Rethinking Faith

It is no secret that the Church has done a very bad job loving the LGBTQ+ community. Churches in America are experiencing massive splits and mass exoduses due to their belief and attitude towards the LGBTQ+ community.  This week, Colby Martin joins us once again to help others (re)think their stance on the LGBTQ+ community. Colby wrote a book called "Unclobber" where he reexamines what the Bible says (and does not say) about homosexuality in such a way that breathes fresh life into outdated and inaccurate assumptions and interpretations. We used that book as a jumping-off point to have a beautiful conversation with our friend Cheyenne. Cheyenne identifies as gay and she opens up and shares her story with us. She offers helpful insights and helps us learn how to be true allies of the LGBTQ+ community. Enjoy!  RESOURCES: The Trevor Project - Saving Young LGBTQ Lives  Q Christian Fellowship Good Fruit Project Unclobber (book)  ColbyMartinOnline Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

A building crescendo of developments, culminating in evangelical support for the Trump presidency, has led many evangelicals to question the faith they inherited. If being Christian means rejecting LGBTQ persons and supporting systemic racism, perhaps their Christian journey is over. This week, David Gushee joins us to help us (re)thinking Evangelicalism. Gushee offers a new way forward for disillusioned post-evangelicals and proposes new ways of Christian believing, belonging, and behaving, helping post-evangelicals from where they are to a living relationship with Christ and an intellectually cogent and morally robust post-evangelical faith. We hope our conversation together shows that it is possible to follow Jesus out of evangelical Christianity, and more than that, it's a necessary journey. Enjoy.  Resources: After Evangelicalism: The Path to a New Christianity (Book)  Changing Our Mind (Book)  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Have you ever wondered why some people you know hold theological and political views that blow your mind but they find quite reasonable? This week John Sanders joins us to discuss two social science models, Nurturant and Authoritative, to explain this divide. Values are at the heart of our disagreements. Dr. Sanders explains the divide and makes the case that Jesus embodied the Nurturant way of life. He modeled empathy, grace, forgiveness, and care for those beyond his own tribe. The Nurturant and Authoritative approaches have competed for thousands of years but contemporary research shows that the Nurturant way of life produces better mental and spiritual health as well as superior communities in which to live. Enjoy RESOURCES: Embracing Prodigals: Overcoming Authoritative Religion by Embodying Jesus' Nurturing Grace (Book)  The God Who Risks (Book) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

If we were to ask you to name some of the things you love the most... how long would it take you to say yourself? If you’re anything like us, you’ve tried to love God and love others without thinking too much about yourself. Wanting to avoid self-centeredness, perhaps you have doubted yourself and condemned yourself— maybe even hated yourself.  This week, Jonathan Puddle joins the conversation to help us (re)think how we view ourselves. Drawing from Scripture, trauma-informed therapy, Christian inner-healing, breathing and embodiment exercises, and silent prayer & contemplative spirituality, You Are Enough is a holistic healing journey towards abundant life. Our hope is that you would embrace the truth of your beloved-ness in every part of your mind, body, soul and spirit. RESOURCES: You Are Enough: Learning to Love Yourself the Way God Loves You JonathanPuddle.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week Tripp Fuller joins the show to help us (re)think our Christology. Tripp offers a robust constructive open and relational Christology. He offers us a three-pronged constructive Christology that engages historical Jesus studies and seeks to speak in both an existential and metaphysical register. Ultimately, Tripp offers a centering Christological metaphor for an open and relational vision: the self-investment of God. Enjoy! RESOURCES: Divine Self-Investment: An Open and Relational Constructive Christology TrippFuller.com The Road to Edmond Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week we were joined by Scott Erickson to help us (re)think Advent this year. "For too many of us, Christmas has lost its wonder. Maybe for you, the joy of the season is painfully dissonant with the hard edges of life right now. Or maybe you feel wearied by the way Christmas has become a polished, predictable brand. Or maybe this sacred story feels too far removed from our world today, a world that's hard to make sense of. But what if the Christmas story is not just something that happened a long time ago . . . but a story that is still happening today?" Enjoy. RESOURCES: Honest Advent (Book)  ScottEricksonArt.com  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Wow! 100 episodes! Thank you to everybody who has supported the show thus far. This week, Josh and Marty reflect back over the past 100 episodes. They discuss what elements they have rethought in their own faith, and where they hope to be after another 100 episodes. Enjoy!  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week we were joined by Juanita Campbell Rasmus to help us (re)think how to BE.  "It felt as though every nerve in my body was popping. Imagine large strong hands slowly applying pressure while breaking a family-size package of uncooked, dry spaghetti. I was the spaghetti. Breaking down one piece at a time."  This is how Juanita begins the wise, frank, and witty account of what she later called "The Crash" and what her counselor labeled "a major depressive episode." This experience landed Juanita, a busy pastor, mother, and community leader, in bed. In addition to exhaustion and depression, on the spiritual front she experienced a dark night of the soul. When everything in her life finally came to a stop, she found that she had to learn to be―with herself and with God―all over again. This was a wonderful conversation filled with spiritual wisdom and guidance. Enjoy! RESOURCES: Learning to Be: Finding Your Center After the Bottom Falls Out (Book)  Healing Our Beginning (Book)  You Can Heal Your Life (Book) JuanitaRasmus.com It's Not About the Cheese    Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week we were joined by Biblical Scholar/Theologian/Former Bishop of Durham, NT Wright. Wright contends that there are a few 'signposts' that are inherent to humanity: justice, spirituality, relationships, beauty, freedom, truth and power.  If we do not live up to these ideals, our societies and individual lives become unbalanced, creating anger and frustration—negative emotions that divide us from ourselves and from God, he contends. Using the Gospel of John as his source, Wright shows how Christianity defines each signpost and illuminates why we so often see them as being "broken" and unattainable.  Drawing on the wisdom of the Gospels, Wright explains why these signposts are fractured and damaged and how Christianity provides the vision, guidance, and hope for making them whole once again, ultimately healing ourselves and our world. Enjoy! RESOURCES: Broken Signposts: How Christianity Makes Sense of the World Surprised by Hope    Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

We’ve caused a turning point in the Earth’s natural history. Everybody Now is a podcast about what it means to be human on the threshold of a global climate emergency, in a time of systemic injustice and runaway pandemics. Scientists, activists, farmers, poets, and theologians talk bravely and frankly about how our biosphere is changing, about grief and hope in an age of social collapse and mass extinction, and about taking action against all the odds. During the week of October 19th 2020, Everybody Now is being released by podcasters all over the world as a collective call for awareness, grief and loving action. With contributions from: Dr. Gail Bradbrook - scientist and co-founder of Extinction Rebellion Prof. Kevin Anderson - Professor of Energy and Climate Change at the University of Manchester Dámaris Albuquerque - works with agricultural communities in Nicaragua Dr. Rowan Williams - theologian and poet, and a former Archbishop of Canterbury Pádraig Ó Tuama - poet, theologian and conflict mediator Rachel Mander - environmental activist with Hope for the Future John Swales - priest and activist, and part of a community for marginalised people Zena Kazeme - Persian-Iraqi poet who draws on her experiences as a former refugee to create poetry that explores themes of exile, home, war and heritage Flo Brady - singer and theatre maker Hannah Malcolm - Anglican ordinand, climate writer and organiser Alastair McIntosh - writer, academic and land rights activist David Benjamin Blower - musician, poet and podcaster   Funding and Production: This podcast was crowdfunded by a handful of good souls, and produced by Tim Nash and David Benjamin Blower   Permissions: The song Happily by Flo Brady is used with permission. The song The Soil, from We Really Existed and We Really Did This by David Benjamin Blower, used with permission. The Poem The Tree of Knowledge by Pádraig Ó Tuama used with permission. The Poem Atlas by Zena Kazeme used with permission. The Poem What is Man? by Rowan Williams from the book The Other Mountain, used with permission from Carcanet Press. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices