Editor, Sojourners magazine

Julie has been a member of the Sojourners magazine editorial staff since 1990. For the last several years she has edited the award-winning Culture Watch section of the magazine. In her time at Sojourners she has written about a wide variety of political and cultural topics, from the abortion debate to the working class blues. She has coordinated in-depth coverage of Flannery O’Connor, campaign finance reform, Howard Thurman, the labor movement, and much more.

She studied English literature at Ohio State University and has an M.T.S. (focused on language and narrative theology) from Boston University and an M.F.A. in creative nonfiction from George Mason University.

Julie grew up on a farm in the northwest corner of Ohio. She has been fascinated by the power of religious expression in and through culture since she can remember. Obsessively listening to her older sister’s copy of the Jesus Christ Superstar cast recording when she was 10 was an especially crystallizing experience. In addition, Julie’s mother often argued about doctrine and the Bible and took her at least weekly to the public library, both of which were useful background for Julie’s current work.

She lives in the Columbia Heights neighborhood of Washington, D.C. and is a member of St. Margaret’s Episcopal Church (where she had an unlikely four-year reign as rummage sale czarina). Her personal interests overlap nicely with her professional ones: Music, books, reading entertainment, culture, and religion writing, art, architecture, TV, films, and knowing more celebrity gossip than is probably wise or healthy. To make up for all that screen time, she tries to grow things, hike occasionally, and wonder often at the night sky.

Some Sojourners articles by Julie Polter:

Replacing Songs with Silence
Censorship, banning, blacklists: What’s lost when governments stifle musical expression?

Extreme Community
A glimpse of grace and abundance from - of all things - reality TV.

The Cold Reaches of Heaven
Nobel Prize-winning physicist Bill Phillips talks about his faith.

Just Stop It
Daring to believe in a life without logos. An interview with journalist Naomi Klein.

Called to Stand with Workers

Women and Children First
Developing a common agenda to make abortion rare.

Obliged to See God (on Flannery O’Connor)

Posts By This Author

When Vulnerability Is No Act of God

by Julie Polter 03-01-2010
Long-term partnerships and deep relationships must be at the heart of the rebuilding effort in Haiti.

Dangerous Denial

by Julie Polter 01-01-2010

Bald-faced lies about global warming.

Gut-Level Healing

by Julie Polter 08-01-2009

We can overcome obstetric fistula.

Bridge Over Troubled Waters

by Julie Polter 06-01-2009

A promising new movement leaves the bumper-sticker platitudes behind and offers the potential to actually reduce abortion.

Catholic Benedictine sister Adrienne Kaufmann

by Julie Polter 06-01-2009
on the nitty-gritty work of seeking common ground on abortion

Shedding 'Pro-Choice' and 'Pro-Life' Labels

by Julie Polter 05-21-2009
In his http://www.whitehouse.gov/the_press_office/Remarks-by-the-President-at-N..." href="https://sojo.net/%3Ca%20href%3D"http://www.whitehouse.gov/the_press_office/Remarks-by-the-President-at-Notre-">http://www.whitehouse.gov/the_press_office/Remarks-by-the-President-at-N...

Why a Green Economy

by Julie Polter 05-01-2009
Amid deepening poverty and a crashing ecosystem, we need a new way of doing business.

Don't Lose Hope

by Julie Polter 12-01-2008
Five things we must do now for Darfur and Congo.

Re-Rooting Ourselves in God

by Julie Polter 12-01-2008

Being vessels of that perfect love that casts out fear.

Make Something Money Can't Buy (Glue Gun Optional)

by Julie Polter 11-19-2008

Why Bother?

by Julie Polter 09-01-2008
Kathleen Norris explores how an ancient concept of spiritual malaise speaks to us today.

Extreme Charity

by Julie Polter 05-01-2008
For members of the philanthropic group Bolder Giving, generosity pays.

Fiscal Spirituality

by Julie Polter 05-01-2008
Serving God with your money, in boom times and bust.

Kitchen-Table Giving

by Julie Polter 04-01-2008

Who needs a charity ball when you can have a potluck?

'If Such Women Should Rise!'

by Julie Polter 12-01-2007

The prophetic voice of abolitionist Maria W. Stewart.

'Child Brides: Stolen Lives' on NOW Tonight

by Julie Polter 10-12-2007

Mamta, a winsome, wide-eyed girl of 12 moves through her daily chores in a poor household in India. Although still a child, her life has little play, and she will too soon be bearing the full responsibilities and burdens of an adult woman: Mamta was married at the age of 7. At puberty she will quit school and move to the house of her husband, who she's had no contact with since her wedding night [...]

Spare Change and Social Change

by Julie Polter 04-01-2007
Individual efforts and social responsibility go hand-in-hand.

Attack of the Monster Houses

by Julie Polter 03-01-2007
Why do Americans want to live so large?

Family Matters

by Julie Polter 01-01-2007

How to defend the family more.

Widening The Heart

by Julie Polter 08-01-2006

Like a cluster of traffic cops, insurance adjusters, and whiplash lawyers at a multicar pileup, writers of all sorts are trying to make sense of the dangerous intersection of faith and politics in