My favorite place in the Sojourners’ Fellowship house is the chair by the window. Each morning, I tiptoe through the dark house, flip on a lamp, and turn on the kettle. I center myself in the lingering darkness of the previous night.
Most English translations of the Bible use exclusively masculine pronouns to refer to God, and the presumed maleness of God has become the default mindset of many Christians. But does the precedence of masculine pronouns require Christians to refer to God only with masculine pronouns forever?
In January 2020, COVID-19 was first detected in United States. In the two years since, we’ve experienced death and mourning on a massive scale, lost relationships over politically driven misinformation about the deadly virus, and felt constant fear and anxiety as we try to protect ourselves and our loved ones. This trauma has shaken many to their spiritual core in ways that will leave lasting effects. As the omicron variant rips through communities, I’ve heard many people express feelings of resignation. Helplessness. Hopelessness. And given how trauma works, we shouldn't be surprised when notice ourselves experiencing these feelings, even in our churches.
I believe the material histories and needs of marginalized people demand structural change and not merely a “seat at the table.” As ethnic studies professor Jodi Kim summarizes, “one does not have to be cynical to observe that this liberal or corporate multiculturalism, with its politics of symbolic, imagistic, or cultural representation has replaced, rather than complemented, substantive political representation or redistribution of wealth and power.” The language of representation can present progress but in reality, it is the path toward homogenization.
Pope Francis said on Wednesday that parents of LGBTQ children should not condemn them but offer them support. He spoke in unscripted comments at his weekly audience in reference to difficulties that parents can face in raising offspring.
As part of the Catonsville Nine, the rebel priest Daniel Berrigan joined eight other Catholic activists in setting fire to hundreds of draft files with homemade napalm. It was 1968 and he was protesting the Vietnam War. The way he evaded prison was perhaps as memorable as the crime he committed.
For most folks, Christian nonviolence evokes unified images of civil rights marches, Vietnam War resisters, and bumper stickers calling us to “turn the other cheek” or “beat swords into plowshares.” Yet Christian nonviolence isn’t a single school of thought, “but rather a rich conversation wrestling with what it means to live out the biblical call to justice amid the complexities of ever-changing political, social, and moral situations.”
On Jan. 15, a gunman held four hostages in a standoff that lasted around 11 hours at Colleyville’s Congregation Beth Israel, a synagogue northeast of Fort Worth not affiliated with Kutner’s. The FBI said Friday it is considering the incident a terrorist act and hate crime.
Paul offers a reflection on accountability and community care when he uses the metaphor of a body for the community, writing, “If one member suffers, all suffer together with it; if one member is honored, all rejoice together with it” (1 Corinthians 12:26). Accountability requires seeing that we all belong to one another as members of the human community. This is why efforts to distinguish between the vaccinated and unvaccinated, the “healthy” and the “disabled,” the “deserving” and “undeserving” is antithetical to an ethic of accountability.