On the cusp of Pride month, Uganda's President Yoweri Museveni signed one of the world's toughest anti-LGBTQ laws, including the death penalty for "aggravated homosexuality", drawing Western condemnation and risking sanctions from aid donors. Same-sex relations were already illegal in Uganda, as in more than 30 African countries, but the new law goes further. It stipulates capital punishment for "serial offenders" against the law and transmission of a terminal illness like HIV/AIDS through gay sex. It also decrees a 20-year sentence for "promoting" homosexuality. Given the news, our episode this week is a re-release of a conversation we had with Samson Turinawe. Samson is the Executive Director of the Universal Love Alliance, a grassroots organization in Uganda which advocates for LGBTQ people.A Ugandan humanitarian, educator and human rights defender. He believes that "every human being should be respected simply for being who they are, a part of Life's creation." Tolerance, inclusiveness, love, compassion, dialogue, and reconciliation are all central themes in his work. Through his teaching and activism, he emphasizes that “ignorance can be defeated through education, poverty through hard work and possession of capital, and internal schisms and separatism through unity. Samson is working for a new generation -- one that is open-minded, open-hearted, diversity-embracing, and committed to serving all of humanity.You can find out more about his work here.And go to http://www.crackersandgrapcejuice.com to find other episodes and to support the show.

Our guests this week are Joshua Chatraw and Mark Allen, coauthors of the new book, The Augustine Way: Retrieving a Vision for the Church’s Apologetic Witness. Chatraw and Allen are the authors as well of the award-winning Apologetics at the Cross (an Outreach magazine and Gospel Coalition Resource of the Year). In this new book, they recover Augustine's mature apologetic voice to address the challenges facing today's church. The Augustine Way offers a compelling argument for Christian witness that is rooted in tradition and engaged with contemporary culture. It focuses on Augustine's best-known works, Confessions and The City of God, to retrieve his scriptural and ecclesial approach for a holistic apologetic witness. Joshua is a professor at Beeson Divinity School in Birmingham, Alabama and Mark is professor biblical and theological studies at Liberty University in Lynchburg, Virginia.

Our guest this week is fellow Mockingbird writer Duo Dickinson. Duo is an American architect who has built over 500 projects in 10 states over 30 years. His work has received more than 30 awards. His design work has appeared in over 70 publications including The New York Times, Architectural Record and House Beautiful. He has written six books, including Small Houses for the Next Century and Expressive Details for McGraw-Hill and The House You Build, published by Taunton Press and as a paperback entitled House On A Budget. His book, Staying Put, received positive reviews in The Washington Post and The New York Times, among other publications. Dickinson is a contributing writer for Mockingbird, Common Edge, and Hearst Publications. He is a contributing writer on home design for Money Magazine. He blogs at Saved By Design: https://savedbydesign.wordpress.com The post he reads and discusses in the episode: https://savedbydesign.wordpress.com/2023/05/10/when-god-was-not-there/ His professional website: http://www.duodickinson.com

Our guest today is Sarah Hinlicky Wilson. Sarah is the Founder of Thornbush Press, launched in 2020, and author of a number of books under its imprint: I Am a Brave Bridge, Sermon on the Mount: A Poetic Paraphrase, Small Catechism: Memorizing Edition, Pearly Gates: Parables from the Final Threshold, To Baptize or Not to Baptize: A Practical Guide for Clergy, and A-Tumblin’ Down.Since August 2018 she has lived in Mitaka, Japan, on the campus of Japan Lutheran College and Theological Seminary, where her husband Andrew L. Wilson is Professor of Church History. She serves as one of the pastors at Tokyo Lutheran Church near the Shin-Ōkubo station in central Tokyo. She is also an Affiliated Faculty Member at the Johannelund School of Theology in Uppsala, Sweden.From July 2016 to July 2018 she lived in St. Paul, Minnesota, getting reacquainted with her home territory in between international sojourns. During that period she wrote a memoir about the year she spent in the newborn Republic of Slovakia when she was 17.From 2008 to 2016 she lived in Strasbourg, France, where she worked at the Institute for Ecumenical Research, a close affiliate of the Lutheran World Federation, specializing in Eastern Orthodoxy and Pentecostalism. She continuse to serve as a Visiting Professor of the Institute and, as such, the Consultant to the International Lutheran-Pentecostal Dialogue. With her colleague Theodor Dieter from the Institute, she teaches an annual course in Wittenberg, Germany, on Martin Luther’s theology.In 2010, Andrew and she followed the footsteps of Martin Luther’s pilgrimage from Germany to Rome five hundred (or maybe four hundred ninety-nine) years earlier.She earned a Ph.D. in Systematic Theology in 2008 and an M.Div. in 2003 at Princeton Theological Seminary. During that time, Andrew and Sarah got married and became parents to Zeke. She served as pastor at a Slovak-American church in Trenton, New Jersey, and became the editor of Lutheran Forum, an independent theological quarterly, which she continued to do until the end of 2018. All her articles from that period are available here.Before graduate school she spent one year working at First Things, where she first started publishing theological essays. Since her first in October 1998, she has published hundreds of articles in popular venues like Christianity Today, The Christian Century, and Books & Culture, as well as scholarly journals like Pro Ecclesia, Pneuma, Lutheran Quarterly, and Concordia Journal. She has edited four books and contributed to a few more.She did her growing up in New York and New Jersey and still thinks of herself as a New Yorker, even though she hasn’t lived there since the last millennium.

For our episdoe today, we have a panel discussion that Jason moderated at St. Louis University for Dr. Ruben Rosario Rodriguez’s new book, Theological Fragments: Confessing What We Know and Cannot Know about an Infinite God.The interlocutors were:Nichole Flores, Associate Professor of Religious Studies at the University of Virginia and author of The Aesthetics of Solidarity: Our Lady of Guadalupe and American Democracy.Scott Paeth, Professor of Religious Studies and Peace, Justice, and Conflict Studies at DePaul University and coeditor of Shaping Public Theology: Selections from the Writings of Max L. StackhouseAristotle Papanikolaou, Archbishop Demetrios Chair in Orthodox Theology and Culture at Fordham University and author of The Mystical as Political

Our guest today is Trevin Wax.Trevin is vice president of research and resource development at the North American Mission Board and a visiting professor at Cedarville University. A former missionary to Romania, Trevin is a regular columnist at The Gospel Coalition and has contributed to The Washington Post, Religion News Service, World, and Christianity Today, which named him one of 33 millennials shaping the next generation of evangelicals. He has taught courses on mission and ministry at Wheaton College and has lectured on Christianity and culture at Oxford University. He is a founding editor of The Gospel Project, and the author of multiple books, including The Thrill of Orthodoxy, Rethink Your Self, This Is Our Time, and Gospel Centered Teaching.Every generation faces the temptation to wander from orthodoxy―to seek out the jolt that comes with false teaching, and to drift with cultural currents. And so every generation must be awakened again to the thrill of orthodoxy, and experience the astonishment that comes from stumbling afresh upon the electrifying paradoxes at the heart of the Christian faith.In The Thrill of Orthodoxy, Trevin Wax turns the tables on those who believe Christian teaching is narrow and outdated. Returning to the church's creeds, he explains what orthodoxy is and why we can have proper confidence in it, and lays out common ways we can stray from it. By showing how heresies are always actually narrower than orthodoxy―taking one aspect of the truth and wielding it as a weapon against others―Wax shows us that false teaching ultimately proves bland and boring, and that orthodoxy is where true adventure can be found.

This week we are talking with Zac Hics. He is the pastor of Church of the Cross in Birmingham, Alambama, adjunct lecturer in musc and worship at Samford University, and author of The Worship Pastor: A Call to Ministry for Worship Leaders and Teams. Zac in on to talk about his book Worship by Faith Alone: Thomas Cranmer, The Book of Common Prayer and the Reformation of Liturgy.

Cornelius Plantinga is an American theologian and most recently a seminary president. His new book Under the Wings of God shows us how to read scripture devotionally. About the book: Longing. Hope. Love. Fear.These are just some of the experiences embodied in the infinitely rich Christian life. In Under the Wings of God, seasoned author Cornelius Plantinga explores these facets and more, reflecting on the joys and challenges of a life following God.Rooted in Scripture, this book offers wisdom about topics including the problem of suffering, the nature of Christian virtue, love of God and our neighbor, longing for redemption and reconciliation, humility, and hospitality. Plantinga delves into hard questions with a calm and pastoral authority that offers the perfect antidote for the unrest in the world and the church right now. Each reflection is presented with a Bible text and a brief prayer, useful for personal devotions or small group discussions. Listeners will emerge with a deeper understanding of and appreciation for the Christian life, equipped with timeless insights into the ups and downs of a life lived in the presence of God.

Our friend, Dr. Ken Jones, the Gerharde Forde Professor of Theology at Grandview University, joins Jason, Johanna, and Teer to reflect on the crucifixion.

Our guest this week is my friend Sarah S. Scherschligt, pastor of Peace Lutheran Church in Alexandria, Virginia. She comes on the pod to talk about climate change, despair and hope, and her new book chronicling her work to pastor during the pandemic. In March 2020, when COVID-19 changed our world, Washington D.C.-based pastor and writer Sarah Scherschligt posted a brief, thoughtful reflection on social media to comfort her reeling community. The next night, she did it again.For thirteen months, during the exceptional stretch of days from March 2020 to April 2021, Scherschligt published her reflections daily, offering deep spiritual insights as a progressive Lutheran pastor and mother. For the members of her community and congregation who read them in real time, Scherschligt’s reflections were an anchor and balm—a nightly benediction, offering comfort, wisdom, and hope.Her reflections are now compiled into a book, God Holds You: A Pandemic Chronicle. Part memoir, part social commentary, part Biblical interpretation, God Holds You addresses not only faith during the COVID-19 pandemic, but the social upheaval of the time, including the struggle for racial justice, the January 6th insurrection, and the deepening environmental crisis. With wit and wisdom, Scherschligt also recounts familiar aspects of daily life during that lock-down year, such as virtual kindergarten, countless Zoom meetings, and vigorous handwashing.God Holds You: A Pandemic Chronicle adds depth and meaning to our collective remembering, encouraging readers to examine their own experience of the pandemic and to consider questions like: “Where did I find grace? How did my faith change? And how does the pandemic still affect me?” Pastors and preachers will appreciate Scherschligt’s creative application of Scripture. Church groups will use her insights as the basis for adult education sessions on how the pandemic affected communities of faith. And although she writes from a progressive Christian perspective, readers of all backgrounds and faiths will benefit from revisiting this remarkable time with Sarah Scherschligt as a guide.