Heather Goodman
Location: West Chester, PA, USA
http://allthingsareyours.wordpress.com

I was raised a secular Jew with parents who gave me full permission to “decide whatever I wanted to believe in.” I ended up choosing Jesus. Having never been to a church before that, I approached Christianity with almost a complete blank slate. Fast-forward decades later, and I’ve participated in or at least tasted almost every major type of Christianity, as well as grown in my understanding of Judaism and Islam and other faiths. I’m a progressive evangelical charismatic practioner,as well as an avid critic of the progressive, evangelical, and charismatic scenes -- because I think it’s important to be self-criticial in whatever camp I participate in. I was raised in a very scientifically-oriented, tech-savvy environment and as a high school biology teacher, I’m very positive about evolution being reality and the Christian faith needing to have both feet on the ground about the natural world, and about theology. I do not see technology as the way to God or the way for humans to be enlightened, I think those things will always remain matters of the heart and spirit and free will; but I do see technology as the way forward for our material selves in this material realm, and I am happy to lead the way forward technologically and theologically for those of faith to reconcile their belief in an unseen, uncreated kingdom while living in this created kingdom, and to wholeheartedly embrace technological adaptations to enable humanity to thrive and succeed in the cosmos.