1 Corinthians 13

Jim Wallis 5-06-2015

(Ollyy / Shutterstock)

ONE OF MY favorite descriptions for the people of God, what the New Testament calls the “body of Christ,” is the evocative language of “the beloved community” used by Martin Luther King Jr. during the civil rights movement.

beloved community is a powerful vision of a new coming together, a new community that welcomes all peoples in their diverse ethnicities and nationalities. Everygroup, clan, and tribe is included and invited in. That dream and vision undergirded King’s movement for civil and voting rights, both spiritually and philosophically, and deeply reflected his own underlying moral belief and hope as a Christian minister.

Yet in one of his most famous quotations, King also said this: “I am ashamed and appalled at the fact that 11 o’clock on Sunday morning is the most segregated hour in Christian America.” He said this in 1953, while he was still associate pastor at his father’s Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta. But obviously, and most painfully, that quote is still true today.

Troy Jackson 8-05-2010
"I'm against you guys." A middle-aged man from Cincinnati proudly wearing an American flag on his T-shirt defiantly uttered these words to me a few weeks ago in Columbus, Ohio.
Nadia Bolz-Weber 2-10-2010

This week my friend Sara reminded me that the really amazing thing about 1 Corinthians 13 is that even hundreds of thousands of schlocky wedding and inspirational posters and bad Christian coffee mugs can't kill it. Paul's hymn to love is perhaps one of the most recognizable texts in the New Testament. And it is really beautiful

Cathleen Falsani 1-22-2009
President Obama's inaugural address might not have been one for the ages.

But it certainly was the right one for the moment.

Joan Bisset 1-19-2009
What a moment it was on Saturday at the War Memorial Plaza in Baltimore as President-elect Barack Obama heard a woman shouting in the crowd, "We love you, Obama!" and he answered, "I love you back.