Category: Subverting Empire

Let Us In the Name of the Holy Trinity…

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Columbus DayFrom the first chapter of Howard Zinn’s classic The People’s History of the United States (1980). For Columbus Day Indigenous People’s Day.

Because of Columbus’s exaggerated report and promises, his second expedition was given seventeen ships and more than twelve hundred men. The aim was clear: slaves and gold. They went from island to island in the Caribbean, taking Indians as captives. But as word spread of the Europeans’ intent they found more and more empty villages. On Haiti, they found that the sailors left behind at Fort Navidad had been killed in a battle with the Indians, after they had roamed the island in gangs looking for gold, taking women and children as slaves for sex and labor. Continue reading “Let Us In the Name of the Holy Trinity…” →

Have Mercy on Us!

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lepersBy Wes Howard-Brook and Sue Ferguson Johnson

*NOTE: this piece was originally posted to Radical Discipleship in October 2016.

The final leg of the journey to Jerusalem begins with this week’s gospel (Lk 17.11-19). Alert readers, though, will note that Jesus and the disciples have not gotten very far. At the very beginning, Luke tells us that “they entered a village of the Samaritans to make ready for him” (9.52). Now, eight chapters later, Luke says, “On the way to Jerusalem Jesus was going through the midst (Gk, dia meson, misleadingly translated by NRSV as “between”) of Samaria and Galilee.” Like the Israelites in the wilderness, they seem to be going in circles in the land north of Judea. Perhaps this is a sly reference to the disciples, like their Israelite ancestors, lacking the faith that the journey they are on will lead to the place of God’s abundant provision. Indeed, as we heard last week, the disciples had just demanded of Jesus, “Increase our faith!” (17.5). Continue reading “Have Mercy on Us!” →

Wild Weeds and Imperial Trees: Reading a Messianic Parable at the Crossroads of Settlement and the Wild

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wild mustard (public domain)

By Jim Perkinson, some timely scholarship for this weekend’s Gospel story

*Note: these comments from Dr. Perkinson are a summary of his “ground-breaking” essay on seeds and soils in Political Spirituality in an Age of Eco-Apocalypse: Essays in Communication and Struggle Across Species, Cultures, and Religions (Palgrave McMillan, 2015)

The seed parables of the gospels are “heirloom” for modern readers. They come across time, hard with unpacked dynamism.  As bare kernels, they sit unmoving before the eyes. But given the right nutrients from without, they may sprout with a surprising prolixity.

I want to treat these little Galilean riddles like transportable spore, and see what they do in a plot of contemporary “compost.” Continue reading “Wild Weeds and Imperial Trees: Reading a Messianic Parable at the Crossroads of Settlement and the Wild” →

Contemplative Resistance

On By RadicalDiscipleshipIn Subverting Empire, Theological Animation2 Comments

CPIOn November 2-3, the Center for Prophetic Imagination is offering a 2-day retreat called “Contemplative Resistance.”

In a letter to his discouraged friend Daniel Berrigan, Thomas Merton once wrote: “Do not be discouraged. The Holy Spirit is not asleep.”

It is easy to be discouraged by rampant injustices in our world today. Children in cages. Fascism on the rise. Environmental collapse looming. The list is long.

Where is the Spirit at work in this world? How do we act in ways that challenge injustice while being rooted in the presence of God? Continue reading “Contemplative Resistance” →

A Way of Love, Not a Way of Sin Remediation

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A re-post from Mark Van Steenwyk, executive director of The Center for Prophetic Imagination (originally posted to social media on September 23, 2019). MVS

Sin isn’t a homogeneous substance that exists in human hearts. It isn’t a phantomous thing that can only be combated with prayer and good intentions.

The Bible doesn’t make the case that all of humanity is bad to the core and that sin is about individual human choices and that the only way to fight sin is to win people to Jesus. That story has been placed upon Scripture and, at the same time, fits so nicely within the framework of individualism and religious conservatism. Which is why it persists in the USA. Continue reading “A Way of Love, Not a Way of Sin Remediation” →

The Rich Man and Lazarus: Warning Tale and Interpretive Key to Luke

On By RadicalDiscipleshipIn Subverting Empire, Theological Animation2 Comments

fyodorBy Ched Myers, on Luke 16:19-31, this weekend’s Gospel text

Note: This piece was originally posted to Radical Discipleship in October 2016. As was the case last week, this is a longer post, because of the importance of Luke 16 to those of us suffering from “Affluenza.” For a recording of a recent webinar Ched did on this gospel text, go here. [Right: Fyodor Bronnikov, “Lazarus at the rich man’s gate,” 1886.]

This Sunday’s gospel completes our journey through Luke 16. How rare it is that the lectionary allows a sustained look at Luke’s narrative argument! Last week’s text was Jesus’ subversive tale of the “defect-ive” discipleship of the beleaguered middle manager of a “filthy rotten system” (16:1-13). I read it as a poignant fable for those who would try to monkey-wrench the dominant economic system to provide a modicum of Jubilee justice for themselves and others.  The “paired” story of Lazarus and the Rich Man represents, in turn, a warning tale about the dark consequences of failing to deconstruct the systems of vast social and economic disparity that hold our world hostage. Continue reading “The Rich Man and Lazarus: Warning Tale and Interpretive Key to Luke” →

This resurrection will likely be painful

On By RadicalDiscipleshipIn Subverting Empire, Uncategorized3 Comments
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Credit: Samira, http://www.flickr.com/photos/mink/4466099617/

By Bre Woligroski. This article first appeared in Geez magazine Issue 25, Spring 2012, The utopia issue.

Those of us wannabe revolutionaries who have been working, praying and calling out for significant social change have found some tangible positive signs lately.

Our world is shifting. Some sort of change is in the air and it makes my heart leap and stirs my soul.

Stories of resistance play on every newsfeed; on a global scale, symptoms of the collapse and the collective rejection of capitalism are becoming evident. Between the Arab Spring, the struggling economies of the U.S., Greece and Italy and the growing commitment to the Occupy movement, something is moving and changing. A new way of relating to each other is on the proverbial horizon. Continue reading “This resurrection will likely be painful” →

Discipleship as Defection from the Mammon System: Jesus’ Parable about a “Manager of Injustice”

On By RadicalDiscipleshipIn Subverting Empire, Theological Animation1 Comment

luke16By Ched Myers, on this weekend’s Gospel text Luke 16:1-13

Note: In this piece, originally posted to RadicalDiscipleship.net in September 2016, Ched offers a longer study because of his conviction that this is a crucial text for middle class Christians. A more detailed version of the reflections below can be found here; a webinar exploring these themes can be found here. [Right: “The Wicked Servant,” Ian Pollock, 1972.]

Summary: This Sunday’s gospel can be read as a poignant fable for all who realize that they have been disenfranchised by the dominant economic system, and who would try to “monkeywrench” whatever status they have in it to provide a modicum of Jubilee justice for themselves and others.  This parable illustrates the contemporary strategy of navigating what Wendell Berry calls the “Two Economies” by using capital to build social relations, rather than sacrificing social relations to build capital.  Continue reading “Discipleship as Defection from the Mammon System: Jesus’ Parable about a “Manager of Injustice”” →

When Spirit Starts Scratching

On By RadicalDiscipleshipIn Subverting Empire, Theological Animation1 Comment

Speed Limit 3By Tommy Airey

The first time I heard her was in the middle of the night. She woke me up. I dragged my angry ass out of bed and bee-lined it for the bathroom. I strained straight up and pounded on the ceiling. Her scratching stopped. For five seconds, all was quiet on Washtenaw Avenue. But she would return. And would keep returning night after blessed night.

About 72 hours after the first episode, Lindsay and I hypothesized that the serial scratcher was a raccoon. Her nocturnal lifestyle gave her away. After midnight, she let it all hang out, hauling in branches and pinecones and rocks. The havoc played out in the vent that became her home that winter. Sometimes it sounded like she was playing a friendly game of marbles. Sometimes we were certain the light fixtures were going to crash through the ceiling. A raccoon roommate is like having an uncle who watches Fox News. He shows up at the worst times and he’s impossible to ignore. Continue reading “When Spirit Starts Scratching” →