Jeannie hails from the lush suburbs of San Diego, where it is just as common to see birds of paradise growing along the freeway as it is to see a gleaming red arrow pointing you to hamburger heaven, otherwise known as In-N-Out. By the time she graduated high school, the comforts of home proved to be too, well, comfortable! And so she left to brave the frigid winters of Pittsburgh, where she studied English literature and professional writing at Carnegie Mellon University. After four years, the masochist in her decided she needed to subject herself to more bad weather, and so she moved to Wheaton, Ill., to study American church history at Wheaton College. There she learned that while cold is bad, cold plus wind is even worse. She returned home, hung up her down parka, and finally entered the working world as an editor at Outreach Magazine and youth pastor at Temecula Calvary Korean Church. After many late deadline nights and trips to Pinkberry with her students, God called her to Sojourners in Washington, D.C. She couldn’t be happier.
These days, Jeannie spends most of her time fiddling with syntax, thinking up new web initiatives, and learning from veteran Sojourners editors. Her idea of a perfect afternoon includes black coffee, a good book, and her magnificent sister.
Posts By This Author
Changes in Attitude
DURING STEVE SLAGG’S freshman year at Wheaton College in Illinois, a gay-rights advocacy group called Soulforce announced that it was embarking on a nationwide bus tour of conservative Christian colleges that had campus policies against homosexuality to facilitate some of the first open conversations about lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) people. Wheaton College was one of their stops.
“We were talking a lot on campus about Soulforce and what we were going to do about them,” remembers Slagg about the spring 2006 tour. “It felt like nobody was really aware of the fact that there were people in this community who were gay.”
So Slagg decided to come out. He started with friends and classmates, but he also spoke with campus groups, and he held a meeting on his dormitory floor. He was interviewed in the campus paper, The Record, under the headline “Gay at Wheaton,” and numerous classmates approached him for private coffeehouse conversations around campus.
The pressure and attention grew to be too much, and Slagg quickly receded into normal campus life.
But during Slagg’s senior year, after feeling as though the conversations around homosexuality on campus had not changed, he wrote an essay for a new campus literary journal, The Pub, about being gay at Wheaton. “We exist,” he declared. “The most harmful and pervasive lie I’ve encountered at Wheaton has been that homosexual students either don’t exist at Wheaton or aren’t worth considering. Outrageously enough, I believed this lie for most of my freshman year.”
A Mason of Peace
An Arab Christian works -- person by person and block by block -- to bring Muslims and Christians together in Jordan.
Friday Links Round Up: Free Starbucks. London. Farewell.
Here's a little round up of links from around the Web you may have missed this week:
- Sandwich coasters are fun.
- Guy lets the world use his Starbucks card for free.
- Voters put corn kernels into jars with their favorite Republican presidential candidates.
Friday Links Round Up: World Travel. Bon Iver. Google Earth.
Friday Links Round Up: Wealth Gap. Tattoos. The Horn of Africa.
Friday Links Round Up: Swampy Monster. Jane Austen. John Mayer.
Here's a little round up of links from around the Web you may have missed this week:
- Our prayers extend to the people of Norway. Lord, have mercy.
- Why voter ID laws will disenfranchise women. (HT: Kristof)
- The New York Times said it best. Today's weather "felt more like being licked by a big, swampy monster."
- Who wrote what? Rep. West vs. Jane Austen.
- These awesome folks turned Carmageddon into a dinner party.
Friday Links Round Up: Cookies. Dads. Harry Potter.
- How do you like your chocolate chip cookies? (Personally, I prefer thick, chewy, and not too sweet.)
- Are you a stay-at-home dad?
- Learn more about new media and faith.
- Religious groups are part of the suit against Alabama immigration law (hat tip: CCIR).
- The changing face of AIDS.
Friday Links Round Up: Puppies. Sudan. Atlantis.
Puppies. Sudan. Atlantis. Here's a little round up of links from around the Web you may have missed this week:
- Friends don't let friends drink and buy puppies.
- Be in prayer for South Sudan, which becomes an independent nation tomorrow.
Friday Links Round Up: Moldy Toast. Carp Attack. E-Verify.
Moldy Toast. Carp Attack. E-Verify. Here's a little round up of links from around the Web you may have missed this week:
- Moldy toast like you've never seen it before.
- Save our inboxes! Sign on to the Email Charter.
A Web of Power
How online tools are transforming the way social change happens.
Friday Links Round Up: Asians. Bumper Stickers. Levitation.
Friday Links Round Up: Japan. Pastors. Surfing.
Audio Interview with Bernard Lafayette
In 1958, Bernard Lafayette was 19 years old and a student at American Baptist College in Nashville, Tennessee, when his life changed.
Friday Links Round Up: The Onion. Palin. Pick Our Cover.
The Onion. Palin. Pick Our Cover. Here's a little round up of links from around the Web you may have missed this week:
- Onion-like headlines in real life.
- Speaking of The Onion: literally unbelievable.
- Reality check: You are enormously insignificant.
- UN Report: Internet access is a human right.
- "Dear Children of Troy: Read. Read. Read. Read. Read. Read. That's the advice of your good friend, Dr. Seuss."
- Help us stay, Mr. President.
- The Palin emails.
- Innovations to help African farmers thrive.
- Eboo Patels' most cringe-worthy question: Why don't Muslims denounce terrorism more?
- Which cover do you like better? Help Sojourners magazine pick!
Freedom Fighter
Freedom Fighter
Bernard Lafayette, a leader in the civil rights movement and teacher of nonviolence, discusses lunch counter sit-ins, Martin Luther King Jr., and the challenges and victories of nonviolent movement.
Friday Links Round Up: Awesome people. Vegetarians. Going mute.
Awesome people. Vegetarians. Going mute. Here's a little round up of links from around the Web you may have missed this week:
- Awesome people hanging out together.
- An alternative to abortion.
- Take a walk in Milan.
- Are you a new vegetarian? Some tips.
- Tom Hanks addresses Yale graduates.
- Kathy Khang shares more about her experience with depression.
- Simple and powerful: forgive.
- Don't you sometimes wish you could just hit the mute button?
- Sojourners' Enuma Okoro on Pentecost:
"Pentecost is God's 'show-and-tell' lesson that after the incarnation no one people has a purchase on the fullness of God. No single denomination, no one race, no one ethnicity, and no one socioeconomic group mediates God's fullness to the world. Diversity is an essential attribute of a Spirit-filled church (Acts 2:8,18)."
Friday Links Round Up: School Lunch. Commencement. Women.
Here’s a little round up of links from around the Web you may have missed this week:
- School lunches from around the world.
- Imagine an America in which all-female families survived the depression.
- Sheryl Sandberg, COO of Facebook, on Why Women Should Be In Charge.
- Speaking of commencement speeches, here are excerpts from Aron Ralston’s speech at my alma mater: “May your boulders be your blessings.“
- Fresh out of college, women still make less than men.
- Saudi women driving in protest.
- Withdrawal from Afghanistan gains congressional support.
- Want to work at Sojourners?
Friday Links Round Up: Ice Cream. Capitalism. The End of the World.
Here's a little round up of links from around the Web you may have missed this week:
- One in four children in the United States are in poverty.
- Ben&Jerry's Ben Cohen talks to Sojourners about ice cream, oreos, and military spending.
- Female college graduates are getting paid less than their male peers.
- Is Capitalism's popularity waning?
- If your house was burning, what would you take with you? (My house almost burned down once. I had time to grab my computer, family photos, and a signed copy of Deadeye Dick.)
- Any winos out there?
- Have you ever been to Paris?
- I remain obsessed with tiny living. (Amazing!)
- Cathleen Falsani on the end of the world.
Friday Links Round Up: Tomatoes. Uganda. Fair Trade.
Tomatoes. Uganda. Fair Trade. Here's a little round up of links from around the Web you may have missed this week:
- Are you living in a food desert? Here's a map that will tell you.
- Stop the hate in Uganda.
- This Saturday is World Fair Trade day. (What is fair trade, you ask?)
- The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops asks Senator John Boehner for a budget that "reduces future deficits, protects the poor and vulnerable people, advances the common good, and promotes human life and dignity."
- Continue praying for Egypt.
- Mark Bittman visits Immakolee, Florida, America's tomato capital.
- Easy Korean cooking for beginners.
- A cheerful video for you: coffee time.