Freedom Road Podcast

On this episode we are joined by Sibil Fox and Rob Richardson, featured in the award-winning Amazon documentary, Time, which is now published as an incredible book that tells more of the story. Fox and Rob are a formerly incarcerated couple. Fox served 7 years and Rob did 21 years time behind bars in Angola prison in Louisiana. Lisa invited Fox and Rob on the program because they learned something about resilience, they learned something about our broken justice system, they learned something about grace—doing all that time.We’d love to hear your thoughts. Tweet Lisa at @LisaSHarper or Freedom Road at @FREEDOMROADUS. And, keep sharing the podcast with your friends and networks and letting us know what you think!www.amazon.com/Time-Fox-Rich/dp/B08J7DDGJYfoxandrob.comtwitter.com/lisasharpertwitter.com/FreedomRoadus

On this episode we are joined by Dr. Michael Emerson, renowned sociologist and Head of the Department of Sociology at University of Illinois, author of the landmark sociological study on evangelicals and race, Divided by Faith.In the context of the rise of white Christian nationalism—and the shameless claiming of that moniker by a growing gaggle of politicians— we invited Dr. Emerson to Freedom Road, because Lisa was blown away by a talk that he gave based on his most recent study of the white evangelical religion. There are things that he and his team found that are both clarifying and really scary.We’d love to hear your thoughts. Tweet Lisa @LisaSHarper or Freedom Road at @FREEDOMROADUS. And, keep sharing the podcast with your friends and networks and letting us know what you think!www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/273885.Divided_by_Faithtwitter.com/lisasharpertwitter.com/FreedomRoadus

This month we are joined by Natasha Sistrunk Robinson, T3 Leadership Solutions, founder and cochair of Leadership Links. Most noted for her book, A Sojourners Truth and Mentor for Life. Natasha’s latest project brought together a bunch of dynamic women writers to contribute to Voices of Lament: Reflections on Brokenness and Hope in a World Longing for Justice.Natasha was invited to speak with us because Voices of Lament lifts the curtain to help us see past the white veneer of the evangelical church—to see its impact on women of faith—of color.We’d love to hear your thoughts. Tweet to Lisa @LisaSHarper or to Freedom Road at @FREEDOMROADUS. And, keep sharing the podcast with your friends and networks and letting us know what you think!Join us on a journey through the power and the practice of Faith-Rooted Organizingwww.t3leadershipsolutions.comwww.leadershiplinksinc.org/homewww.ivpress.com/a-sojourner-s-truthwww.natashasrobinson.com/voicesoflamentasistasjourney.com/2021/04/29/a-black-woman-at-war/#contenttwitter.com/lisasharpertwitter.com/FreedomRoadusfreedomroad.us/downloads/the-power-and-practice-of-faith-rooted-organizing

This month we are joined by Michelle Ferrigno Warren, President and CEO of Virago Strategies, a consulting group that provides strategic direction and project management for civic engagement campaigns alongside communities affected by racial and economic injustice. Michelle's new book, JOIN THE RESISTANCE: STEP INTO THE GOOD WORK OF KINGDOM JUSTICE, offers a roadmap into the movement for so many of you who are looking around and saying how can I help make difference?We’d love to hear your thoughts. Tweet Lisa @LisaSHarper or Freedom Road at @FREEDOMROADUS. And, keep sharing the podcast with your friends and networks and letting us know what you think!https://michelleferrignowarren.com/https://michelleferrignowarren.com/join-the-resistance/https://twitter.com/lisasharperhttps://twitter.com/FreedomRoaduswww.instagram.com/lisasharper/Please join us at Justice Revival:https://justicerevival.org/donate/

This month we are in conversation with Rev. Dr. Alexia Salvatierra and Brandon Wrencher. Dr. Alexia, a national leader in faith engagement in immigrant justice for decades, is the dean of Centro Latino and associate professor of integral mission and global transformation at Fuller Theological Seminary. Brandon Wrencher is a minister, community organizer, teacher and facilitator whose work falls in the intersection of decolonizing church, contemplative activism and local presence to build beloved communities. www.fuller.edu/centro-latino/www.goodneighbormovement.org/leadershipwww.instagram.com/goodneighbormovement/twitter.com/lisasharperwww.instagram.com/lisasharper/

This month Lisa Sharon Harper is joined by Kamal Bell, founding owner of Sankofa Farms. The goal of Sankofa Farms is to create a sustainable food source for ethnic minorities in both rural and urban areas located in Durham and Orange County, North Carolina. We invited Kamal to come speak with us because his work offers a way forward toward repair of what racial hierarchy broke in the world.www.sankofafarmsllc.com/www.instagram.com/sankofafarms/twitter.com/lisasharperwww.instagram.com/lisasharper/

This month we are joined by Robert Draper, New York Times Magazine political journalist to discuss his most recent article: “The Arizona Republican Party’s Anti-Democracy Experiment”. Apart from being a regular commentator on MSNBC, CNN and Washington Journal, among others, Draper is also the author of several books, including his most recent bombshell, To Start a War: How the Bush Administration Took America into Iraq (2000).  In Robert Draper's essay on the Arizona GOP’s Anti-Democracy Experiment, he goes under the hood and explains how it all happened. And given the fact that we are about a month away from one of the most consequential elections in American history, we had to get Robert’s take on how we understand what’s going down and the stakes for our nation.www.nytimes.com/2022/08/15/magazine/arizona-republicans-democracy.htmltwitter.com/DraperRoberttwitter.com/lisasharper

This month, we feature an episode from a new podcast featuring Freedom Road's Lisa Sharon Harper: The FOUR. You can check out other episodes of The FOUR at thefour.black.Few have worked harder to cut and mend the ties between oppressor and oppressed than the one and only Ruby Nell Sales. The FOUR are honored to be joined by this iconic human rights activist, public theologian, and social critic.Ms. Sales’ long fight for freedom began in the 1960s with the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, SNCC, at Tuskegee University, as a student freedom fighter in Lowndes County, Alabama. And it nearly got her assassinated. Jonathan Daniels, a white freedom worker from Episcopal Divinity School in Cambridge, Massachusetts, pulled Sales out of the line of fire. But Daniels was shot and killed. The assailant was acquitted by an all white jury.Ms. Sales witnesses profound strength in the American Black family, including her own. But for too many people of African descent, family stories were buried as a strategy to conquer us, and that toll remains to this day. It’s something TheFour’s Lisa Sharon Harper has taken on, documenting this nation’s history through a richly researched 10 generations of her family story—Black, white and Native American—in her newest book, Fortune: How Race Broke My Family and the World and How to Repair It All. Like Harper’s family story, Mama Ruby calls for repair through truth-telling, reparation and a measure of forgiveness to cut the ties that still bind.

This month, we feature an episode from a new podcast featuring Freedom Road's Lisa Sharon Harper: The FOUR. You can check out other episodes of The FOUR at thefour.black.Kristin Kobes Du Mez catapulted to the top of the best-seller list with her book, Jesus and John Wayne. A leading church historian, she joins The FOUR in a real eye-opener for the team. Kristin pulls back the curtain on conservative white evangelical America to give us a behind-the-scenes look at the white evangelical movement, what got us to January 6th, and where we may go next. In sum, at times The FOUR were left speechless. 

This month, Americans will pause to commemorate the day when the last enslaved African Americans were notified that they had been set free, on June 19, 1865 (two and a half years after the Emancipation Proclamation). In this context, Lisa Sharon Harper and Cole Arthur Riley (author of This Here Flesh, creator @BlackLiturgies on Instagram) reflect on the impact of 400 years of subjugation on Black flesh and Black souls. Listen as Cole taps into the spirituality of her father and grandmother to find the resilience needed for the next leg of the journey.