Pagan Christianity by Frank Viola.

Well when you give us feedback we listen . . . our podcast with Frank Viola, author of Pagan Christianity, is now live. You can subscribe to the podcast over on The Nick & Josh Podcast site.

I know Bob Hyatt, Joe Thorn, Daryl Dash, and Bill Kinnon have all pushed back with some concerns and criticisms for Frank’s Pagan Christianity. And Kingdom Grace has been hosting an open-ended discussion on her site. Consequently, the blogosphere has been humming with people sharing their reflection on Pagan Christianity.

Nick and I did our best to incorporate as many of the concerns and questions being raised during our conversation with Frank. And in my estimation, Frank responded to the criticisms graciously and respectfully. After listening to him share his side of things, I think some of the criticisms might be caricaturing Frank and Pagan Christianity in the same way that they are asserting that he’s caricaturing Christianity and church history.

To be fair, I haven’t yet read the book (free copy Frank?) and was only able to engage with it via Bob Hyatt’s blog and Frank’s website where he responds to the criticisms. Add to that the fact that The Nick & Josh Podcast is notorious for throwing nice fat pitches at our guests as opposed to throwing those nasty sliders, and you have a recipe for a pretty straight forward 30 minute conversation. My only complaint was that 30 minutes wasn’t near enough time for us to ask the questions we wanted to ask and for Frank to develop his thoughts and responses to those questions.

On the bright side, I’m planning on traveling down to St. Petersburg to the A Sustainable Faith un-conference where I hope to probe (non-alien) Frank some more about the criticisms and how he reconciles the practices of the church with it’s contextual, local, and specific place.

Anyway . . . I think it’s a great podcast (I’m biased) and I think Frank is a gentleman who is as bold as he is inquisitive.

Again, if you want to check out the podcast you can do so here. Nick also has a reviw up on his site.