Who is Spectrum?

Spectrum Staff | January 12, 2012

We live in Africa. We live in Australia. We live in Lincoln, Nebraska.

We are seminary students. We are lawyers. We are Sabbath School teachers. We work at the General Conference. We’re out of a job. We’re retired. We’re looking for a post-doc position.

We run from the church. We run the church.

We are all the 99% Wall Street occupiers. And some Tea Party members, too.

We love the church. We left the church. We love to talk about the church. We defend institutions. We love the people.

We are the readers of Spectrum, the Spectrumites as some like to call us. We are the several hundred thousand unique visitors who came to the web site in 2011, and 35% of us are new to the site.

Seeing that the Sabbath School lesson is about the Trinity, we let everyone know we don’t believe in the Trinity. Or we say anyone who disbelieves in the Trinity is a heretic. Either way, if we teach the lesson, and it’s Friday night, we go directly to the Sabbath School commentary: Can it provide an idea about where to take the discussion?

We love the blog, but hate the rancor in the comments. We love the comments and can’t wait to read what the regulars have to say. We wish that they would pipe down a little. We miss the ability to vote a comment up or down. We can’t read the comments anymore, it just gets us too upset.

Can’t we just have a cordial exchange between educated people with well-thought-out opinions? Can just anybody join the conversation? Why do we let people continue to comment when all they want to do is to tear down the site? Or, tear down the church? Or, tear down each other?

We’re erudite, gracious, bombastic, sarcastic, diplomatic, wrong-headed, right-minded, critical, enthusiastic community members.

We love each other. We tolerate each other. We have to keep talking to each other.

We want to believe that they will know us by our love. Or, is it by our honesty?

We thank each and every one of you for being part of Spectrum. Let’s all reach for our higher selves and take the conversation to new heights of cordiality and grace in 2012.

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I had a dream last night, a dream of General Conference Sessions past and future. I stood in the center of a stadium, packed with people, all captivated by the music and stagecraft in front of them. I looked around and felt a sadness that kept growing inside of me until it was overwhelming.

Religion Can Be Fun

Spectrum Staff | October 22, 2015 | Post Archives

Some time ago I was sitting in what quite possibly was the most boring church service I have ever been in. (No, I won’t tell you where I was.) There couldn’t have been more than 50 people in the sanctuary, and I’m being generous. We sang no less than 5 hymns. All hymns were sung in a dry, slow manner. The sermon seemed uninspired, barely prepared, and was presented with no sense of conviction. It felt like we were in church for three hours. We were in church for about 70 minutes.