Good???

A. Unabashed Pacifist:

Every moment without peace is a lost opportunity.

B. Unabashed Christian:

Holy One,

Where there is life, there is hope. You give the breath of life and with it comes hope. When hope is extinguished in a person, then life vanishes and death has come upon that person. Spring brings with it signs of hope. Thank you for the renewal of hope that comes with this season. Thank you for hope renewed despite troubling situations. Bring hope to conditions that seem locked in hopeless dead ends. Thank you for the little things that give hope – some new learning, chocolate, a stimulating book, helpful gestures from a friend, a moving concert, the memory of Holy Week. You breathe fresh hope in me.
Amen

C. Un-quoting Jesus:

“I don’t know about Good; just as good a day as any to die perhaps.”

[I couldn’t agree more. But He didn’t say it.]

D. Blog: Was it a Good Friday? Why?

The preacher said suffering is never required by God, but we can expect it, especially when we live the way of Christ and the emerging divine dominion, a way that challenges the entrenched power structures.

Living in that way does require letting go of or overcoming our fear of worldly power and what it can do to us. When we, in a sense, die to (or overcome) that fear, the result might well be suffering imposed by worldly powers (religious, political, social, economic)

It appears that only when we accept the possibility of undeserved suffering for this divine cause can change/newness/better life/the dominion of God emerge. (Any number of martyrs attest to this transformative process).

Regarding the other interpretation, that suffering and Cross are necessary to satisfy God:

As far back as the Abraham & Isaac story, biblical writers have said that God does not require sacrificing children in order to appease God or to atone for human failings (sins). The traditional interpretation that emphasizes the faith of Abraham misses the mark, I believe. The point is that the God of the Hebrews, as opposed to other gods, does not expect believers to sacrifice children. Traditional Christianity has overlooked (or rejected) this understanding of that story, and imposed the idea of child sacrifice by God upon Jesus’ death on the Cross.

Glorifying Jesus’ suffering on the cross (Mel Gibson movie as only one example) to “save us from our sins” appears to allow most Christians to avoid taking up their own crosses in the way Jesus did, that is, in the service of the divine dominion. If He did it for us, the reasoning seems to go, then we don’t have to do it. We can remain in our fear of worldly powers; because He overcame those powers, we don’t have to confront their evils. We’re saved from any of that.

It looks to me like a sham following the way of Christ.