Welcome to Liberating Lectionary

I am convinced that the Gospel of Thomas, and other non-canonical texts from the first two centuries of the Christ Movement  can help us re-engage with the spirit of Jesus.  This blog will seek to connect these texts to a worship life focused in the Revised Common Lectionary.

This project grows out of study with Hal Taussig and friends using as a textbook A New New Testament: : A Bible for the 21st Century Combining Traditional and Newly Discovered Texts, (ANNT) conceived and edited by Dr. Taussig. He brought together a team of scholars to select non-canonical texts that can illuminate the world of early Christianity when read alongside the Christian Bible.

Since our New Testament did not exist for at least the first three hundred, if not five hundred, years after Jesus, the "other" texts that didn't make the cut existed alongside our familiar "Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Acts..." etc.

As Taussig says, "The assumption that the existing New Testament was always the privileged authorized book about Jesus is not true."

There are many online resources to open up these texts, assembled from a variety of perspectives. Some possible places to explore further would include:

http://www.ftsr.ulaval.ca/fileadmin/theo/fichiers/recherche/activites/evenements/nag-hammadi-70-ans-programme-ftsr.pdf (International colloquium: Nag Hammadi at 70: What Have We Learned? Agenda for an event this past summer. Papers are scheduled to appear in print in 2019. http://www.peeters-leuven.be/boekoverz.asp?nr=10672)

http://www.theodesproject.com/read-the-odes// ("A legacy of worship passed down from the first believers. Now all the mystery and majesty of the Spirit-led vision has been re-voiced in The Odes Project.") After reading the odes, be sure to listen to the beautiful adaptations for singing in today's churches. Notice that all of the feminine imagery for God has been left out. So not quite "all the mystery and majesty...", but still remarkable!

http://gnosis.org/welcome.html ("The Gnosis Archive, a vast collection of primary texts and resources relating to Gnosticism and the Gnostic Tradition, both ancient and modern.") There you will find excerpts from the popular book which introduced me to this subject: The Gnostic Gospels by Elaine Pagels (http://www.gnosis.org/naghamm/Pagels-Gnostic-Gospels.html)

--Jack Lohr