Holy Heretics: Losing Religion and Finding Jesus

Episode SummaryHave you ever paused long enough to consider why you continue pursuing the spiritual path? After all the scandals, abuse, religious trauma, and oppressive theology, why are you still here?This same question hit me last week during church and I didn’t have a profound answer. For whatever reason, I just can’t quit my search for the Sacred.I bet you’ve asked a similar question, or at least had the honesty to wonder just what the hell you are still doing in a movement that has caused you so much heartache. If eternal punishment is off the table, why even bother? I believe our latest episode on Holy Heretics provides an answer.According to today’s guest, spirituality isn’t about escaping the fire of hell, it is about your personal transformation. In short, you must become fully human in order to become fully divine. Sounds like the historical Jesus doesn’t it? A closer look at ancient Christianity reveals a novel truth—what Jesus was attempting to create was not a path to heaven but the revelation of the Way to birth a fully divine human race, a people as radically alive, compassionate, and enlightened as he is himself.What Jesus lived into and enacted was a new life of “kingdom consciousness,” available now to every person willing to claim their divine inheritance. The invitation is clear: you can walk the same road Jesus walked and attain the same deification he attained. The point to all your spiritual seeking isn’t to sin a little less, or ensure your spot in heaven, it is to become like Jesus himself. That, my friends, is the point.In today’s episode with monk and mystic Father Brendan E. Williams, we attempt to show you how to walk that road, what spiritual tools you will need along the way, and how to begin the practice of daily contemplation and meditation in our modern world. If you are seeking a more contemplative pilgrimage back to God, if you are ultimately wondering why to continue the spiritual journey, this conversation will provide a more mystical pathway forward, allowing you to discover the divine secret within you.Bio:The Rev. Father Brendan E. Williams, CMR is a monk and a priest of the Episcopal Church, and serves as Prior of the Episcopal monastic order, The Communion of the Mystic Rose. He also serves in chaplaincy, parochial ministry, and retreat leadership. Father Brendan is a scholar of religion and mystical theology, a yogī, a professional spiritual director and meditation instructor. He frequently writes and offers teaching in comparative religion, ascetical theology, contemplative practices, Indo-Tibetan and native Gaelic traditions. He can be found online at: www.brendanelliswilliams.com.Please follow us on social media (use the buttons below) and help us get the word out! (Also, please don’t hesitate to use any of these channels or email to contact us with any questions, concerns, or feedback.)If you enjoyed this episode, please leave us a rating and a review 🙏Show notes: http://www.sophiasociety.org/podcast/this-is-the-wayFollow us on social media! Twitter: @holyheretics | Instagram: @holyhereticspodcast | Facebook: @holyheretics | Substack: holyheretics.substack.comAdvertising inquiries: garyalan@sophiasociety.orgSupport our work on Patreon or Substack and get early access to episodes! and premium content like our online class on deconstruction! https://www.patreon.com/holyheretics or subscribe to our Substack to gain access to subscriptions and online classes in faith deconstruction! This episode was produced by The Sophia Society and written by Gary Alan Taylor.  Music is by Faith in Foxholes.

Episode Summary:Living in the United States is a daily dose of trauma. Our nation is philosophically and pragmatically built on injustice, coercion, lies, oppression, exploitation, violence, dehumanization, and planetary destruction. Do we ever stop to think about how messed up the world is? The answer, of course, is an overwhelming no. We are living in what theologian John Dominic Crossan called a domination system—shorthand for a way of organizing society in a hierarchical, patriarchal, power-driven arrangement where the masses are politically oppressed, economically exploited, and socially marginalized. This same system has an almost demonic disregard for the environment. Worse yet, the largest Christian movement in the United States (white evangelicals) can be counted on to support it all. It’s madness writ large dressed in drag as the “American Dream.” We don’t seem to realize it, but most of us are suffering from Complex PTSD simply for existing in this dirty, rotten system.Worse, we live in a culture of lies. As today’s podcast guest Derrick Jensen writes, “In order for us to maintain this way of life, we must tell lies to each other, and to tell lies to ourselves. Truth must be avoided at all costs.” The truth about our economy, about our dying planet, about violence and domination at the family and cultural level; truth about the daily injustices that rule our lives in this decaying empire. Life doesn’t have to be this way. We can work together to create a more just and equitable world. We can carve out subversive spaces even if we will never be able to leave these shores for a different home. But, how do we do it? How do we speak truth to power? How do we challenge a culture that silences the least of these? How do we push back on the religious, political, economic, and social domination systems that rule our lives and malform our bodies and our planet? How do we confront evil and injustice without losing our souls? How, as Christians, can we resist the dominant culture and live into what Dr. Martin Luther King called “the beloved community?” As theologian Marcus Borg writes, “Jesus wasn’t talking about how to be good within the framework of a domination system. He was a critic of the domination system itself.”Today’s conversation on Holy Heretics with eco-philosopher and environmentalist Derrick Jensen invites us to envision this way of life. A way that will take great courage, but is necessary for the life of every sentient being on this planet. Jensen’s visceral, biting observations and stories always manage to lead back to his mantra: 'Things don't have to be the way they are.' I think this is the most profound conversation we’ve had to date on the show. I hope you enjoy!Bio:Hailed as the philosopher poet of the environmental movement and a leading voice in cultural dissent, Derrick Jensen is is an American eco-philosopher, writer, author, teacher and environmentalist. He explores the nature of injustice, how civilizations devastate the natural world, and how human beings retreat into denial at the destruction of the planet. author of twenty-one books, including A Language Older Than Words, The Culture of Make Believe, and Endgame. He was named one of Utne Reader’s “50 Visionaries Who Are Changing Your World.” Jensen unflinchingly examines the culture’s darkest corners while searching for a way forward. In A Language Older Than Words, he draws on his own experience of childhood abuse to examine violence as a pathology that afflicts every life on the planet.Please follow us on social media (use the buttons below) and help us get the word out! (Also, please don’t hesitate to use any of these channels or email to contact us with any questions, concerns, or feedback.)If you enjoyed this episode, please leave us a rating and a review 🙏Show notes: http://www.sophiasociety.org/podcast/we-dont-have-to-live-this-wayFollow us on social media! Twitter: @holyheretics | Instagram: @holyhereticspodcast | Facebook: @holyhereticsAdvertising inquiries: garyalan@sophiasociety.orgSupport our work on Patreon or Substack and get early access to episodes and premium content like our online class on deconstruction! https://www.patreon.com/holyheretics or subscribe to our Substack to gain access to subscriptions and online classes in faith deconstruction! This episode was produced by The Sophia Society and written by Gary Alan Taylor.  Music is by Faith in Foxholes.

Episode SummaryHave you ever paused long enough to consider that maybe, just maybe you are living a lie? Is it possible that your outer shell, or your outer identity isn’t really you after all? What if all your coping mechanisms that have come to shape your identity isn’t the real you? Maybe you’ve spent your life operating out of your false self based purely on survival, but is that who you were born to become? I hope not. At some point, if you don’t examine your false self, the real you will die. Father Richard Rohr writes, “Too much of both religion and common therapy seem to be committed to making people comfortable with what many of us call our “false self.” It’s just rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic, which is going to sink anyway. To be rebuilt from the bottom up, you must start with the very ground of your being.”I’m not sure why it’s this way, but your true self is oftentimes hidden and must be sought out and cultivated. Your true self is who you are in God and who God is in you. Truth be told, you don’t need to create your true self, you simply need to awaken to the you that you already are. This is the point of real conversion, that moment in your life when you wake up to who you were made to be. As you listen to Heather’s story of awakening to trauma and discovering the still, small voice within her, ask yourself what you need to do in order to be reborn from the false self that dominates your life and into your true self hidden all these years under the weight of ego, defense mechanisms, and posturing. Being human, or finding your true self, is a constant search for our divine nature as “children of God,” an eternal journey that will one day end back where it started, in mystical union with our Creator. Thankfully, you’ll know you are on your way to becoming your true self when love, compassion, grace, beauty, and truth take root in your soul and become actualized in your daily life. Our choice in life, C.S. Lewis says, is either “to be like God”—by sharing the divine life—or to be miserable.Bio:Heather first cultivated her storytelling skills through video production and editing. By listening to thousands of people share their stories, she learned to listen for authenticity and confront difficult realities. The collision of certain truths with her religious worldview led Heather on a search for clarity and understanding. She prioritizes truthful answers over personal comfort. Heather writes honestly about the power of love, fear, beauty, angst, and courage. Heather’s background gives her a unique ability to pull up what is real from underneath the stories we tell ourselves about God and our lives. Heather lives in Atlanta, Georgia with her husband and three precious children. She sometimes forgets to do basic things like put conditioner in her hair while showering or start dinner on time because her mind is busy pondering how the Universe works and why humans behave like they do. You can connect with Heather on her website www.ReturningToEden.com or on Instagram @heatherhamilton1 or on Facebook: Facebook.com/heatherhamiltonauthor. Please follow us on social media (use the buttons below) and help us get the word out! Please follow us on social media (use the buttons below) and help us get the word out! (Also, please don’t hesitate to use any of these channels or email to contact us with any questions, concerns, or feedback.)If you enjoyed this episode, please leave us a rating and a review 🙏Show notes: http://www.sophiasociety.org/podcast/finding-your-true-selfFollow us on social media! Twitter: @holyheretics | Instagram: @holyhereticspodcast | Facebook: @holyhereticsAdvertising inquiries: garyalan@sophiasociety.orgSupport our work on Patreon or Substack and get early access to episodes! and premium content like our online class on deconstruction! https://www.patreon.com/holyheretics or subscribe to our Substack to gain access to subscriptions and online classes in faith deconstruction! This episode was produced by The Sophia Society and written by Gary Alan Taylor.  Music is by Faith in Foxholes.

Episode SummaryOne of the paths available to you post-evangelicalism is mysticism, a spirituality that in many ways is almost the direct antithesis of evangelical Christianity. If evangelicalism was all about certainty, apologetics, Biblicism, and defending your faith at all costs, Christian mysticism can be defined by unknowing, mystery, paradox, and direct experience with the Sacred. Mystics know something the rest of us don’t know. God is right here with us, right here inside us, right here hidden in plain site just waiting on us to have the eyes to see that this tired old world is filled to the brim with Divinity.A mystic is anyone who has moved beyond the basic understanding of faith as a belief system and into a deeper level of spirituality, recognizing faith as an intimate relationship with the divine through direct experience. They have a “thirst to taste both the holy and the human with unmediated directness,” in the words of Harvard scholar Harvey Cox. The mystical life has less to do with brief moments of divine euphoria and more to do with the realization that through practice, meditation, silence, contemplation, service, and prayer, God is a lived and present reality in daily life. To the mystic, God is no longer some external object to be studied from a distance, but rather an immediate reality to be known, loved, and communed with. Mystics typically inhabit the border streams of faith, existing on the margins, often running afoul of institutional religion. The telos or end goal of their faith is loving union with God, a kind of returning home to your maker and sustainer. Mystics embody what orthodox Christianity has been preaching from the beginning—that God is both transcendent (other worldly) and immanent (present), beyond us yet with us, unknowable yet utterly known. Simply, mystics understand that “knowing” God goes beyond the intellectual and the rational to include intimacy, like a bride “knows” her husband.Bio:Keith Giles is a former pastor who left the pulpit to follow Jesus and start a house church where no one takes a salary and 100 percent of all offerings are given to help the poor in the community. He has been a published writer since 1989. He is the author of several books, including: "Jesus Unbound: Liberating the Word of God from the Bible" and "Jesus Untangled: Crucifying Our Politics To Pledge Allegiance To The Lamb."Keith is the co-host of the Heretic Happy Hour Podcast which has featured interviews with Bart Ehrman, John Fugelsang, Richard Rohr, Brad Jersak, Greg Boyd, and many others.Keith also teaches several online courses including "Square 1: From Deconstruction to Reconstruction" and other courses based on his many books.You can follow him online and find out more about his books at www.KeithGiles.comPlease follow us on social media (use the buttons below) and help us get the word out! (Also, please don’t hesitate to use any of these channels or email to contact us with any questions, concerns, or feedback.)If you enjoyed this episode, please leave us a rating and a review 🙏Show notes: http://www.sophiasociety.org/podcast/what-is-christian-mysticismFollow us on social media! Twitter: @holyheretics | Instagram: @holyhereticspodcast | Facebook: @holyhereticsAdvertising inquiries: garyalan@sophiasociety.orgSupport our work on Patreon or Substack and get early access to episodes! and premium content like our online class on deconstruction! https://www.patreon.com/holyheretics or subscribe to our Substack to gain access to subscriptions and online classes in faith deconstruction! This episode was produced by The Sophia Society and written by Gary Alan Taylor.  Music is by Faith in Foxholes.

Episode SummaryAuthoritarianism is on the rise all across the world. Here in America, the leading proponents of anti-democratic ideology are evangelical Christians who have been swept up in the cult of Donald Trump. Driven by a dominator theology and good old-fashioned white supremacy, conservative Christians can be counted on as the leading supporters of dictatorial politics. As Dr. David Gushee writes in his book Defending Democracy From It’s Christian Enemies, “Our current democratic crisis reveals a need to revisit the very meaning of democracy…Concerned citizens should care about the direction of movement in their own country. Ours is trending in a bad direction.”And that trend is leading many Christians to embrace what Gushee describes as “Nazified Christianity.” Since the 1960’s, much of American public life has been moving toward greater freedoms, greater inclusivity, greater access to power, self-determination, and wealth for underrepresented populations. The Civil Rights Movement, feminist movement, sexual revolution, LGBTQIA movement, and the #METOO Movement have leveled the playing field. And who does that threaten? White, male Christians who are reacting to those new freedoms with violence and extremism. So, how do we work to not only save our democracy from it’s Christian enemies, but to awaken our friends and family who have been taken captive by the rise of totalitarianism and the despotism of the Republican Party? This scholarly, yet practical conversation provides you with the resources and tools to have transformational conversations about the politics of Jesus as well as helping to equip you with the action-steps to save democracy during this political season. Bio:Rev. Prof. Dr. David P. Gushee (PhD, Union Theological Seminary, New York) is Distinguished University Professor of Christian Ethics at Mercer University, and Chair of Christian Social Ethics at Vrije Universiteit (“Free University”) Amsterdam, and Senior Research Fellow, International Baptist Theological Study Centre.Gushee is the elected Past-President of both the American Academy of Religion and the Society of Christian Ethics, signaling his role as one of America's leading Christian ethicists. He is the author, co-author, editor, or co-editor of more than 28 books and over 175 academic book chapters, journal articles, and reviews (see his full academic C.V.). His most recognized works include Kingdom Ethics, and Changing Our Mind. His other most notable works are Introducing Christian Ethics, Still Christian, After Evangelicalism, Righteous Gentiles of the Holocaust, and the forthcoming Defending Democracy from Its Christian Enemies. Altogether his books have sold over 100,000 copies and been translated into a dozen languages.With his works read around the world, and an active lecturing schedule on several continents, he has global impact in the field of Christian ethics. A leader in the growing post-evangelical movement, he has also put feet to his faith in several activist campaigns.David and his wife Jeanie live in Atlanta. He is a classic novel reader, world traveler, and tennis player, and awaits a call from his beloved Atlanta Braves to resume the baseball career he abandoned in college.Please follow us on social media (use the buttons below) and help us get the word out! (Also, please don’t hesitate to use any of these channels or email to contact us with any questions, concerns, or feedback.)If you enjoyed this episode, please leave us a rating and a review 🙏Show notes: http://www.sophiasociety.org/podcast/saving-democracy-from-her-christian-enemiesFollow us on social media! Twitter: @holyheretics | Instagram: @holyhereticspodcast | Facebook: @holyhereticsAdvertising inquiries: podcast@sophiasociety.orgSupport our work on Patreon or Substack and get early access to episodes! https://www.patreon.com/holyheretics or subscribe to our Substack to gain access to subscriptions and online classes in faith deconstruction! This episode was produced by The Sophia Society and written by Gary Alan Taylor.  Music is by Faith in Foxholes.

OK, I'll admit it right up front, this is a heavy episode. This one feels like a therapy session processing through the anger, the rage, the bitterness, and all your past complicity in white evangelical Christianity. If you haven't noticed yet, one of the pit stops on the deconstruction road is animosity. You finally wake up to all the harmful ways evangelical Christianity has impacted your life and the lives of others and sometimes all you can feel is resentment. It's easy to get stuck here, raging against the evangelical machine. But what might it look like to fuel your anger for something good, beautiful and true? Author Marla Taviano helps us unlearn our past by learning how to heal and move forward, channeling anger into transformative love. Ultimately, how do you stay emotionally, spiritually, and mentally healthy as you process the grief of growing up evangelical? We also discuss what it means to be a real ally, how to decolonize the deconstruction space, and ways you can center marginalized voices in your daily life. BioMarla Taviano (she/her) is into: books, love, justice, globes, anti-racism, blue, rainbows, poems (and a hundred other things). Reads and writes for a living (and a life). Mom to some freaking awesome kids. Wears her heart on her t-shirts. On a mission/quest/journey to live wholefarted (not a typo). (Big fan of parentheses—and em dashes.) Connect with her on IG: @marlataviano and @whitegirllearning or marlataviano.com.If you enjoyed this episode, please leave us a rating and a review 🙏Show notes: http://www.sophiasociety.org/podcast/a-reckoning-with-white-evangelicalismFollow us on social media! Twitter: @holyheretics | Instagram: @holyhereticspodcast | Facebook: @holyhereticsAdvertising inquiries: podcast@sophiasociety.orgSupport our work on Patreon and get early access to episodes! https://www.patreon.com/holyheretics or subscribe to our Substack to gain access to subscriptions and online classes in faith deconstruction! This episode was produced by The Sophia Society.  Music is by Faith in Foxholes.

Episode SummaryIn the second-part of our conversation about the Divine Feminine, we look at the ramifications of believing God is a guy. Institutional Christianity has given us God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit, a triune male God with “He/Him” pronouns. And this male dominated theology has created a male dominator culture that manifests itself politically, socially, sexually, religiously, and economically in pragmatism, patriotism, persecution, capitalism, greed, aggression, egoism, hierarchy, oppression, exclusion, bigotry, ignorance, and emotionally stunted men. All of which has the planet on the brink of destruction. But what if we’re wrong? What if God isn’t a guy after all? And how would seeing God in female form change the way we understand ourselves and the world around us?Rediscovering the Divine female attributes of God is one of the first steps toward our collective liberation from the dominant power structures that rule our lives. In this episode, we uncover all the ways God is referenced in female language throughout Scripture and church history. We also look at Jesus’ primordial identity as Holy Wisdom, or the Sophia of God, making the historical Jesus the personification of the Divine Feminine. Quotables“If God is male, the male is God.”“Domination of women has provided a key link, both socially and symbolically, to the domination of earth.”“The symbolic evidence of women’s invisibility in the human race is most clear perhaps in her suppression, her camouflage, her negation even in language. Women are subsumed, excised, erased by male pronouns, by male terminology, by male prayers, even by exclusively male images of God.”“There has always been a vocal minority recognizing the many pronouns for God, including “He/Him,” “She/Her,” “They/Them.”“All Language about God is metaphorical, but those metaphors matter.”“One of the most ancient metaphorical understandings and expressions of Divinity is God as womb of the world.”“How can women be made in the image of God if God cannot be imagined in female form?”“What does God do all day long? God gives birth. From all eternity God lies on a maternity bed giving birth.”“Sophia is the first of God’s works, God’s female companion in the creation of the cosmos.”“Sophia became flesh and dwelt among us.”“Just as God is our Father, so God is also our Mother.”Please follow us on social media (use the buttons below) and help us get the word out! (Also, please don’t hesitate to use any of these channels or email to contact us with any questions, concerns, or feedback.)If you enjoyed this episode, please leave us a rating and a review 🙏Show notes: http://www.sophiasociety.org/podcast/what-are-gods-pronounsFollow us on social media! Twitter: @holyheretics | Instagram: @holyhereticspodcast | Facebook: @holyhereticsAdvertising inquiries: podcast@sophiasociety.orgSupport our work on Patreon and get early access to episodes! https://www.patreon.com/holyhereticsThis episode was produced by The Sophia Society.  Music is by Faith in Foxholes, and sound engineering is by Joshua Mudge (currently accepting new clients: josh.mudge09@gmail.com).

Episode SummaryHave you ever paused to wonder why it was always God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit—a trio of divine beings known only as “He” and “Him?” This should cause us to ask a basic question. Why is God so overwhelmingly referred to as a He in institutional Christianity, as well as in Judaism? Did you know that from ancient times God was first known as our Mother, and sustainer? Over the next two episodes we’re going to discuss what I believe is one of the most important spiritual conversations we’ve ever had on the show, the Divine Feminine. What might it look like to see God in female form and through female language? How would your relationship to the Divine change if you were equipped to see the other side of God? And how has knowing only God the Father warped our souls, impoverished our theology, and deadened our spirits? As Sister Joan Chittister writes, “It is precisely women’s experience of God that this world lacks. A world that does not nurture its weakest, does not know God the birthing mother. A world that does not preserve the planet, does not know God the creator. A world that does not honor the spirit of compassion, does not know God the spirit. God the lawgiver, God the judge, God the omnipotent being have consumed Western spirituality and, in the end, shriveled its heart.”I hope this episode will introduce you to the Divine Feminine, to God our Mother, and how reframing your image of God will change how you view yourself, the world, and your neighbor. BioGary Alan Taylor is the Co-Founder of The Sophia Society and Host of Holy Heretics Podcast. Gary Alan has an undergraduate degree in History from Milligan University, a Master of Arts in Holocaust Studies from East Tennessee State University, and worked on a PhD at The University of Tennessee. Gary Alan has spent his life in faith-based organizations and began deconstructing his faith about ten years ago when he was introduced to a theology of liberation and nonviolence. With his friend and colleague Melanie Mudge, Gary Alan created The Sophia Society to be a sacred space for the spiritual formation of post-evangelicals. Since then, The Sophia Society has served thousands of “exvangelicals” through it’s monthly Liminal Spaces publication, podcast, articles, online classes, and community spaces. You can plug in or simply learn more about The Sophia Society here! Gary Alan is passionate about overcoming his own religious trauma by pursuing a more mystical form of faith. Additional ReadingWoman Strength by Joan ChittisterThe Divine Feminine by Virginia Ramey MollenkotThy Queendom Come by Kyndall Rae RothausGod is a Black Woman by Christena ClevelandShe Who Is by Elizabeth A. JohnsonBeyond God the Father by Mary DalyIf you enjoyed this episode, please leave us a rating and a review 🙏Show notes: http://www.sophiasociety.org/podcast/god-our-motherFollow us on social media! Twitter: @holyheretics | Instagram: @holyhereticspodcast | Facebook: @holyhereticsAdvertising inquiries: podcast@sophiasociety.orgSupport our work on Patreon and get early access to episodes! https://www.patreon.com/holyhereticsThis episode was produced by The Sophia Society and written by Gary Alan Taylor.  Music is by Faith in Foxholes.

Episode SummaryWe continue our march toward the marginalized this week with another conversation with Dr. Miguel De La Torre about the future of American political identity. As a Lantinx scholar, Miguel sees a future in which American society is run by white Christian nationalist elites at the expense of everyone who is 'the other.' Much like South African Apartheid, America could become a nation controlled by a very powerful and violent minority all supported by white evangelicals. After all, it was conservative Christians who helped set up South African Apartheid in the 1948. Following these through lines of American racism and oppression, he warns of a decline in democracy and rise in political violence—but equips us with the nonviolent ethical framework to resist this bleak future. If you are a citizen of the United States, have you ever considered what it might look like to become Un-American? Have you ever considered all the ways the American Empire forces you to compromise your faith? As Christian ethicist Stanley Hauerwas once wrote, “Being a Christian is going to put you at odds with a great deal of what it means to be an American.” In this episode, we call upon listeners to consider what it might mean to remake America in the image of the God of liberation, and how do achieve that nonviolently? What role can you play in resisting this dominator form of Christianity and politics? BioDr. Miguel De La Torre is Professor of Social Ethics and Latinx Studies at the Iliff School of Theology in Denver, Colorado.  He has served as the elected 2012 President of the Society of Christian Ethics and served as the Executive Officer for the Society of Race, Ethnicity and Religion (2012-17). Dr. De La Torre is a recognized international Fulbright scholar who has taught courses at the Cuernavaca Center for Intercultural Dialogue on Development (Mexico), Indonesian Consortium for Religious Studies (Indonesia), University of Johannesburg (South Africa), Johannes Gutenberg University (Germany). Additionally, he has lectured at Universidad Bíblica Latinoamericana (Costa Rica), The Association for Theological Education in South East Asia (Thailand) and the Council of World Mission (Mexico and Taiwan). Advocating for an ethics of place, De La Torre has taken students on immersion classes to Cuba, Guatemala, the Peruvian Amazon, and the Mexico/U.S. border to walk the migrant trails. Among multiple yearly speaking engagements, he has also been a week-long speaker at the Chautauqua Institute, and the plenary address at the Parliament of World Religions. De La Torre has received several national book awards and is a frequent speaker at national and international scholarly religious events and meetings. He also speaks at churches and nonprofit organizations on the intersection of religion with race, class,  gender, and sexuality . In 2020, the American Academy of Religion bestowed on him the Excellence in Teaching Award. The following year, 2021, the American Academy also conferred upon him the Martin E. Marty Public Understanding of Religion Award. De La Torre is the first scholar to receive the two most prestigious awards presented by his guild and the first Latinx to receive either one of them. Check out De La Torre's BLOG for additional resources and readings. If you enjoyed this episode, please leave us a rating and a review 🙏Show notes: http://www.sophiasociety.org/podcast/resisting/american/apartheidFollow us on social media! Twitter: @holyheretics | Instagram: @holyhereticspodcast | Facebook: @holyhereticsAdvertising inquiries: podcast@sophiasociety.orgSupport our work on Patreon and get early access to episodes! https://www.patreon.com/holyheretics and get access to our online class Making Sense of the Bible Post-Deconstruction! This episode was produced by The Sophia Society.  Music is by Faith in Foxholes.

Contrary to what many assume, peace isn’t meekness in the face of evil it is the courageous and oftentimes creative task of disarmament. Active peacemaking is a way to fight against injustice without using violence. It is using the transformative force of love to resist oppression. It says that the means are the ends, that the way to peace is peace itself. “Love of enemies does not necessarily ease tensions; rather it challenges the whole system and becomes a subversive formula for true personal and national liberation,” writes liberationist theologian Gustavo Gutierrez. Therefore we shouldn’t be surprised that peacemakers like Dr. Martin Luther King, Nelson Mandela and Mahatma Gandhi appear as anything but peaceful.But what might it look like for you to live a life of nonviolent resistance to evil? How do you confront evil and injustice without becoming unjust yourself? In this episode with Holy Heretics host Gary Alan Taylor, we discuss ways to take power back from the oppressors through nonviolent, subversive action. We draw on the teachings of Jesus who provided a 'third way' beyond fight or flight that leads to an opportunity for the perpetrator to not only recognize your humanity, but repent of his oppression. For our new patrons, thank you for joining us! Thank you for providing the resources we desperately need to continue creating this sacred, subversive space. Our podcast is an act of nonviolent resistance to dominator evangelicalism. We will not be silenced. We will not be intimidated by the religious establishment. We will continue to speak loudly and proudly for the marginalized, no matter the cost. Your commitment to this work is also an act of resistance, thank you! BioGary Alan Taylor is the Co-Founder of The Sophia Society and the Host of Holy Heretics Podcast. Gary Alan grew up in conservative evangelical culture as a preacher boy and his deconstruction journey began way back as an undergraduate at Milligan College when he took a course that changed his life. Taught by Stanley Hauerwas protege Phil Kennesson, Christ and Culture planted seeds that would grow into a subversive faith decades later. Prior to his faith deconstruction, Gary Alan worked in evangelical spaces as a content creator. He has written for RedLetter Christians and Missio Alliance and has a Master of Arts degree in Holocaust Studies as well as PhD work in Colonial American History. Gary Alan and his wife Jennifer live in Monument, Colorado and attend Grace and St. Stephens Episcopal Church. Quotables“Four in ten Americans live in a household with a gun. 44% of Republicans say they own a gun.”“What might it look like to deconstruct your faith nonviolently?”“Here in America, we love our guns, and we love our God given right to blow you away.”“Even out theology is violent. We believe in a violent, wrathful God, so violence is wrapped into the DNA of what it means to be an American.”“When the United States kills it’s enemies, it’s probably a Christian who pulls the trigger.”“What I fear is being in the presence of evil and doing nothing. I fear that more than death.”“We don’t have enough money for healthcare, education and basic human services because we spend billions of dollars on war, and we call that pragmatic.”“For what the world spends on defense every 2.5 hours, smallpox was eliminated.”“We believe that violence saves.”“Can you commit an act of violence for the cause of justice?”“Is there ever a time that you could kill for the right cause?”“What if the people we think are so evil aren’t evil at all?”“Our addiction to redemptive violence is the fault of the church.”“When war is undertaken in the name of God, there can be no limit in the killing, because so much is at stake.”“Nonviolence isn’t an exception to the rule, but is at the heart of what it means to be a Christian.”“There wasn’t even a word for pacifism in the early church because to call yourself a Christian meant you lived a life of nonviolence.”“Even in death, Jesus was nonviolent.”“Jesus was nonviolent because God was nonviolent.”“Is my job causing suffering to the planet or to the poor?”“What or who am I afraid of?”“In what ways do I benefit from the empire in which I live?”“Pacifism isn’t meekness in the face of evil.”If you enjoyed this episode, please leave us a rating and a review 🙏Show notes: http://www.sophiasociety.org/podcast/the-power-of-nonviolent-resistanceFollow us on social media! Twitter: @holyheretics | Instagram: @holyhereticspodcast | Facebook: @holyhereticsAdvertising inquiries: podcast@sophiasociety.orgSupport our work on Patreon and get early access to episodes! https://www.patreon.com/holyhereticsThis episode was produced by The Sophia Society and written by Gary Alan Taylor.  Music is by Faith in Foxholes.