Welcome, Jesus, to Our World

About the Book

WJTOW suggests that we might be better off paying less attention to Jesus’ Second Coming and more to his sense of irony and his outrage with religious bigotry. The questions people need to ask about this “man of Nazareth” have a lot to do with recognizing how different our world is from the one Jesus was born into and understood so intimately. It’s probably true that the 21st century world, with all of its problems and troubles, is a much better world than the first century middle east that Jesus knew, and we shouldn’t be ashamed to come to Jesus with all this package of Darwin and Einstein, Hubble telescopes and Mars landers, medical miracles and quantum physics. Our modern souls are, after all, all we have to give to him.

This book looks at a handful of questions that thoughtful Christians have raised with the author (and a couple of his own) in more than 50 years in serving parishes in the US and Canada. The author takes a common sense approach to these issues and assumes that Jesus knew what he has talking about. Moreover, it still makes sense even in a modern, space-age setting.

About the Author

After half a century in the parish ministry Brewster Willcox has decided to “come clean” with some questions that thoughtful members in adult study groups and Confirmation classes have raised about the “God-man” that Christianity brings to the dialogue of world religions. He has spent his life wrestling with this Jesus Christ, and now he wants to reveal his battle wounds.

Along with the rest of us, Brewster hates abusive dictators and terrorists, natural disasters and the occasional idiot that clutters up our landscape. But he just can’t stop loving this world he has been born into and has lived his life appreciating. He believes Jesus loves this 21st century world as he does.

Brewster lives, in retirement, in Muskegon, Michigan; but family and friends take him to Arizona, Connecticut, Washington, D. C. and Canada; and curiosity has taken him farther afield to Moscow, Prague, and Tetouan, Morocco. But he always loves coming home to Michigan and a cozy cottage on Crystal Lake and to the friends who challenge him and keep him alive at 77.