Category: Theological Animation

Lent Bootcamp: Love in the Time of COVID-19

On By RadicalDiscipleshipIn Theological Animation, Uncategorized5 Comments

By Dee Dee Risher

Like each of you, I am spinning and dancing in the flux that is COVID-19.

My city, Philadelphia, is on lockdown, people asked to go out only for necessities or to the doctor. Every day I have gotten news of loved older ones exposed or friends who have COVID-19, schools and colleges closed, information overload. I’ve cancelled retreats and trips I have looked forward to for months, reeled home one college student from across the globe. I’ve been anxious about what the virus will do in Project HOME’s 900-resident community of formally homeless and vulnerable people, concerned and sad about life experiences cancelled, uncertain about how long it may go and how bad everything may get. You probably have a similar list of things falling, failing, the world shifting a bit under fear and responsibility.

Continue reading “Lent Bootcamp: Love in the Time of COVID-19” →

Love in the Time of Corona Virus

On By RadicalDiscipleshipIn Subverting Empire, Theological Animation2 Comments

RudyBy Tommy Airey

“The only regret I will have in dying is if it is not for love.”—Gabriel García Márquez, Love in the Time of Cholera (1985)

In the rapidly shifting week between last Tuesday night when the NBA announced that rim-protector Rudy Gobert (right) tested positive for Covid-19 and Monday when the current occupier of the White House horrifically changed his language and started calling the pandemic “the Chinese Virus,” the contrast between free-market Capitalism and free-range Christianity was unpixilating in my soul. To clarify, most so-called “Christian” offerings are factory farmed, unquestionably committed to free-market fundamentalist policies—and the rugged individualistic postures they cultivate.

Continue reading “Love in the Time of Corona Virus” →

o, woman

On By RadicalDiscipleshipIn Subverting Empire, Theological AnimationLeave a comment
Water Transfer 3
Re-loading cases of water to deliver to victims of water shut-off.

By Jim Perkinson, on John 4:5-42, for the beloved community that meets at St. Peter’s Episcopal Church (right) at the corner of Trumbull and Michigan in Detroit.  

o, the waters, the waters, the waters

o jacob, my father
o leah, my mother
o rachel, crying after the lost ones Continue reading “o, woman” →

The Naming Project

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TNP_largeBy Logan Rimel

For seven summers in a row, I’ve gathered with the other directors and counselors of The Naming Project for a week at Bay Lake Camp in Deerwood, MN. Since summer 2012, I’ve been blessed to be a part of this faith-filled summer camp for youth ages 14-18 of all sexual orientations and gender identities, and a director there since 2017. Each summer, the counselors and directors work to create a space where LGBTQ+ and allied youth can explore the intersection and interaction of their faith, identity, and community. Continue reading “The Naming Project” →

Yet You Do Not Receive Our Testimony

On By RadicalDiscipleshipIn Subverting Empire, Theological Animation2 Comments

MLKBy Tommy Airey, a seven-minute sermon at Storydwelling, a community of belonging, ritual and resistance in Bend, Oregon

“Very truly, I tell you, we speak of what we know and testify to what we have seen; yet you do not receive our testimony.”–John 3:11

Nicodemus, like most powerful men, knows how to conduct a covert operation. He was a Pharisee from Jerusalem with a lot to lose if others saw him associating with Jesus of Nazareth, the radical Galilean rabbi. Nicodemus’ night call would be like the President of the United States secretly meeting with Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. in the 1960’s, when Dr. King’s approval rating hovered around 25% in white America. Continue reading “Yet You Do Not Receive Our Testimony” →

A Spirituality of Disconnection

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CPIBy Mark Van Steenwyk, executive director of the Center for Prophetic Imagination

Any spirituality that nurtures abstracted love, generic unity, and vague justice is worse than useless.

A Jesus-shaped spirituality moves us to love specific people, to struggle for tangible solidarity, and challenges us to work for particular justice.

If your spirituality provides positive feels and comfort because it helps you cope with the pain of the world, without ever addressing that pain, then it is, ultimately, a spirituality of empire. Continue reading “A Spirituality of Disconnection” →

To Rebirth This Country

On By RadicalDiscipleshipIn Cloud of Witnesses, Subverting Empire, Theological Animation3 Comments

AlexanderFrom Michelle Alexander, on a panel with Keeanga Yamahtta Taylor and Naomi Klein in May 2017.

I have been having some trouble with the frame of “resistance” for some time. I understand completely why the term, the phrase, the rallying cry emerged following Trump’s election — it makes complete sense to me. But I think we’ve got to think beyond resistance. Resistance is inherently defensive. Continue reading “To Rebirth This Country” →

Indigenous Wisdom Re-Schooling Christian Vision

On By RadicalDiscipleshipIn Subverting Empire, Theological Animation1 Comment

LilyFrom the Center For Babaylan Studies, this webinar is live tomorrow at 2pmEST. Click here to register!

Is it possible to learn from indigenous wisdom and practice across the globe and then re-read the biblical writings with an eye to the indigenous traces not entirely erased there? Or is going back to indigenous ways the same as going back to superstitious belief? Does following Jesus mean forsaking all other ancestral ways? This webinar will walk through the scriptural tradition to explore a possibility of calling Christianity to depth-work in recovering some of its own indigenous, anti-imperial roots. Continue reading “Indigenous Wisdom Re-Schooling Christian Vision” →

TRACKED BUT NOT SEEN: THE FIGHT AGAINST RACIST SURVEILLANCE

On By RadicalDiscipleshipIn Theological Animation, Uncategorized1 Comment
green light-1-main_i
Photo credit: Craine’sDetroit

In Detroit, the constant flash of green lights says: You are being watched.

BY BILL WYLIE-KELLERMANN

Reposted from Sojourners, MARCH 2020

WE GATHERED THIS fall on the steps of St. Peter’s Episcopal Church. Summoned by the Detroit chapter of Black Youth Project 100, we were preparing to march a mile-long stretch of gentrified Michigan Avenue, which intersects there. I had served the church for 11 years as pastor, and in the last dozen or so this Catholic Worker neighborhood had been invaded by $400,000 condos, plus destination bars and restaurants. Among others, guests at our Manna Meal soup kitchen and Kelly’s Mission, largely black, are stigmatized and made unwelcome. Continue reading “TRACKED BUT NOT SEEN: THE FIGHT AGAINST RACIST SURVEILLANCE” →

Prepping for Ash Wednesday A supplication

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ash-wednesday-4823377_960_720By Ken Sehested, borrowing from St. Augustine and Isaiah 55:12

Return to your heart, O you transgressors,
and hold fast to the One who made you.
Stand with the Beloved and your footing
shall be firm. Rest in the Merciful One
and you shalt be buoyed.

Where do you go along these rugged
paths, pilgrim, so far from home yet so
winsomely loved? Be clear about what
you seek, and where you seek, for the
beatific life cannot be found in the land
of illusion. Continue reading “Prepping for Ash Wednesday A supplication” →