Listener Question Edition

Summary

In our first Listener Questions Edition, Bishop DeDe and Adam take on only listener submitted questions about our spiritual lives. The questions range from the importance of discussing faith openly, the nuances of Bible translations, the impact of guilt and shame on one's spiritual journey, and how to reconcile the teachings of the Old and New Testaments. This episode is a totally off-the-cuff discussion with Bishop DeDe where she doesn't know the questions in advance, and you get real answers about the need for curiosity, humility, and grace in understanding and practicing faith.

Takeaways

• We need to practice speaking about our faith.
• Curiosity and humility are essential in faith discussions.
• Different Bible translations serve different purposes.
• Guilt and shame can hinder our relationship with God.
• God's grace is more important than our sinfulness.
• Sin is a communal experience, not just individual.
• The liturgy invites us into a transformative experience.
• It takes time to heal from past experiences with faith.
• Understanding scripture requires humility and prayer.
• God's love is constant and unconditional.

Chapters

00:00 Introduction

01:54 Understanding Bible Translations

07:20 Navigating Guilt and Shame in Faith

12:58 Reframing Sin and Liturgy

18:08 Reconciling the Old and New Testament

AI Disclosure: To support our staff in their limited time, many of our episode summaries are first generated by AI and then edited by the Communications Director to accurately reflect and preview our podcast episodes.

Transcript

Bishop DeDe (00:02.253)

Hey friends, welcome to the podcast. My name is DeDe Duncan-Probe. I am the Episcopal Bishop of Central New York, Canada to Pennsylvania, Utica to Elmira, that entire geographical area. And I'm joined by Adam Eichelberger. He is our Director of Communications. And we're gonna do something new today. Every time on this podcast, our conversation, our topic is speaking of faith. How do we talk about our faith?

How do we bring our faith to life in our lives? How does our belief in Jesus or our belief in God, if that is more your faith, how does that translate into how we live and how we talk with one another? To practice speaking, because so many of us have lost that ability or feel intimidated in this time, not to talk about our faith because out of fear or other things.

This is to be an empowering, encouraging podcast. And I am so glad today that we're going to do something a little different because y'all have been learning to speak of your faith and ask questions and be curious. yes, I think curiosity and humility need to make a comeback. And so I'm so glad that on this podcast, you are already there. We have received a number of listener questions. And so today's topic is going to be listener question day.

We're going to, we're going to respond and speak together about the questions you may have. I encourage you, a listener, as you hear this podcast, if there are new questions or refinements or things you'd like to talk about, send those questions in. We love hearing from you. And I'm so glad that this is a conversation between us as we practice speaking our faith. So Adam, what questions do we have today? And little heads up.

We decided to do this the hard way. I have no idea what the questions are. So together we are going to live figure this out. So what are the questions we have, Adam?

Adam Eichelberger (02:01.773)

Yes.

Adam Eichelberger (02:06.478)

Yes. Yes, very inside baseball listeners, but Bishop DeDe has not had any previous knowledge of anything I'm about to ask her. So first of all, listeners, thank you for continuing to submit your questions. Some of you come in with like really quick ones that we've featured on the podcast before, but these listeners are ones that I picked out their questions because they are longer in form and maybe require a little bit longer conversation. So I'm going to start with the first one. We'll start with kind of a little bit of a softball.

Bishop this one came from a listener who did not leave a name they listed as anonymous and they wanted to know I Know it was mentioned in one of the podcasts about different versions of the Bible used I Have been using the new King James Version since becoming an Episcopalian and they said they stumbled across this version at the start and didn't know about any other versions I was wondering what version is used more and if there is a preference on what is used

I know that there are many versions out there and everyone seems to have a favorite. I was just wondering if you could talk about this and elaborate on it. So Bishop DeDe, our listener anonymous, uses a New King James version and they want to know about what is maybe the preferred translation that we use in the Episcopal Church and maybe what you recommend. What would be best for somebody getting into the Bible?

Bishop DeDe (03:27.705)

Wow, this is a great question. We could actually do an entire episode podcast on it because it really, you you have publishers and then they hire theologians and then these translations, transliterations come from points of view. And so there's a whole thing here. But I'm going to try to narrow that down and talk just really more in the Episcopal Church, the new revised standard version.

Adam Eichelberger (03:33.326)

Exactly.

Bishop DeDe (03:57.695)

is kind of the most often used in a service. It's the one that we often go to. Some churches will use the Common English Bible. That is also one that is utilized. The New King James is one with which I have a lot of familiarity. I remember when it came out and I read it and I worked with it. A lot of this comes down to the theologians and the publishing company, what their perspective.

was or is and how they were working with it. The New Jerusalem Bible, you just have lots of options. so depending on where you are in your faith journey, the New King James is just fine. The New Revised Standard Version is really a good standard bearer. At issue here, in case it's

sounds like these are all just about political or partisan perspectives, which they can enter into. The New International Version, for instance, is more often used in conservative or churches, not in nominational churches, often really read the New International Version more. What's at issue here is that the language of the Bible is Koine Greek in most of it.

In fact, the Septuagint, there's, again, there's a whole, whole history here. But the...

Koine Greek, much like English, was a tonal language. There's things that we do know about it. And the fact that it only existed for about 250 years, it's not a contemporary language. And so when we read passages in the original text, and depending on which text you're reading, there are different ways to translate different words. And so much like if I said, I'm gonna go outside.

Bishop DeDe (06:01.833)

or if I said, I'm gonna go outside, or I'm gonna go outside, those we know have different meanings. It be mad, it may be upset, it may be going out. There are places in scripture where we're not exactly sure, similarly, what's being talked about. Also, just know that in Koine Greek, there wasn't punctuation. So try to imagine, and you can do this, used to be something we would do in youth groups, is have a text without punctuation.

and then try to transcribe it and then read it back. Or the game of telephone, if you will. Getting to the truth of scripture is not a linear, binary, and I'm borrowing that term with grace, process. It is something that where we try to use our best understanding of the context around the passage to come to an understanding of the meaning. So with our translations with the New Revised Standard Version,

with a new international version, with the common English Bible, the scholars who worked on those biblical transliterations, translations, have brought to that work their understanding of how the words and phrases and context may best be transliterated. There's a lot of detail with that. may invite, I actually have a good friend, shout out to Dr. Deirdre Good, who's a wonderful biblical scholar and a dear friend.

We might have her on the podcast and she can talk to us much more efficiently than I have. For your purposes though, new King James version is fine. The new Revised Standard Version is probably what you'll hear most in most Episcopal churches. And then the Common English Bible is also in there.

Adam Eichelberger (07:50.456)

There we go. And so again, this is like you said, Bishop DeDe, we have plenty of voices that could chime in on this and we'll probably actually have to do a little bit more of a Bible deep dive in a later episode.

Bishop DeDe (07:59.341)

Yes, I'd love to. It's a really essential, important thing because often people will say, well, the Bible says this. Well, that's a little bit more concrete than it really is. We come to the Bible with faith, hearing the Word of God that's spoken to us and washes over us. So let's do have a deeper dive with that.

Adam Eichelberger (08:08.046)

Mm-hmm.

Adam Eichelberger (08:24.142)

Absolutely. So we have two questions that were both submitted by a listener named Anthony, and we're going to start off with this first one. Anthony writes, Bishop DeDe, I was raised Roman Catholic and had been away from the church for almost 30 years. I came back to the church last year and after about eight months, I got disillusioned by all of the, and Anthony uses air quotes, manmade aspects of the Roman Catholic Church.

I have recently been attending my local Episcopal Church, St. James in Hendersonville, North Carolina. So hello, Hendersonville, North Carolina. How are you?

Bishop DeDe (08:58.305)

Hey, Anthony. Hey, North Carolina. Yep.

Adam Eichelberger (09:01.462)

So they said, struggle so much with guilt related to sin to the point that it was and is debilitating and has made me question everything. I know you've touched on this before on the podcast, but I'm curious if you have advice for someone like me coming from a guilt centered form of worship and how to maintain a strong relationship with Jesus as a sinner, not becoming consumed by fear, anxiety and guilt that comes with human life. So this is a big one.

Bishop, what do have for Anthony?

Bishop DeDe (09:30.317)

Well, and a wonderful question, Anthony, and I think so many of us and listener, you may be able to really relate to and understand Anthony's question. I invite you to think about how you might respond. How would you speak to Anthony's question? Anthony, there was a point in my life, because I too was raised with a lot of guilt and shame around repent, you know, we need to repent because you're bad and God doesn't, you know, God wants you to be different. So you're lovable and a lot of, I think,

I want to believe unintended consequences, but nonetheless, it was very rigid upbringing. And at some point in my life, I realized that that is that guilt is kind of manmade as a coercive and to subjugate and manipulate people because God sent Jesus to die for our sins so that we can be made whole and live free redeemed lives.

So no matter what we believe about a lot of things in our lives, we can look at the gospel of Jesus Christ and hear and see and know that the passion of Jesus happens as a response to our sinfulness that we may be forgiven and made whole. At the point in which we acknowledge this, I think God is far less concerned with our sinfulness than we are.

God is not surprised that we're sinners saved by grace. That is the move of God, is to invite us into salvation. And if we take this gift of God and say, great, I'm forgiven so I can do whatever I want to, that inherent part of our gospel is incarnation, that God's truth is embodied. So if I continue to be hateful or all the things,

in my life, it will keep me from the salvation of Jesus. There's not because of you know, hell and those things, but I am only redeemed so far as I am willing to allow God's grace to move in my life. And so to receive God's grace and accept it is to then commit myself to something bigger and something that's very focused on the gospel of Jesus Christ. So guilt and shame

Bishop DeDe (11:54.957)

have no sway then because what's compelling to us is we want to live for Jesus. It becomes proactive, not reactive. And so the work that we all need to do in our inner lives is to move away from toxic shame because that isn't God's intent. And to move away from this punitive, angry, sinners in the hand of an angry God theology. And to receive the free gift of God as is said in scripture,

to receive this gift that we may be made new, that how we are is transformed by love, that we become love, that we love because God first loved us, that we change our lives because God cares for us so deeply. So instead of that coercive, soul-tarnishing guilt, to give it to God and receive that forgiveness and know that God loves you beyond measure.

and God is at work in you refining and purifying you. And yes, when we're wrong to repent, to change our minds and say, okay, I've been pretty selfish and I've been sort of hard-hearted and I'm lying all the time, I need to change my mind. I need to turn to God's ways and then to receive the free gift of God's grace and mercy in our own lives. Often our own shame is what convicts us.

And we're busy shaming ourselves. And so it may take counseling, it may take some therapy, it may take some real work in our inner life, but to receive the grace of God and know that God loved while we were yet sinners, God's grace comes to us. While we were yet unknown and did not know God, God loved us. And then to allow that love to change us and make us new. So to lay it down,

and be released from it and let the truth truly set you free. That's the call, Anthony.

Adam Eichelberger (13:57.75)

Hmm. Absolutely. And Anthony has another one that we're going to come back to after this one. This one's from Chris. Chris is local to our central New York area from Syracuse. And it's a similar question, but there's a there's something at the end. I really think it's really good for not just maybe for Chris, but for all of us to consider. Chris says, Hi, Bishop DeDe. I am really enjoying your podcast and the deep discussions on faith and life. I would like to grow closer to God, to the God you describe and to the Episcopal Church.

It seems like a good place to do that. However, most of my previous encounters, much like Anthony's with Christianity, were of the turn or burn variety. And some of the words and concepts in the liturgy, like sin, hell, or even Christ, come with baggage. Here's the kicker right here. Any suggestions on how I can leave that baggage at the church door and participate more fully in the Sunday services? Thanks. And then, PS, I also love all the dirty stuff. Keep it coming. So, Chris.

Bishop DeDe (14:35.075)

Mm-hmm.

Bishop DeDe (14:56.217)

Thank you, Chris. I'm so glad you asked this question. I'm really, the point of this podcast is to be useful. And so I'm really happy that it's engaged and been helpful.

Adam Eichelberger (14:56.738)

Thank you.

Bishop DeDe (15:12.385)

Yes, so much has been used to harm people, whether this issue of sin. It may be helpful to do some reading and some study around what sinfulness actually is. We have such an individualized theology sometimes. We don't realize where it's sort of like your own sin. And we don't realize that with Jesus, this is communal, that sin is the

water we swim in. And so we are selfish or hateful or dehumanizing or, you know, all the things is this is in, in this world. Greed is good. Hate is, you know, revenge is sweet. All of these sayings are sinful. Greed is one of those seven things God hates. If we look at scripture, greed is not good. Greed harms, greed corrupts.

Revenge is not sweet, it corrupts, it harms us. And so, first of all, to see sin as not solely focused on how we act from moment to moment, but rather the state in which we live, the state of the human species. And then to see the repentance as we're part of changing our mind, we're part of turning to God's ways that we may be made.

whole. And so for each of us, when we come into the church, to listen to the prayers of the people, one of the things I shared just recently that I love is listening to the people praying and being quiet and letting it sort of wash over you, to hear that all of us are here together to seek a new way. And when in the liturgy it says sin, to allow ourselves to

to rehear those words with an invitation to God's mercy. And with Jesus, often people are triggered by Jesus because there's so much verbiage about it being a harsh judgment against rather than in scripture an invitation into love. So there's an inner work that we all have to do when we've been harmed and been taught

Bishop DeDe (17:40.033)

and it's been drilled into us a certain way to then go in and feel how bad that feels and to recognize it, to work with a counselor or a pastor or, and in our nomenclature, a priest to talk with a priest and say, I need help in tuning my ear to a different way of hearing these words. I want to understand the liturgy. There's a path in the Episcopal Church, one of the things I love, and again, Adam's taking notes for this.

We should do a podcast on our Eucharistic prayers and the differences between them and what they're doing. But the liturgy takes us on a journey. We come into the church, we're welcomed, we talk about God's glory and mercy, or Lord have mercy, Christ have mercy during Lent. And then we hear about the, we say a prayer, center the day, we read stories of scripture, and then we hear those talked about in the sermon. And then we come together around this altar in the peace.

And then we hear about God's salvation and invitation to us to be part of this eternal hymnody of love. And then we're sent out with renewed by the Eucharist together to share that message with the world. So the whole service is meant to invite us in to being transformed by the love of God and prepared to be sent out. So whatever harm, Chris, you may have experienced in the church, it will take time.

It will take time to hear, it will take time to hear the words differently, but with attention and with healing, and especially with new experiences of those words being said with different inflection, you will find yourself going through a process of those things falling away and the love of God coming more to the fore. Not every Episcopal church is perfect. We have our, you know, issues too.

But our intent as a body is to worship together, to repent, to apologize and renew and be sent out more whole as a community of faith.

Adam Eichelberger (19:51.394)

really good. And Chris, that's a great question and something that we all need to be mindful of. know, like how do we let go of our baggage when we come to the church? Because sometimes I'll speak for myself. I bring my baggage into church with me on Sundays sometimes. And it's good for me to be able to walk that line of like, sometimes I need to leave it here and let it go. But also for me, feeling free to bring in my baggage and know that Jesus is okay with my baggage. And so is the church.

Bishop DeDe (19:55.393)

Mm-hmm. Yep.

Bishop DeDe (20:16.845)

That's right. That's right. We're all called into the healing, redeeming work of God. Rome wasn't built in a day, but it's just steps. We start with one place and we just know that it's going to get better and together we can heal.

Adam Eichelberger (20:26.211)

Yep.

Adam Eichelberger (20:32.384)

Mm-hmm. All right, we got one last one. This is going back to North Carolina, back to Anthony, because Anthony had a second question and I wanted to get to that too. Bishop DeDe, I struggle with reconciling. The difference is in biblical law between Old and New Testament. I know the coming of Christ rescinded.

Many of the old observances like burnt offerings, keeping kosher, but where's the line? Much of Deuteronomy is troubling to a modern mindset, capturing and keeping female slaves and taking them as wives. Loss of inheritance, Sabbath adherences. Some aspects we still keep, but others we don't.

Again, where's the line? How do we or how do I reconcile the things that were law but now seem outdated and even barbaric to us now?

Bishop DeDe (21:26.765)

Well, Anthony, this is a great, great question. And for listeners, I encourage you to really ponder with Anthony as we think about this together and how you might answer this. You know, Anthony, I think of Jesus saying that, you know, I've come not to abolish the law, but to, you know, to fulfill it. And that the Scriptures are worthy of reproof and correction. That...

Adam Eichelberger (21:28.61)

Hahaha.

Bishop DeDe (21:53.689)

the work that God is doing in us is not a static event. In those scriptures, it's important to recognize, whether it's Deuteronomy or Genesis, that the scriptures were written at a time in a place that's pre-Copernican. And I bring this up because before Copernicus, truth was much more diffuse and understood in a different way in many ways.

We tend to think of truth as it's whatever time it is, we're standing at this corner. We tend to look, post-Kopernican, at truth as fact. What can we prove? What do we know? What do we have hold of? What do we have power over? Truth becomes kind of something that we believe we can understand.

pre-Capernaum, there was not a real assumption that we would understand anything. know, the rains come, the winds blow, but we don't know where they come from. The humility and ecclesiastes or ecclesiastes, any of the Hebrew scriptures, that there's an invitation to recognize God is at work and we do not know. And so when we start with that humility of unknowing, and then we look at the Deuteronomy.

and understand that at that time, these were things that were talked about. But then to go behind those a bit, there are many ways to read scripture. And even the Antiochians and the Alexandrians, really, just, know, Chris will be happy, super nerdy. But back in the day, you know, how we read scripture has always been at debate. And whether you're talking

Adam Eichelberger (23:41.388)

Hahaha!

Bishop DeDe (23:49.825)

you know, early, early church fathers or this last week, for some they want to look at, as the entire Kings did at scripture as literal, linear, verifiable truth. And some like the Alexandrians want to look at the metaphor, the understanding, the wider, the more expansive ways of contemplating a God who is bigger than us, who knows more than us.

And so I don't know that I could say where the line is. I think that's a little bit more anti-Achene than I am because I understand that God is at work. And I assume I'm not gonna totally understand God. And I assume this by very common things like, why are french fries unhealthy and celery isn't? I mean, really, if I were God, I would reverse that. But God and God's wisdom.

has created this world. And so we know that when we forgive one another, we're better. We know that when we speak the truth, that sets us free. We can experience that revenge corrupts us. We can experience that when we judge another person, there's the log in our own eye. We can experience these things because those are eternal truths that are not necessarily meant to be specific to an actual spec.

and an actual log, that they're not about the facts, they're about eternal truth. So as you read scripture and as you're engaging with Jesus coming and fulfilling the law, to allow it to wash over you, we understand by the power of the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit gives us understanding. So to pray before we read scripture, to come to scripture as a prayer,

to engage with it with a realization that God is at work in us and to come to it with humility that we may not know. We by faith may just have to accept we'll never know. But what we can know with certainty is God's love, but we can know with a complete understanding is that Jesus is our Lord, the Son of God, that we.

Bishop DeDe (26:11.831)

don't have to be able to prove what we believe when we know it to be true. And that truth is in the experience of it. So when we're dehumanizing another, some part of that dehumanizes ourself. And I would say that is where the line is, is when what we're doing draws us more closely to God and builds holiness and nurture in our lives.

Great questions, Anthony. Let's keep the conversation going. And now that we've talked today, I'm gonna hand this over to you listener and say, it's your turn to go and to talk with others about what we've discussed here, to bring your questions and talk with us about those questions and to share in the conversation as we continue to proclaim this never ending hymn of God's love that redeems, heals, renews, restores, empowers and calls us forward.

that like John the Baptist, we will proclaim the love of Jesus to a world that is hurting. So may you be blessed and be a blessing. Know that you are loved beyond measure and welcome to the conversation. I look forward to speaking soon.