk about real stuff instead of just like what the weather is and how good the tea is. It fellas they're actually having real conversations with each other every week, and thriving when they get to know each other, you know, so it's interesting, who knows, in the two months from now you have me back on obviously, oh, yeah, that went disastrously rejected that. Whatever. But but but literally, the pandemic has allowed, even that thought to, to be seriously discussed.

Zack Jackson 29:21

So you something you said really stood out to me that taking taking that day to fall back in love with the world so that you're better equipped to then go go out and save it, like progressive superheroes that we all emphasis on the word think we are you there you go. So it It occurs to me that that is more than anything the value that science has given me personally. I'm thinking back to a conversation we had the beginning of the pandemic with Dr. Scott Samson was on the podcast before and he was talking about inspiring the love of the world into children so that those children grow up to care about the world? Yeah. Right. The environmental movement has to begin with loving the world and being, you know, being curious about this. And so for me, that's a lot of my link between my love of science, my love of God, my love of world, my people. It's, it's in that, yeah, Sinai and Synapses is a fellowship, elevating the discourse between science and religion. And so typically, the the fellows have some foot in, in both the one foot more heavily in one than the other. Where's your connection to the world of science? Where do you see yourself plugging in? And?

Eric Elnes 30:48

Yeah, well, I, before I became a had any notion of being a minister, I thought I was gonna be a solar energy research scientist. So I've always had a science has been, you know, very much in my blood. Of course, we've been talking about science this whole time, but really more like social science, you know, the ways your whole movements of people act over, you know, over time, but I can totally geek out on quantum physics, astrophysics, those kinds of things, too. And the climate change thing is, is a really, really a high importance piece of scientific scientific interest for me right now and sociological interest, I think, you know, we are in great danger. Right now, if we don't pay attention to the science on this and, and it's actually part of my enthusiasm for trying to reclaim Sabbath actually feeds very much directly into what I believe the science is telling us about climate change, that one of the best things we can do actually is actively train ourselves to disengage with a materialistic utilitarian, consumeristic society that we did we unplug from the the fantasy that we need to keep consuming every day of the week, in order to to be happy, that we can actually unplug from that system unplugged from the advertising unplugged from all of the, you know, the, our society gives us so many things to do all week long to keep us distracted from what's important. And the pandemic has taught us anything, it's like, once you stop, slow down from your 65 mile an hour lifestyle to a three mile an hour lifestyle, like a walking pace, you notice stuff that you never noticed before. And we need to we need to not just make that a pandemic reality, we need to make that a weekly reality to notice stuff. And, and to get involved in on those x, those six days a week, say, you know what, the Sabbath day, actually is more real than any of these other days, I want to bring that mentality into the rest of the week, as well that we're going to unplug from all this rampant consumerism, we're going to unplug from this overscheduling of our children and ourselves, you know, we're going to unplug from treating people as commodities. And, you know, and and basically stealing money from their pockets so that we can enrich ourselves by not paying people a living wage and things like this. So it to me the Sabbath, actually, and the cell science and climate change all these things in social justice, they all kind of converge in that way. There's, there's more than one kind of convergence going on. But I think what you know, but if you want more than the harder science stuff, you know, for this podcast, I think that, you know, one of the most intriguing concepts that I've heard in recent years is that what had happened when the Higgs boson field was was proven, then that that energy precedes matter, that it absolutely does, you know, to me, that was just a real sea change, you know, and an important watershed moment, at least in my own life, because, you know, if you were to then take the totally non scientific unprovable assumption that that energy is love, that precedes matter. Now, suddenly, you're looking back at those people known as Celtic Christians, that that exists in flower for so many centuries, that until they're finally put down by the Roman Church, their whole notion that, that that this entire plane of existence, we're on it that all of the creative world is literally the incarnation of God's love. It is literally like, do you want to know what God's love looks like? Tastes like feels like smells like go take a walk in the forest. Go get on the lake, go next. You know, get out in nature, and that and you'll see it you'll smell God's love. You'll hear God's love, you'll feel it. This is what it looks like it's in. It's the incarnation of love. And that feeds them back into my scientific the scientific piece like why every Christian should be like, madly in love with science. Because Science in looking at the net, the created world is really dissecting the way love works. You know, the way love operates, and, and challenges some of our notions of love, you know, to, you know, you can use a piece of steel to make a surgical scalpel to heal somebody or to make a knife that will stab somebody, you know, but it's both using something that is theoretically then a create an incarnation of love. Right? So what does that say? It doesn't say that stabbing somebody is loving, it means that that love has an incredible vulnerability to it. That can actually release its own need for control of you. Because for its own reasons, and love has its own its reasons. But that you run into that you start to reconsider your notions of God even that the God is so gentle with us, you know, it's not the God of, of wrath that the guy you get out of line and you know, one millimeter and suddenly like, you know, this fire and brimstone coming at you but a God that is actually gentle enough to do what Jesus says God does, which is You're the son May God makes God's sunshine on the on the righteous and the wicked, you know, in the rain to fall, that actually we are the every person is so utterly blessed by this creation. And there's no morality test given to give you these blessings, as the Talmud says, The Talmud talks about how even a stolen seed bears fruit. Like, literally, you can steal seeds, like something that's totally immoral. And yet those seeds are still going to grow if you plant them in the ground. You know, there's, there's, there's a vulnerability to love. That is just absolutely astonishing. And I think we can all learn, you all learn from we keep thinking we can only give good gifts to people if they deserve it. You know, and if they're at least a little like it by dessert when they're a little bit like us, or at least a little bit like us,

Zack Jackson 37:16

or if they're broken, they're at least broken in the same ways.

Eric Elnes 37:19

Yeah, yeah, exactly. Yeah. But that doesn't seem to be on the agenda of the sacred order of things. And you know, and maybe Jesus was right, and not just naive when he said, you know, love your enemies, do good to those who hate you pray for those who persecute you, all those things that we just think, you know, like we give lip service to, and when we think but when push comes to shove, we say, Well, he's just a naive idealist. Well, now that we've democratized the incidence of mass destruction, is he such a idealist? Or is he a realist? You know, we need to get about that. That vulnerability, that robust rowboat build ability that is willing to gift people who even we, we made, who makes us profoundly uncomfortable, and keep gifting them and keep loving and out love our enemies. Because this whole world is the incarnation of, of love, energy proceeds matter. And we then in a flowing with the material and the spiritual order of things.

Zack Jackson 38:23

So here, as we as we near the end of our time together, you have created dozens of videos, probably hundreds of sermons, maybe 1000s of sermons at this point. Dozens of podcasts for books, I believe. you've walked across the country you've shared at events, you have a lot of important things to say. But I am asking every fellow the same question at the end, which I think is probably harder for someone who has a lot to say to answer. But just if you What is one thing, one thing that you wish that everyone knew about the world,

Eric Elnes 39:23

that the world is an incarnation of a love that loves you personally, personally, beyond your wildest imagination, that everything in this world is oriented toward you, your neighbor, and also other creations and the nonhuman world as well, but it exists in a state that is created out of love. And when you begin to treat it that way, you start to see it that you start to see that more much more clearly. And the more you Pay attention to that reality, the more that reality reveals itself to you, then you don't have to believe in God, I don't think even to benefit from that set that orientation. It's not a it's not a, there's not necessity there just so you pay attention and you start to treat it as if it is, it is a love. That is, I think nature has consciousness. It's our consciousness. But if nature is truly an incarnation of love, then Love is a relational thing. It's not you can't say 12 ounces of love. Right? So all of all creation is inherently relational. We know that if you take humans out, it's inherently relationship, right? So add us back in the equation we're inherently in relationship to and you start to flow without love, you start to flow with creation when you flow with love.

Zack Jackson 40:56

Well, thank you so much for that. Thank you for this past 45 minutes or so of conversation. If our listeners are interested in hearing more about what you have to say, they can check out any of your books, I actually just purchased gifts of the dark wood seven blessings for soulful skeptics and other wanderers. I just the description alone felt like hey, he wrote a book for me, that's great. You can also check out dark wood brew.org dark wood brew.org to check out the videos that they're produced. And there's some more links and information about how to find the podcast, and all kinds of other things that you're doing. there anything else that you would like to let folks know about how they can find you? Or? I think you've done a great job already. More than they need to know about me. No address or cell phone number.

Eric Elnes 41:53

No, but if you're ever in Portland, first Congregational Church of Christ, come come. Well. We are at least get online. You will Yes, physically now.

Zack Jackson 42:02

Maybe the second Sunday. If you're there. There we go. Come to the second Sunday. Bring some KFC and have a good time. All right. Well, thank you so much, Eric. Thank you, sir. It's been a