Reimagining the Good Life with Amy Julia Becker

What is a meaningful life? Does thinking about disability change your answer? Heather Lanier, author of Raising a Rare Girl, talks with Amy Julia about her daughter’s diagnosis and subsequent reactions from medical professionals, parents’ expectations for their children, the gift of vulnerability, the power of language, and the truth that love is stronger than fear.SHOW NOTES:Heather Lanier “is a poet, essayist, teacher, and speaker. An assistant professor of creative writing at Rowan University, she is the author of the memoir, Raising a Rare Girl.”Connect Online: Website: heatherlanierwriter.comFacebook: @heatherkirnlanierInstagram: @heatherklanierTwitter: @heatherklanierOn the Podcast:Heather’s book: Raising a Rare GirlAmy Julia’s book: A Good and Perfect GiftJesus says, “Do not be afraid.”____Season 5 of the Love Is Stronger Than Fear podcast connects to themes in my newest book, To Be Made Well, releasing Spring 2022...you can pre-order here! Learn more about my writing and speaking at amyjuliabecker.com.*A transcript of this episode will be available within one business day.We want to hear your thoughts. Send us a text!Connect with me: Instagram Facebook YouTube Website Thanks for listening!

It’s been a rough year. Protests, political division, a global pandemic. And our bodies ache. Our friendships feel strained. We’ve had too much to drink. We haven’t exercised enough. On a self-care level and a social-care level, we are not doing well. In the midst of all the personal and social turmoil, Season 5 of the Love is Stronger than Fear podcast begins next week. In this season, I’m looking for conversations about hope and healing. Not conversations that sugarcoat the hardship. Not conversations that substitute entertainment for real connection. But conversations that look at the hardship and hurt in order to name it and understand it so that we can move towards healing. Together. For this season of the Love is Stronger than Fear podcast, you can look forward to hearing from filmmakers and authors and practitioners about faith and healing, disability and healing, self-care and healing, and how we can begin to repair our social fabric. Our first episode will drop next Tuesday, September 7th. Do go ahead and subscribe wherever you get this podcast so you don’t miss an episode, and please spread the word about these conversations. And send me guest suggestions if you have them. My email is amyjuliabeckerwriter@gmail.com, or you can always fill out a contact form on my website amyjuliabecker.com.I look forward to this journey together into healing, wholeness, and hope. _____Season 5 of the Love Is Stronger Than Fear podcast connects to themes in my newest book, To Be Made Well, releasing Spring 2022...you can pre-order here! Learn more about my writing and speaking at amyjuliabecker.com.👁‍🗨Accessibility: You can read the transcript for this episode here via the transcript tab or view subtitles on my YouTube channel soon.We want to hear your thoughts. Send us a text!Connect with me: Instagram Facebook YouTube Website Thanks for listening!

Can peacemaking dismantle racism? Osheta Moore, author of Dear White Peacemakers, offers a warm and welcoming invitation to White people as she talks with Amy Julia about antiracism, the difference between peacekeeping and peacemaking, and the equalizing nature of our belovedness. Show Notes:“Osheta Moore is a writer, pastor, speaker, and podcaster in Saint Paul, Minnesota, as well as a mother of three and economic justice advocate for women in developing countries.” Preorder her book Dear White Peacemakers: Dismantling Racism with Grit and Grace.Connect Online:Website: osheta.comInstagram: @oshetamooreOn the Podcast:Osheta’s books: Dear White Peacemakers and Shalom SistasDear White Peacemakers podcastHow to Be an Antiracist and White Fragility Galatians 3:28, Ephesians 2:16Osheta’s IG post after Ahmaud Arbery video was releasedEnneagramPenny’s Down syndrome diagnosisAustin Channing Brown, Myisha T Hill, Latasha Morrison, Rachel Cargle“If Jesus actually calls us to be peacemakers, what does that look like, and how does that look in our everyday lives?”“If I really care about your belovedness, I’m going to invite you into this work and listen to you and be patient with you and love you. But if you care about my belovedness, then you’re going to understand that there are systems that are continually oppressing me, like police brutality or school systems. You’re going to do what you can to change those systems so that I can move through this world as a beloved.”“Part of my nonviolent peacemaking practices is to hold onto the humanity of people.”“Do some intentional work of owning and acknowledging your belovedness…oftentimes we don’t see the humanity of others because we’ve neglected the humanity of ourselves.”“Belovedness can be the great equalizer that we need in this world.”__BOOK GIVEAWAYTo enter to win a copy of Dear White Peacemakers:1. Share this podcast episode on Facebook, Instagram, or Twitter and tag Amy Julia Becker when you share.OR2. Go to this episode post on Amy Julia's Instagram & tag a friend in the post's comments.Shipping to continental US addresses only...Thank you to Breaking Ground, the co-host for this podcast.Head, Heart, Hands, Season 4 of the Love Is Stronger Than Fear podcast, is based on my e-book Head, Heart, Hands, which accompanies White PiWe want to hear your thoughts. Send us a text!Connect with me: Instagram Facebook YouTube Website Thanks for listening!

Why should Christians in particular participate in the work of reparations? Duke Kwon and Greg Thompson, the co-authors of Reparations, talk with Amy Julia about white supremacy, the harms and thefts of centuries of racism, and the imaginative, beautiful, restoring work of reparations. (scroll down for book giveaway!)Show Notes:Duke L. Kwon is the lead pastor at Grace Meridian Hill in Washington, DC, and Gregory Thompson is a pastor and the executive director of Voices Underground. They are the co-authors of Reparations: A Christian Call for Repentance and Repair.Connect online:Twitter: @dukekwondc and @_wgthompsonInstagram: @dukekwondc, @gregory__thompson, @reparations_projectVoices Underground: vuproject.orgOn the Podcast: Reparations: A Christian Call for Repentance and RepairW. E. B. Du BoisLove Is Stronger Than Fear episode with David SwansonThe National Memorial for Peace and Justice and the Legacy Museum#justicedepositsReparations in Tulsa, OKHBO: True Justice“If we understand racism for what it really is, the harms go far beyond personal relationships. They go deeper, they go longer, they go wider, and for centuries.” - Duke“We are calling people not simply as white people to engage in the work of reparations...We’re calling the Christian church—everyone who bears not whiteness per se but everyone who bears the name of Christ—because the Church itself as a community, as a corporate entity, was complicit in, and actually active perpetrators of, the evils of white supremacy.” Duke"Could it be true that our theological tradition actually invites us to [the work of reparations]?” Greg“…we invented education, markets, city planning—I’m not worried about our creativity once we start asking questions. What I’m worried about is our resistance to asking questions.” GregBOOK GIVEAWAYTo enter to win a copy of Reparations:1. Share this podcast episode on Facebook, Instagram, or Twitter, and be sure to tag Amy Julia Becker when you share.OR2. Go to this episode post on Amy Julia's Instagram and tag a friend in the post's comments.Shipping to continental US addresses only__Thank you to Breaking Ground, the co-host for this podcast.Head, Heart, Hands, Season 4 of the Love Is Stronger Than Fear podcast, is based on my e-book Head, Heart, Hands, which accompanies White Picket Fences. We want to hear your thoughts. Send us a text!Connect with me: Instagram Facebook YouTube Website Thanks for listening!

“What does it mean for me to actually be a Potawatomi woman? To be a Christian? To be human?” Author Kaitlin Curtice, a member of the Potawatomi Nation, joins Amy Julia on the podcast to talk—and to ask questions— about racial and religious identity, holidays and traditions, and entering into an expansive understanding of the love of God.Show Notes:As both a member of the Potawatomi Nation and a Christian, Kaitlin Curtice offers a unique perspective on the never-ending journey of finding ourselves and finding God. Kaitlin’s book Native: Identity, Belonging, and Rediscovering God  “shows how reconnecting with her Native American roots both informs and challenges her Christian faith.”Connect online:Website: kaitlincurtice.comInstagram: @kaitlincurticeTwitter: @KaitlinCurticeOn the Podcast:Kaitlin’s books: Native and Glory HappeningThe Doctrine of Discovery document“[when] your faith becomes the catchall for your identity, we lose the nuance of what it means to be human in a lot of ways.”“That’s what assimilation does…the church wants what is white in me but not what is native in me.” “What I want to do is help people ask the questions in the first place about America, about Christianity, about who they are…and that’s about belonging, right, about identity.”“Can we have thoughtful, reciprocal relationships with one another where the end goal isn’t, ‘Can I get you to heaven or not?’”“You can’t reconcile something until you actually acknowledge it. American Christianity has not acknowledged its complicity in the genocide and colonization of Indigenous peoples.”“When we learn to have this reciprocal relationship with the earth, we will become more humble as human beings.”“We take care of ourselves because we also are trying to learn to care for one another better.”“This journey [of decolonization work or anti-racism work] is lifelong, and it will involve us messing up and trying again and apologizing and fixing it and reading another book and then reading that book all over again…”“Every time we take a step forward or we do the action, that doesn’t mean that we’ve now reached the end and done all the things. We should always be doing all of the things and not think that we have to reach some finish line. We’re always doing it. That’s what being human is. That’s how we love each other better.”__Thank you to Breaking Ground, the co-host for this podcast.Head, Heart, Hands, Season 4 of the Love Is Stronger Than Fear podcast, is based on my e-book Head, Heart, Hands, which accompanies White Picket Fences. Check out free RESOURCES that are designed to help you respond to the harm of privilege and join in the work of healing. Learn more about my writing and speaking at amyjuliabecker.com.👁‍🗨AWe want to hear your thoughts. Send us a text!Connect with me: Instagram Facebook YouTube Website Thanks for listening!

What does thriving, interdependent community look like? Rev. Dr. Matt Floding talks with Amy Julia about Friendship House, a sustainable housing model where graduate students and adults with intellectual disabilities live in interdependent communities. They focus on the beautiful work that is possible when communities refuse to believe in scarcity and fear and rather trust in the abundant love and provision of God.SHOW NOTESRev. Dr. Matthew Floding is the director of ministerial formation at Duke Divinity School and a founder of Friendship House Partners USA.Connect Online:Website: friendshiphousepartners.comOn the Podcast:Friendship HouseWestern Theological Seminary, Holland MIErik CarterPenny’s diagnosis of Down syndromeFriendship House locationsWestern Graduate Certificate in Disability and Ministry“Safe, affordable, community-oriented housing—seminarians needed that; people living with an intellectual or developmental disability needed that.”“…the community-building model that we hoped would build life together: eating together, praying together, and celebrating—finding every opportunity to celebrate life in each other.”“‘It’s not doing something to someone or doing for someone. It’s life together with someone. And receiving from.’ If we really truly believe that there is this treasure in each human being who bears the image of God, then it really is about mutuality and belonging.”“Everyone has needs to be met.”“The skills that come with interdependent living—social awareness, self-awareness, active listening skills, this attentiveness and attending to each other—these are foundational skills for people going into ministry, but they’re foundational skills for human beings who live in community.”“I have come to believe that person-first language is the key to my relationships across racial lines, economic divisions...before I label…with any label whatsoever, the disability community has taught me that they are a person first.”“The belovedness and the dignity that comes with being made in the image of God—the disability community gets that.”---Thank you to Breaking Ground, the co-host for this podcast.Head, Heart, Hands, Season 4 of the Love Is Stronger Than Fear podcast, is based on my e-book Head, Heart, Hands, which accompanies White Picket Fences. Check out free RESOURCES that are designed to help you respond to the harm of privilege and join in the work of healing. Learn more about my writing and speaking at amyjuliabecker.com.👁‍🗨Accessibility: You can read the transcript for this episode here, or see this episode with subtitles on my YouTube channel.We want to hear your thoughts. Send us a text!Connect with me: Instagram Facebook YouTube Website Thanks for listening!

Is diversity or discipleship the answer to segregation within the American church? David Swanson, pastor and author of Rediscipling the White Church, talks with Amy Julia about the segregated American church, the white church’s discipleship problem, and how rethinking discipleship can grow communities of welcome that break down barriers. (Scroll down for book giveaway details!)Show Notes:“David W. Swanson is the pastor of New Community Covenant Church, a multicultural congregation in Chicago's Bronzeville neighborhood. He helps lead New Community Outreach, a nonprofit that collaborates with the community to reduce sources of trauma, and speaks around the country on the topics of racial justice and reconciliation.”Connect online:Website: dwswanson.comTwitter: @davidswansonFacebook: @PastorDavidWSwansonInstagram: @david.w.swansonOn the Podcast:Rediscipling the White Church: From Cheap Diversity to True SolidarityDr. Brenda Salter McNeilMichael Emerson and Christian SmithDavid Bailey on Love Is Stronger Than FearArrabon“There’s something that’s been discipling us outside of Jesus that has left us content with that segregated status quo...Why is it that my discipleship to Jesus hasn’t upended or broken through some of the segregated patterns that are so normal in this country?”“What makes us so incredibly unique is that we make up this family with other welcomed outsiders…and the center is always Christ, the center is always Jesus’ body, which welcomes us as these former outsiders now sitting together at the same table.”“One of the attributes of whiteness is forgetfulness.”___Book GIVEAWAY:To enter to win a copy of Rediscipling the White Church...1. After 1 p.m. EST on April 6, go to Amy Julia's Instagram account: @amyjuliabecker2. Follow @amyjuliabecker on Instagram ✔️3. Like the post for this podcast episode 💙4. And tag a friend in the comments of the post who might be interested in this podcast episode 😀Winner will be randomly selected on Monday, April 12, 2021. Thank you to IV Press for making this giveaway possible.[Shipping to the continental United States only. This giveaway is not affiliated with Instagram. Contest will end at 11:59 p.m. EST 04/11/21] ___Thank you to Breaking Ground, the co-host for this podcast.Head, Heart, Hands, Season 4 of the Love Is Stronger Than Fear podcast, is based on my e-book Head, Heart, Hands, which accompanies White Picket Fences. Check out free RESOURCES that are designed to help you respond to the harWe want to hear your thoughts. Send us a text!Connect with me: Instagram Facebook YouTube Website Thanks for listening!

What is the role of art in bringing hope and healing to the fractures of our world? Makoto Fujimura, a leading contemporary artist and the author of Art+Faith, talks with Amy Julia about creating beauty through brokenness, the art of waiting and making, and how the theology of God’s new creation transforms communities of Christ.Show Notes:Makoto Fujimura is the author of Art+Faith: A Theology of Making, and his “art has been featured widely in galleries and museums around the world, and is collected by notable collections including The Museum of Contemporary Art in Tokyo, The Huntington Library as well as Tikotin Museum in Israel.” Connect online:Website: makotofujimura.comFacebook: @makotofujimuraartInstagram: @iamfujimuraTwitter: @iamfujimuraYouTubeOn the Podcast:Makoto Fujimura’s Books: Art+Faith, Refractions, Culture Care, and Silence and Beauty Silence movieSilence by Shūsaku EndōEmbers InternationalKintsugi art1 Corinthians 3, John 11-12, Luke 19Liuan Huska interviewMargaret Mead"I consider what I do to be prayer and theological work as much as aesthetic work, so I’ve always felt the presence of God in my studio, in the practice of making.""It becomes essential conversation for us to find our thriving. What does it mean to be a human being today, let alone a Christian? The arts fundamentally can bring us to a deeper conversation."”We are not going back to pre-pandemic normal. It’s a new world. It’s a world in which we have all suffered—and we have all shared in the suffering—and, therefore, we have an opportunity to create communities that would both nurture and protect those broken places and really be able to share because of our brokenness...A Kintsugi master even amplifies or exposes the fractures but does it in a beautiful way. And can we do that as communities, especially communities of Christ?”"Waiting is such an important part of art. You cannot have music without pauses. You cannot have choreography without the body stopping. And so being still, finding that still point of the turning world, as TS Elliot writes, is very much at the heart of every art form.""If we are not making, we are consuming."___ Thank you to Breaking Ground, the co-host for this podcast.Head, Heart, Hands, Season 4 of the Love Is Stronger Than Fear podcast, is based on my e-book Head, Heart, HandsWe want to hear your thoughts. Send us a text!Connect with me: Instagram Facebook YouTube Website Thanks for listening!

How should Christians care for immigrants and respond to the divisiveness surrounding immigration policies in the United States? Briana Stensrud, director of Women of Welcome, talks with Amy Julia about her journey from working in the pro-life movement to working with immigrants, biblical hospitality, and what extending welcome to immigrants could look like today.SHOW NOTES:Briana Stensrud is a human dignity advocate and the Director of Women of Welcome. Connect online:Women of Welcome: womenofwelcome.comInstagram: @womenofwelcomeInstagram: @bri.stenzFacebook: @WomenofWelcomeOn the Podcast:Women of WelcomeLatasha Morrison and Be the BridgeHeather MacFaydenAmy Julia’s trip to the borderLetter on Immigration ReformLove Undocumented by Sarah QuezadaGenesis 1:27, Matthew 25, Luke 10:25-37Association for a More Just Society“The borders on my definition of what it meant to be pro-life really started to expand because of my anchoring in the belief of the dignity and sanctity of every human life. Being against abortion was not enough.”“You have law enforcement handling a humanitarian crisis, so instead of treating vulnerable people as a specific vulnerable population, what you’re doing is trying to meet that humanitarian need with a military response, which is such a mismatch because you’re asking border patrol to handle toddlers, and their job is to thwart and find those who would seek to do harm to the country or enter illegally.”“Women of Welcome…we are a community of Christian women who are looking to enter into this issue from a biblical perspective. What is Christlike welcome? What is biblical hospitality…immigration for us is a biblical issue; it’s not a political issue. What that does is it frees us up to engage and enter into this space and speak very transparently and honestly about the policies that are affecting vulnerable people no matter who’s in charge, no matter who the president is.”“We want safe borders. We also want compassionate treatment of those who are made in the image of God.”“When you move to this Kingdom mindset of what God cares about, you move off of this “country” or “empire” mindset that says, ‘Citizenship first. America first.’”___Thank you to Breaking Ground, the co-host for this podcast.Head, Heart, Hands, Season 4 of the Love Is Stronger Than Fear podcast, is based on my e-book Head, Heart, Hands, which accompanies White Picket Fences. Check out free RESOURCES that are designed to help you respond to the harm of privilege and join in the work of healing. Learn more abWe want to hear your thoughts. Send us a text!Connect with me: Instagram Facebook YouTube Website Thanks for listening!

How do we respond with courageous love in order to bridge the divisions facing our country? Natasha Sistrunk Robinson, Raymond Chang, and Amy Julia Becker reflect on racial injustice, unity, discipleship, and ways to courageously love our neighbors.Show Notes:Natasha Sistrunk Robinson is an author, speaker, former US Marine Corps captain, Naval Academy Graduate, and founder of Leadership LINKS, Inc. Raymond Chang is the president of the Asian American Christian Collaborative (AACC), a pastor, and writer. On the Podcast:Wheaton CollegeAsian American Christian Collaborative A Sojourner’s Truth by Natasha Sistrunk RobinsonWhite Picket Fences by Amy Julia BeckerLeadership LINKS, INCAACCEphesians, John 17, Psalm 133, Exodus 20, Acts 6:1-3Russell MooreCompassion (&) Conviction by The AND campaignThou Shalt Not Be a Jerk by Eugene ChoGenerous Justice by Tim KellerThe Witness“Unity has always been at the heart of God. So has diversity…it’s not unity in uniformity, which is what we see in a lot of evangelical spaces.” - Ray“When we see these things [racial injustice and civic unrest] happening, it is a cause for mourning. It’s a cause for lament. It’s a cause for care and concern and hospitality.” - Natasha“The church should have so much to offer that our culture doesn’t have in a time of turmoil because we believe in a God of love and in a God of love for every individual human being and for our world in an even broader sense.” - Amy Julia“The Christian ethic is to move towards the stranger, not away from the stranger; move towards the other, not away from the other; move towards the person who’s different, not away from them.” - Ray“We’re called to both preach and practice the Gospel. We’re called to embody the Kingdom of God.” - Ray“We have to count the cost of discipleship, and when we talk about this issue of racial justice and injustice and unity, and all these things, if you really commit to it, it’s going to cost you something…I always talk about these issues as discipleship issues—they are discipleship issues.” - Natasha“The biblical understanding of justice is about proactive care for the vulnerable.” - Amy Julia___Thank you to the Church of the Apostles in Raleigh, NC and the Center for Christianity and Scholarship for sponsoring this discussion. Thank you to Breaking Ground, the co-host for this podcast.Head, Heart, Hands, Season 4 of the Love Is Stronger Than Fear podcast, is based on my e-book We want to hear your thoughts. Send us a text!Connect with me: Instagram Facebook YouTube Website Thanks for listening!