Category: Theological Animation

Gospel Healing in a World of Suffering

On By RadicalDiscipleshipIn Theological AnimationLeave a comment

A new offering from the Alternative Seminary.

A FIVE-WEEK ONLINE COURSE
September 13 – October 11, 2023
Wednesday evenings, 7:00 – 9:00 pm

We have come through a global virus, but our world is still in desperate need of healing.

Severe poverty and deepening divides of income, war and violence, racism and other forms of hatred and systemic discrimination, a ravaged creation: All of these cry out for healing – but what is the healing we need? As we emerge from the global pandemic, how does this moment of deep societal vulnerability force us to ask deeper questions about who we are and what kind of world we need? And how do we engage in self-healing practices?

For five weeks, we will explore together several Gospel accounts of Jesus’ healings, reflecting on how these stories speak to our society and world. We will reflect on ways we are all in need of healing and how we can be empowered to be faithful disciples and healers in this time of manifold crises.

Continue reading “Gospel Healing in a World of Suffering” →

This Fall at Kirkridge

On By RadicalDiscipleshipIn Subverting Empire, Theological AnimationLeave a comment

A message from our comrades at Kirkridge Retreat and Study Center.

Do you know about Kirkridge Retreat and Study Center? 

With a long, storied activist history (Dan and Phillip Berrigan had a favorite room and frequently led retreats and organized actions there) and an 80-year history of supporting LGBTQI Christians, it’s the kind of place radical disciples should know about. And there are a number of retreats coming up that you might be interested in attending:

Laurel Dykstra on Wilderness Prophets and the Climate Crisis

September 29-October 1

Come explore how the wilderness prophets are relevant to spiritual care and action in a time of climate crisis and discern your own prophetic call for this time. We’ll read scripture, engage scripture  and spend time in contemplation in the more-than-human world

Continue reading “This Fall at Kirkridge” →

Enobling, Prophetic Faith

On By RadicalDiscipleshipIn Subverting Empire, Theological AnimationLeave a comment

By Ric Hudgens, a pastor and author rooted in Northern Illinois

*Note: Three years ago as the covid pandemic was just picking up speed we observed the funeral of John Lewis. I wrote this essay that week. The lessons abide.

The funeral of John Lewis at Ebenezer Baptist Church last week was like an event from another world. Lewis was literally on the frontlines of some of the most remarkable years in our nation’s history. He not only lived a long life (“longevity has its place” said Dr. King, who was killed at 39), but remained engaged, relevant, and prophetic to the end. Case in point perhaps, the editorial Lewis wrote for publication on the day of his funeral (“Together We Can Redeem the Soul of America,” New York Times, July 30, 2020).

Everyone gathered in that historic church where King, Jr, and King, Sr were once ministers (and Rev. Raphael Warnock so ably serves today). I watched the entire service remotely, yet savoring the familiar contours of Black Baptist funerals. Despite the pandemic, everyone was masked, and microphones were switched after each speaker. It was a funeral, much like many others I’ve attended—unique perhaps only by the guests’ notoriety and the length of the service.

Continue reading “Enobling, Prophetic Faith” →

The Reverse Card

On By RadicalDiscipleshipIn Subverting Empire, Theological Animation3 Comments

By Tommy Airey

Last week, in Southern California, we got to spend an entire afternoon at the beach with our nephews. We were on boogie boards for most of it. The next morning, Riley and his brother Mason played a couple games of UNO with their Aunt Linds while I made them pancakes. Riley won both times. When we were driving them back to their dad’s place, Riley pulled out an UNO reverse card from his pocket.

Riley said he carries the card with him because it possesses the power to reverse any of the bad stuff that might happen in real life. He said there’s a YouTube clip that shows a guy getting pulled over by a cop. He flashes his UNO reverse card and the cop lets him go without a ticket or jail time. Riley said the blue UNO reverse cards are the most powerful – then the red, the green and the yellow. In that order. He said that all the other fourth-graders at his school last year respected the power of the UNO reverse card too.

Continue reading “The Reverse Card” →

Sublime Madness

On By RadicalDiscipleshipIn Subverting Empire, Theological AnimationLeave a comment

An excerpt from Chris Hedges’ Obama-era Truth Dig article “A Time for ‘Sublime Madness.'”

The theologian James H. Cone captures this in his masterpiece “The Cross and the Lynching Tree.” Cone says that for oppressed blacks the cross was a “paradoxical religious symbol because it inverts the world’s value system with the news that hope comes by way of defeat, that suffering and death do not have the last word, that the last shall be first and the first last.” Cone continues:

That God could “make a way out of no way” in Jesus’ cross was truly absurd to the intellect, yet profoundly real in the souls of black folk. Enslaved blacks who first heard the gospel message seized on the power of the cross. Christ crucified manifested God’s loving and liberating presence in the contradictions of black life — that transcendent presence in the lives of black Christians that empowered them to believe that ultimately, in God’s eschatological future, they would not be defeated by the “troubles of this world,” no matter how great and painful their suffering. Believing this paradox, this absurd claim of faith, was only possible in humility and repentance. There was no place for the proud and the mighty, for people who think that God called them to rule over others. The cross was God’s critique of power — white power — with powerless love, snatching victory out of defeat.

Continue reading “Sublime Madness” →

An Expansive, Infinite Array of Expressions

On By RadicalDiscipleshipIn Feminist/Womanist/Queer Liberation and Theology, Theological AnimationLeave a comment

By Kateri Boucher, a homily for a Pride Celebration at St. Peter’s Episcopal Church (Detroit, MI) on June 4, 2023. Click here to watch the video version (homily starts around minute twenty-six).

It is a powerful thing to be celebrating this holiday in this space, with this community. I don’t take it for granted that we can gather here today in this way. It was only in 1976, 46 years ago, that the Episcopal church officially became open and affirming. As we know, there are many other streams of the Christian tradition that have done so even more recently, or still haven’t yet. 

There are many people who believe that the phrase “queer Christian” is an outrage or an oxymoron. And I can feel it coming from both sides… I’ve joked with my friends that coming out as queer was not a very big deal for me, which I’m very grateful for, but coming out as Christian to my queer friends has caused a bit of a stir. People are like, “Oh my gosh… Are you okay? Can we support you?” Just yesterday I was at a brunch with a bunch of young queer folks and I told someone I work for a church. It was kind of uncomfortable. They were kind of like, “Why?” 

Continue reading “An Expansive, Infinite Array of Expressions” →

A God Who Confuses

On By RadicalDiscipleshipIn Subverting Empire, Theological Animation1 Comment

By Tommy Airey

And at this sound the crowd gathered and was confused… – Acts 2:6a

Last weekend, I preached a Pentecost sermon at a church down in Kentucky. The text brought me back to my roots. When I was ten, I transferred to the Christian school where my mom got hired to teach 5th grade. Every single morning, we pledged allegiance to the American flag, to the Christian flag and to the bible. We would pray together. We would read something from the scriptures – and then my teacher, Mr. Cavallaro, who I absolutely loved, would proclaim, “God said it. I believe it. And that settles it.” His triumphalism is all it took to hook me.

I was ten – and I was being scripted into Christian Supremacy. My pastors and teachers propagated a world that was black and white, saved and damned. They taught me that we get to heaven by believing what God said, but also that some people are just better than others. Some people earned their wealth, their power, their sun-splashed perch overlooking the Pacific. Other people made bad decisions. They live in ghettos, reservations, barrios, slums, cells and socialist countries because they swerved from God’s Holy Word. Game Over.  

Continue reading “A God Who Confuses” →

Christian Nationalism: An Existential Agreement with God

On By RadicalDiscipleshipIn Subverting Empire, Theological Animation1 Comment

By Rev. Graylan Scott Hagler

Newt Gingrich broke onto the national political scene with his “Contract with America.” It was the offering of an agreement, that if the public allowed the Gingrich coalition to lead, that coalition would then deliver on a number of points in the contract. Whether you agreed with the framing of this contract or not it conjured the image of the covenant between God and the people in the wilderness established through Moses on Mt. Sinai. There is an “If” and “then” equation to a covenant. One act is related to the other. One thing is related to the next. One thing is required in order to get to the other thing. A covenant is where at least two parties enter into an agreement.

So-called Christian Nationalism addresses the concept of a covenant, or a contract. In this view, America is the promise of God, and blessings will unfold, fulfillment will be realized, and the country will be the “City on the Hill” as long as its people uphold their part of the bargain. If the nation fails in upholding its agreement the blessings will be squandered, the country will be in decay, and the hopes found will become lost. Hence, we hear the assertions that America was founded on Christian values and principles, and its laws should reflect that. Christian norms should be upheld lest the country fall into decadence and decay. All of the assumptions, of course, are built on concepts of a conquering god, patriarchy and white supremacy. The cultural wars are attempts to uphold these sense of values, and keep the country from falling into perceived decay and obsolesce. Therefore, other religions, other peoples, like immigrants of darker hue, defy the dominant idea of “American”. Blended sexual and family structures, bended genders, and expanding expressions of sexuality suggest a crisis and the need to assert and re-assert the perceived so-called Christian American agreement into the covenant or the blessings and the nation will eventually be lost. This is where the tension emerges. 

Continue reading “Christian Nationalism: An Existential Agreement with God” →

“As a Mighty Wind”: Or, Which Pentecost?

On By RadicalDiscipleshipIn Subverting Empire, Theological Animation1 Comment

By Jim Perkinson, a homily for St. Peter’s Episcopal Church, Detroit, MI (May 28, 2023)

So, Pentecost!  We will begin deep in the weeds.  Literally.  “Pente-cost”—in Greek, the 50th day!  But 50th day after what?  After Passover.  But why 50?  Well, 49 + 1.  Huh?  We scratch our heads.  But of course, the early Christians, though working in the language of the Greeks—pentekoste—are translating practice and memory of the Hebrews.  So hard this biblical faithfulness business—plunges us straight into serious cross-cultural labors and mistakes.  Such a big history of mistakes!  More on that later.  But the Hebrews! They didn’t call it Pentecost, but Shavuot, the Feast of Weeks.  7 weeks after Passover, but with the counting starting on the 2nd day of Passover—so 49 + 1. 

Ok—but then, what anchors Passover, when does it begin?  Ah, now we’re getting down to it, yes, getting down, “gettin’ down,” heavy on the down beat!  But what is down?  What direction?  There—pointing to your feet?  Yes, but what is down there?  A tile floor, you say?  And under that?  Wood floor joists?  And under that?  Pipes?  Yes, yes, and a basement and then cement.  And, and . . . But finally, even in the city, we get to it.  Earth.  What all of life stands on and grows in.  The big assumption.  The Big Momma we take for granted again and again! 

Continue reading ““As a Mighty Wind”: Or, Which Pentecost?” →

An Act of Defiant Hope

On By RadicalDiscipleshipIn Subverting Empire, Theological AnimationLeave a comment

Another subversive bible study from Walter Brueggemann. Re-posted from churchanew.org.

This is an unabashed commendation of a book. The book by Franck Prevot is entitled Wangari Maathai: The Woman Who Planted Millions of Trees (2015). This children’s book, with its winsome art work, tells the story of Wangari Maathai, a Kenyan woman who learned from her mother that “a tree is worth more than its wood.” As she grew up she became aware that her people were deprived of much of their land for agriculture. She saw the devastation of the forests as her country gained independence from Britain. In the face of all the deforestation, her mother taught her:

A tree is a treasure that provides shade, fruit, pure air, and nesting places for birds, and that pulses with the vitality of life. Trees are hideouts for insects and provide inspiration for poets. A tree is a little bit of the future (21).

In response to the destruction of deforestation that she could observe, Maathai organized the Green Belt Movement to encourage villagers to plant many, many trees. She encountered much opposition from business interests and from the authoritarian government of Daniel arap Moi. She was imprisoned by the government for her oppositional stance, but slowly she is able to gain public support for her democratic vision of society. Her great courage led not only to many trees, but to the flourishing of democracy in her home country of Kenya. It is clear that her story is one that our children and grandchildren urgently need to hear, a story of courage in devotion to the wellbeing of the earth and its creaturely population. Click here to read the rest.