Saying Hello and Goodbye

On April 24, 2019April 23, 2019 By RadicalDiscipleshipIn Biography as Theology, Race, Identity, and History, UncategorizedLeave a comment

542ad78c3b0cd.image By Linda Johnson Seyenkulo

Culture is a funny thing. You do not know it is there, until it is not. What I mean by that is the culture to which we are born is so much a part of us that we are not aware. Someone said, “It is the air we breathe.” Or if we were fish, it would be the water we swim in. Culture allows us to live and move without having to think about everything we do.

I’m a white, educated, western woman living in a West African country where many people do not have much education. Me being white, educated and western is part of my culture and my privilege. I do not think about it much, but in being all that, I carry with me an expectation that the way I live and move and have my being is normal; how things should be. I often function that way not thinking about what it means for those around me. Continue reading “Saying Hello and Goodbye” →

KICKED & PRODDED by the SPIRIT

On March 27, 2019March 25, 2019 By RadicalDiscipleshipIn Biography as Theology, Race, Identity, and History, Subverting Empire, UncategorizedLeave a comment

Descending, Front Cover By Oscar Cole-Arnal (Oz)
A review of Descending Like A Dove: Adventures in Decolonizing Evangelical Christianity By Tommy Airey

As of April 4, 2018 I have lived a half century pilgrim’s existence hounded, kicked and prodded by the Spirit through weird and wonderful emissaries thereof. Of course, she had to act this way, precisely because I am of that abominable character best described as a white old fart privileged male—you know that demographic who helped give our world the gifts of Donald Trump and Doug Ford. So I say to the Spirit and her visitations to me—bring em’ on and more of the same. Yes, as a young Lutheran pastor well on the road to pastoral and academic success in my first pastorate near Pittsburgh, my world became upturned by martyr’s blood, not my own, but that of Martin Luther King Jr. With his shed blood pouring from Memphis into my heart, my family and I vowed to disdain our privileges and realign our lives after his model. So we became civil rights and antiwar activists, strong supporters of Cesar Chavez’ boycott—going to jail, facing baton-wielding cops, having anonymous life threats and ending my paid vocational career in Waterloo, Ontario teaching Church History at the Lutheran Seminary there. Since retirement, I remain active in a local group called the Alliance Against Poverty. Continue reading “KICKED & PRODDED by the SPIRIT” →

For the Least of These

On December 26, 2018December 26, 2018 By RadicalDiscipleshipIn Race, Identity, and History, Theological Animation, UncategorizedLeave a comment

By Kelly Gallagher

“For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me…Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these siblings of mine, you did for me.” Matthew 25: 35-36,40

The Rev. Dr. William Barber and the Rev. Dr. Liz Theoharis have created a core principal in the Poor People’s Campaign that they have held firm to and modeled over and over again – to lift up and deepen the leadership of those most impacted by racism, poverty, environmental devastation, and militarism. I like the language of “most impacted” better than “the least of these,” because “least of these” in today’s society can have connotations of “not as good as” or “not as important as.” Either way, the point is the same. Like Jesus, the Poor People’s Campaign: A National Call for Moral Revival, is calling us to engage the margins in an intimate and profound way. A way, I daresay, that has become foreign for many in the mainline church. Continue reading “For the Least of These” →

Don’t Wake a Sleeping Dragon

On December 18, 2018December 18, 2018 By RadicalDiscipleshipIn Race, Identity, and History, Subverting Empire, UncategorizedLeave a comment

By: Anonymous

A few weeks ago I was sitting in Jose’s kitchen, waiting for his monthly phone call. Once a month he gets a call on a voice-recognition system: at some point during a two hour window, the phone will ring. He answers, then has to call back within three minutes. A machine recites a string of numbers, which he repeats, and then he is okay for another month. Since getting Administrative Closure of his case a few years ago, this has been the only contact he has had with the immigration folks. Finally the phone rang. I watched as he called back, heard him repeat the string of numbers. And repeat it again, and again, four times altogether. Finally he turned to me, ashen-faced. “It says it’s going to report me,” he said. Continue reading “Don’t Wake a Sleeping Dragon” →

Nuestros Sueños

On November 20, 2018November 19, 2018 By RadicalDiscipleshipIn Race, Identity, and History, Subverting Empire, Uncategorized1 Comment

By Liza Neal

“Nuestros sueños no se detendrán incluso en la muerte.” Our dreams will not stop even in death.

These words are painted on the Mexico side of the Border Wall. It could have been carved on the Mayflower. Half the Pilgrims that traveled to the “new world” died. The rest would have died if not for the mercy of the Wampanoag, who were repaid with disease, indoctrination, and their leader’s head on a spike displayed next to the Pilgrims’ crops. Continue reading “Nuestros Sueños” →

Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack of Settler Privilege

On November 13, 2018November 12, 2018 By RadicalDiscipleshipIn Race, Identity, and History, Uncategorized2 Comments

By Dina Gilio-Whitaker. Reposted from Beacon Broadside.

November is Native American Heritage Month, when we as American Indian people get to have the mic for a little while. So, I’d like to take my turn at the virtual mic to talk about settler privilege, something you likely have never thought of, or have never even heard of. What you have undoubtedly heard of, however, is white privilege.

Peggy McIntosh first popularized the concept of white privilege in her now-classic 1989 essay “White Privilege: Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack.” The impact of her essay was due at least in part to its clarity and readability; it broke down into a list of easy to understand ideas why white people have unearned advantages in society based on their skin color. Not that it was necessarily easy for white people to accept that they are in fact “more equal” than others, but the essay opened up a conversation that has gained serious traction in our social discourse, especially now when racism is on full, unobstructed display in this Trumpian moment. Continue reading “Unpacking the Invisible Knapsack of Settler Privilege” →

Learning from Laughter and the Trees: He Comes with the Mountains

On September 25, 2018September 24, 2018 By RadicalDiscipleshipIn Biography as Theology, Race, Identity, and History, Uncategorized, Watershed Discipleship1 Comment

20180618_150922 — Cedar at the Poor People’s Campaign action on June 18 in Detroit.

By Lydia Wylie-Kellermann

“You have rocks in your bag.”

Stunned, I said, “it’s possible. I have kids.” I searched frantically through my bag that I had carefully packed that morning in hopes of getting quickly through security at the 36^th District Court before court. I tried to gloss over the contraband tics tacs and pencil I had hidden at the bottom- necessities for keeping a 2-year-old silent in the court room that day. I can’t find anything. They wait, “Check another pocket.” Sure enough, there in the front, I find them. I pull out hands filled with mountain stones, Detroit River rocks, and pine cones all covered in sand that pours through my fingers. I hand them over to the security guard who doesn’t flinch as I apologize and she heads for the trash can. Continue reading “Learning from Laughter and the Trees: He Comes with the Mountains” →

Wild Lectionary: Today, Know This

On September 6, 2018August 29, 2018 By RadicalDiscipleshipIn Race, Identity, and History, Subverting Empire, Theological Animation, Uncategorized, Watershed DiscipleshipLeave a comment

2674246387_1631a0e665_o — Photo credit: Kit Ng

16^th Sunday after Pentecost
Proper 18(23) B

Proverbs 22

By Robert O. Smith

Proverbs of the elders. Received wisdom. The common sense of the ages. Men speaking to men, warning of loose women. Disjointed aphorisms, speaking against the Other, made know to us today.

Continue reading “Wild Lectionary: Today, Know This” →

Wild Lectionary: No Fence Can Hold

On August 30, 2018August 29, 2018 By RadicalDiscipleshipIn Race, Identity, and History, Subverting Empire, Theological Animation, Uncategorized, Watershed DiscipleshipLeave a comment

15th Sunday after Pentecost
Proper 17(22)B

Song of Solomon

By Cheryl Bear

he said, oh lovely one
follow my deep, ancient footprints
you will find me
you will track me until i catch you
i will always stand up for you
you remind me of a spirited young appaloosa
no fence can hold you
you’re blinding, dazzling
like trying to look at a river
flashing with sunlight Continue reading “Wild Lectionary: No Fence Can Hold” →

Gifts on the Shelf: An invitation to a children project

On July 23, 2018July 17, 2018 By RadicalDiscipleshipIn Art as Resistance, Race, Identity, and History, UncategorizedLeave a comment

20180717_133052 By Lydia Wylie-Kellermann

While I waited for my kids to fall asleep, I looked through their bookshelf nurtured by the stories and creativity that rests beside them. There, untouched, were the biographies, the history, the celebrations of protest. These ones always seemed to be neglected when the choices were made with options of talking mice, farting dogs, or gigantic excavators.

I want these stories read and loved. I want them to become part of the fabric of their ancestral history….a movement ancestry. To learn these stories by heart. I want movement history learned as a way to help these boys navigate the scary world they are growing up in. I needed to figure out how to honor the stories and bring the out with gifted anticipation. I needed to create ritual and tradition around them. Continue reading “Gifts on the Shelf: An invitation to a children project” →

Radical Discipleship

Category: Race, Identity, and History