The online editorial staff comprises Betsy Shirley, Jenna Barnett, Josiah R. Daniels, Mitchell Atencio, Heather Brady, Kierra Bennning, and Zachary Lee.
Posts By This Author
Weekly Wrap 1.11.19: The 10 Best Stories You Missed This Week
Impact of the shutdown, marginal tax rates, Opus Dei, app accessibility, Cyntoia Brown’s clemency, and more!
At Golden Globes, Regina King Challenges Industry to Hire More Women
While accepting a Golden Globe last night, actress Regina King made “a vow” to hire “50 percent women” on every project she produces in the next two years.
Tennessee Governor Commutes the Life Sentence of Cyntoia Brown, Orders Early Release
![](https://sojo.net/sites/default/files/styles/large_square/public/blog/screen_shot_2019-01-07_at_1.19.59_pm.png?itok=76vxoDF7)
Image via PBS documentary, Me Facing Life: Cyntoia's Story
Tennessee Gov, Bill Haslam commuted the sentence of Cyntoia Brown Monday morning, the Tennesean reports. Haslam has ordered Brown’s early release set for Aug. 7, after 15 years in prison. Brown is an alleged sex trafficking victim who, at age 16, killed a 43-year-old man who had picked her up and taken her to his home.
Weekly Wrap 1.4.19: The 10 Best Stories You Missed This Week
1. The Border Wall Fight at the Center of the Government Shutdown, Explained
Steel slats, concrete, walls and fences: here’s what Trump actually wants to build, and what Congress might be willing to pay for.
2. Fashioning a New Congress: What This Freshman Class Wears to Work Matters More Than Ever
“They are unafraid to wear their identities on their sleeves, helping to mark a striking shift in how politicians—and specifically, women in politics—have traditionally been expected to present.”
Weekly Wrap 12.28.18: The 10 Best Stories You Missed This Week
A look back at Sojourners favorite stories in 2018, Lin-Manuel Miranda, modern parenting, and more on this week's Wrap!
Through Tragedy and Hope: A Sojourners Look Back at 2018's Top Stories
This year saw many of the president’s immigration-related campaign threats come to fruition. That came to a head in the late spring and early summer of 2018 as the administration implemented a policy of separating children from their parents at the border as they arrived to claim asylum. But, as Sojourners notes here, this crisis point was just one of many ongoing eruptions at our Southern border.
Amid such horrors in immigration policy, churches throughout the country stepped up in a resurgence of the 1980s-era Sanctuary Movement. In addition to accompanying immigrants to Immigration and Customs Enforcement appointments, training for interaction with ICE agents, and other active support measures, many churches — and synagogues and other houses of worship — are opening their sanctuaries to house people at risk of deportation.
Weekly Wrap 12.21.18: The 10 Best Stories You Missed This Week
Christmas at the border, winter solstice, Mary's Magnificat, top word of 2018, and more!
Merriam-Webster Names 'Justice' Top Word of 2018
“Justice” was on people’s hearts, minds, and search histories this year. The word was named Merriam-Webster’s "Word of the Year" for 2018 after being consulted by users 74 percent more than in 2017.
Weekly Wrap 12.14.18: The 10 Best Stories You Missed This Week
1. ‘Tis the Season: Here’s How Jesus Became So Widely Accepted as White
“White Jesus is so much more than an icon. It’s not neutral because it has been proliferated and it’s expanded in terms of its presence over centuries and it has been largely tied to what we call an imperial project. The agenda of a nation state.”
2. Cruel Messengers: The Street Preaching Industry
A look at the Street and Open-Air Preachers of America conference and how street preaching is an organized industry.
Immigration Activists Call for Shutdown of Growing Child Detention Center
The group, called Shut Tornillo Down Coalition, says that the center adds to the abuse of vulnerable children by imprisoning them and separating them from their families and causes them deep harm by compounding on already existent trauma.
Weekly Wrap 12.7.18: The 10 Best Stories You Missed This Week
1. VIDEO: The Church That Meets in a Parking Lot
Every year thousands of churches shutter their doors and die. But here's one congregation that found that shutting their doors — and destroying their building — gave them a new way to survive. Watch and learn more about Los Angeles First United Methodist Church.
2. He Built an Empire, With Detained Migrant Children as the Bricks
The New York Times does a deep dive on the founder of Southwest Key Programs, which has collected $1.7 billion in government contracts and houses more children who have crossed the border than any other detention group in the nation.
Interfaith Groups Call for Ceasefire and Humanitarian Aid in Yemen
The United Religions Initiative, The Charter of Compassion, and The Parliament of the World’s Religions released a joint statement yesterday calling for “an immediate cease-fire in the civil war between the Yemen government and the Houthis rebels.”
The letter states that aid workers from religious and humanitarian organizations have been restricted from administering food, water, shelter, and healthcare to 14 million people enduring a deadly famine.
Weekly Wrap 11.30.18: The 10 Best Stories You Missed This Week
1. Feds deport undocumented immigrant whose church supporters went to jail to protect him
Samuel Oliver-Bruno took refuge in a church basement for 11 months until he was detained during an appointment with immigration authorities last week.
2. At Capacity: Weaponizing Inefficiency at the Border
“The asylum process is inefficient, and no one has an incentive to fix it.”
Weekly Wrap 11.21.18: The 10 Best Stories You Missed This Week
1. How to Have a Conversation with Your Angry Uncle Over Thanksgiving
Get some practice, via the Angry Uncle Bot, courtesy of New York Times.
2. This Is the Face of the Reconquista
“They are too young to have heard how the words Mexican and American have used against one another. In their lives, they have been combined into one. The contours of their lives cross boundaries. The hard lines of difference and the borders of the past have not formed walls of divisions for them.”
Weekly Wrap 11.16.18: The 10 Best Stories You Missed This Week
1. Diversity as a Second Job
“ … factoring in the unpaid demands of work as unofficial diversity and inclusion liaisons, minority journalists might actually be working twice as hard for half as much money.”
2. Where We Start the Migration Story Matters
Many have focused on the arrival of the “caravan” of asylum seekers to the U.S. But we need to start at the beginning of the journey.
Weekly Wrap 11.9.18: The 10 Best Stories You Missed This Week
1. A List Of Firsts For Women In This Year's Midterm Elections
The next Congress will include the first Muslim women, the first Native American women, and the youngest woman ever elected to that body.
2. Exit Polls: How Voting Blocs Have Shifted From the ’80s to Now
Democrats won the House as voters across nearly all demographic groups moved to the left, especially women and young people, according to exit polls.
Weekly Wrap 11.2.18: The 10 Best Stories You Missed This Week
1. Last-Minute Tips for Figuring Out Your Ballot and Making Sure You Can Vote
The midterms are here. Here’s everything you need to know to hit the polls and cast an informed vote this election season.
2. We Are Watching: Lawyers & Collars
On Nov. 6, we'll be watching at the polls to ensure all have the right to vote. Here's how you can join us.
Weekly Wrap 10.26.18: The 10 Best Stories You Missed This Week
1. Trump Cannot Define Away my Existence
The administration seems to think transgender people like me are as imaginary as hippogriffs.
2. The Secret Anxiety of the Upwardly Mobile
Children who do better than their parents often must choose between blending in and standing out.
Eugene Peterson, author of 'The Message,' Dies at 85
Eugene Peterson, acclaimed author and pastor, died today at age 85.
Weekly Wrap 10.19.18: The 10 Best Stories You Missed This Week
The campaign wants to advance a new understanding of poverty as a traumatic experience inflicted by policy-makers.
An Evangelical Texan is now using her pulpit to fight Trumpism. Will her flock follow?