The Politics of Christmas

On December 3, 2018December 1, 2018 By RadicalDiscipleshipIn Subverting Empire, Theological AnimationLeave a comment

From our comrades at the Alternative Seminary in Philly…just in time for Advent:

In an age of Trumpism, can we liberate Christmas from its cultural captivity and rediscover the truly prophetic story that speaks to the crises of our world today?

Peace on Earth and the Politics of Christmas

Saturday morning, December 8
9:30 – 11:30 a.m.
Project HOME, 1515 Fairmount Avenue

Much of the Christian church in the United States has been co-opted by an American gospel of prosperity, racism, violence, and militant nationalism. The celebration of Christmas is a victim of that co-optation: It is often wrapped in innocent, feel-good, Hallmark-card imagery. But in fact the biblical texts describing the coming of Jesus are making powerful assertions about the politics of the Bible that speak very much to our contemporary global crises. We will reflect on the “nativity narratives” in the Gospels of Matthew and Luke to see how they express core biblical themes of justice and liberation. We will try to “un-domesticate” these tales of liberation and reflect on how they are truly challenging us in terms of our allegiance and our discipleship. A perfect event for Advent. A light breakfast will be served. A $5 donation is requested to cover costs.

If you are interested in participating, please contact Will O’Brien at (215) 842-1790 or wobrien@alternativeseminary.net by December 5.

The Alternative Seminary is a program of biblical and theological study and reflection designed to foster an authentic biblical witness in the modern world. For more information, see http://www.alternativeseminary.net.

It’s the End of the World as We Know It

On December 3, 2018December 1, 2018 By RadicalDiscipleshipIn Subverting Empire, Theological AnimationLeave a comment

By Kim Redigan, an Advent reflection on Luke 21:25-28, 34-36 for the Faith Outreach Committee of the People’s Water Board (Detroit, MI)

The gospel reading this first week of Advent is wildly apocalyptic and, ultimately, hope-filled.

Jesus describes a creation in travail. Roaring waves and raging oceans are dire signs of a planet – a people – in distress. Water speaks in the cataclysmic tongues of rising sea levels, poisoned water, privatized water, weaponized water, withheld water. Continue reading “It’s the End of the World as We Know It” →

Loving our Way through the Darkest of Days

On December 2, 2018December 1, 2018 By RadicalDiscipleshipIn Subverting Empire, Theological Animation, Watershed DiscipleshipLeave a comment

WWC Advent Week 1 – December 2 – 8

“Each of us is capable of growing our powers and skills in giving and receiving love. Despite this truth many die of thirst in a freshwater lake. All about us are people who can give us what we need; we must only learn to ask and then pay up by receiving. When we lay bare our needs and open ourselves to receive love we move from independence to interdependence, the basis of true community.”
— Gerald and Elisabeth Jud, Training in the Art of Loving

December 2:
Week One’s Skill of Loving is SEEING.

SEEING: I see you in your uniqueness, not how I want or assume you to be, and I allow myself to be seen. Continue reading “Loving our Way through the Darkest of Days” →

The Season of Advent: Loving Our Way Through these Darkest of Days

On December 2, 2018December 1, 2018 By RadicalDiscipleshipIn Subverting Empire, Theological AnimationLeave a comment

From our comrades at The Wilderness Way in Portland, OR:

NOTE: We will post a follow-up to this intro piece at 2pmEST today!!

“Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.” — Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

As the darkest days of the year approach, coinciding with the season of Advent in the Christian liturgical year, we at The Wilderness Way invite you into a collective spiritual practice of LOVING. Continue reading “The Season of Advent: Loving Our Way Through these Darkest of Days” →

We Are Already Related

On December 1, 2018November 29, 2018 By RadicalDiscipleshipIn Cloud of Witnesses, Subverting Empire, Theological AnimationLeave a comment

From Walter Wink in Just Jesus: My Struggle to Become Human (2014):

In the integral worldview, however, prayer is given the place of honor in the life of the spirit. Since we are all already related to each other, we are immediate to each other. So prayer becomes the most natural thing in the world. We don’t have to pump ourselves up in order to release a charge of healing energy. The other persons don’t even have to know we are praying for them. Because we are already related, and we are one body in God, God’s healing power is already there and here (but there is no distance). Our prayer is simply a matter of opening the situation to God.

Congestion

On November 30, 2018November 30, 2018 By RadicalDiscipleshipIn Subverting Empire, Theological AnimationLeave a comment

By Tommy Airey

Advent is almost here. As always, she sends us signs from the sun, the moon, the rising seas and the leafless fig tree. This season, she is speaking to me through a cough that won’t give up. The sinus pressure adds insult to injury. I am now convinced that these chronic symptoms stem from my inability to just say “no.” As it turns out, I have long been addicted to “becoming all things to all people, so that I might by any means save some” (I Cor 9:22). I share the codependent affliction of the apostle who confessed that his life was unmanageable too:

I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate (Romans 7:15).

Continue reading “Congestion” →

Wild Lectionary: Advent’s Procreative Urgency

On November 29, 2018November 28, 2018 By RadicalDiscipleshipIn Theological Animation, Uncategorized, Watershed Discipleship1 Comment

The First Sunday of Advent, Year C
December 2, 2018

By The Rev. Marilyn Zehr

Luke 21: 25-36

So also, when you see these things taking place, you know that the kingdom of God is near. Luke 21:31

The Kin-dom of God is near. It visits in the night like the spirit presence of the white-tailed deer. I go out early to search for fresh prints in the previous night’s early snows. Like the kin-dom of God, the deer are on the move. It’s rutting season. Their tracks tell me that the does and last year’s fawns move in groups. The lone tracks that cross these are the bucks seeking mates. I am not yet skilled or scent sensitive enough to notice the signs the bucks leave on branches to attract the does but I know it is so. When they mate the doe and buck “enact a ritual of motion, touch, sound and scent before coming together.” (p. 14, All Creation Waits, by Gail Boss and illust. by David G. Klein, 2016) All is now pregnant possibility unfolding just beyond my vision in the night. All I see of their restless urgency are the tracks in the morning snow.

Continue reading “Wild Lectionary: Advent’s Procreative Urgency” →

Jesus Was Non-Binary

On November 28, 2018November 27, 2018 By RadicalDiscipleshipIn Feminist/Womanist/Queer Liberation and Theology, Theological Animation2 Comments

A re-post from our comrades at Friendly Fire Collective (11/27/18):

“So God created human beings, making them to be like himself. He created them male and female, himself.”

All people are made in god’s image. The vast variety of human souls are all a little reflection of rich, deep, complicated god.

In his piece “Is God Transgender?” Mark Sameth writes about the “highly elastic” language used to describe gender in the Hebrew bible. As an example, he describes how Adam is referred to as “them” and Eve is referred to as “he” in Genesis 3:12.

The first people, made in god’s image, switching between pronouns from sentence to sentence. Continue reading “Jesus Was Non-Binary” →

Truth Sunday

On November 27, 2018November 26, 2018 By RadicalDiscipleshipIn Theological Animation, UncategorizedLeave a comment

ChristtheKing-1-1500x926 Sermon B Proper 29
“Christ the King”
Preached at the Church of the Incarnation, Ann Arbor, MI,
November 25, 2018
By Bill Wylie-Kellermann

Psalm 93
Daniel 7:9-10, 13-14
Revelation 1:4b-8
John 18:33-37

I do love the church’s liturgical year, setting the rhythms of our prayer, our community life – and, on occasion, our public witness and action. Even when it’s is appropriated by the culture – inverted, inflated, commodified, corrupted – it still stands primarily as a counter rhythm, a different drummer to which we move. Continue reading “Truth Sunday” →

Rooted in Story and Struggle

On November 25, 2018November 27, 2018 By RadicalDiscipleshipIn Biography as Theology, Theological AnimationLeave a comment

For our final Sunday installment celebrating 30 years of Ched Myers’ Binding the Strong Man: A Political Reading of Mark’s Story of Jesus, radical disciples weigh in on both Ched and his book.

From Jennifer Henry, the executive director of Kairos Canada, reflecting on the viral image from Ossie Michelin’s cell phone in 2013 (left), portraying resistance to fracking led primarily by indigenous women:

What I have learned from the witness of Ched Myers is that we can bring kairos moments like these into conversation with biblical moments, in ways that deepen understanding of the present day struggle and inspire prophetic action. His life’s work does not just demonstrate that we can build this bridge, but that we must, for the integrity of our faith and its call to justice. It is an intersection that enriches both our grasp of the historic texts and our commitment to current struggle. In Ched’s hands this process is never theoretical, but embodied, wading deep into the bible, but just as deeply into social change movements so that we’re grounded in, both rooted in story and struggle.