Kenji Kuramitsu is a chaplain, clinical social worker, and fourth-generation Chicagoan. Kenji teaches ministry at McCormick Seminary, and serves as a community care chaplain for the Obama Foundation. Find him online @afreshmind.

Posts By This Author

'Parasite' Exposes Empty Promises of Trickle-Down Economics

by Kenji Kuramitsu 11-27-2019

Ki-woo (Choi Woo-shik) in Parasite. Credit: YouTube. 

Bong-Joon-ho’s film is about what happens to those living below sea level when the rain comes. 

Can a Digital Sacrament Still Impart Divine Grace?

by Kenji Kuramitsu 04-05-2019

Credit: Shutterstock

As Shamika and I called upon our own experiences in church and seminary, we became especially concerned with providing a resource for those who historically have been barred from participation at the Lord’s Table: the divorced, Christians of color, LGBTQ believers, those living far from physical community, or far from a church that is physically accessible. While we’re not trying to replace “brick and mortar” community, we believe God calls us beyond a spirit of fear in the face of innovations in technology.

4 Lenten Hashtag Curators Share Their Theologies of Resistance

by Kenji Kuramitsu 04-05-2017

Can Christians observe Lent in a way that ties social justice consciousness to spiritual Lenten practices of repentance, resistance, and solidarity? The curators of four social media campaigns — #LentenLament, #LentLite, #EmbodiedSolidarity, and #DetoxifyChristianity — are exploring what this looks like in public. “What does it mean to come together, to lock arms together, to really just stand in the gap for people?” Alicia Crosby, executive director of the Center for Inclusivity and co-curator of last year’s #EmbodiedSolidarity campaign, asked.

The Theology of Suspicion: What ‘Get Out’ Can Teach White Christians

by Kenji Kuramitsu 03-17-2017

We can hope, work, and pray for the day when Christians of all colors might be reconciled to one another in peace. In the meantime, Get Out reminds us that white people, especially those who claim to love us, must do better.

The Lasting Trauma of Japanese American Incarceration

by Kenji Kuramitsu 02-16-2017
75 Years After Executive Order 9066

Japanese American families form a line outside Civil Control Station located in the Japanese American Citizens League Auditorium at 2031 Bush Street in San Francisco to appear for "processing" in response to Civilian Exclusion Order Number 20 in 1942.

On Feb. 19, 1942, President Franklin D. Roosevelt empowered military commanders to execute the “forced evacuation” of anyone with Japanese ancestry from the West Coast of the United States. This order set in motion a mass incarceration that would sweep tens of thousands of people, most of them American citizens, into concentration camps throughout the country’s inland regions.