We face several world crises that could kill us all and end the human story. We also endure the immediate rise of a fascistic religious nationalism spearheaded by Donald Trump, which wants to destroy our American democracy.
What six hidden women can teach us about Jesus
Who is Jesus to you? What informs and shapes your view of Jesus and his work?
A Journalist's Academic Report on LBGTQ and Christianity
The book series provides solid arguments for inclusion of LGBTQ+ Christians in the world’s religious denominations. This book also examines the continuing exodus for those in the LGBTQ+ community and others who have no interest in being included in today’s mainstream churches.
Church and Christian community look a lot different than they did before the horrors of the coronavirus pandemic, racial trauma, and economic uncertainty revealed difficult truths about the wounds we carry. The damage caused by trauma is deep and affects every part of our lives together.
The image of the heart and the heart's desire
Maturing in the Religious Life is a book which takes us into a new world of psychoanalytic study and group analysis and the search for a living God. Spirituality and sexuality appear in a unity of life with philosophical and psychological amplification.
Bob LaRochelle has had a lot of experience with different churches. Raised a Roman Catholic, he was ordained a Permanent Deacon in that church. After a period of intense soul-searching, he left the Catholic Church and embarked on a career in ordained Protestant ministry.
People > Text, Mercy > Sacrifice, and Love > Fear
The Reconstructionist is about an earthquake of loss one pastor experienced that led him to identify three major fault lines running through the foundation of Western Christianity. You'll be invited to tour some of the wreckage as he names the fault lines and reconstructs a more sustainable faith.
Change is inevitable. Make it transformational. Find transformation in unexpected changes, in your life and your congregation
What the Pastor has been taught, What is preached from the pulpit, And ... why the difference!
Much, if not most, of what is preached on Sunday mornings is different than what is taught in reputable Christian colleges and seminaries. This disconnect is fast becoming the leading factor in the continued decline of Christianity in the United States.
Decompress. Share. Feel seen. Be real. Stay as anonymous as you wish. Your parishioners, congregants, local colleagues, subordinates, and superiors needn’t know that you are cracking around the edges, losing hope, etc.
Preeminent German hymn writer Philipp Nicolai was a Lutheran pastor whose small town, Unna, was devastated by the plague during the winter of 1597-8 with over 1300 deaths. He officiated at many funerals, as many as 30 a day.
(and everyone else!)
Every so often, I put out a "musing" that is a guide to my writings and videos. It's that time when churches make plans for their program year, so this is a good moment to share links to my materials for worship, study, and spiritual practice. Use freely. All I ask is attribution!
Beyond Resistance is a template for those devoted to the the idea that faith should be just, generous and inspire commitment to the common good.
"Leaning In: A Prayer of Intention" is a sung prayer of intercession that aims to break down the distinction between the typical "us"
Here's a collection of 10 church songs that come from some pretty famous and influential secular artists. They’re easy enough for most people to sing along to, come in a printable format and are pretty straightforward to play, too.
Amanda Udis-Kessler shares 8 hymns along with the sheet music - just click on the Title of the Hymn to open the PDF Sheet Music.
For generations, the Bible has been employed by settler colonial societies as a weapon to dispossess Indigenous and racialized peoples of their lands, cultures, and spiritualties. Given this devastating legacy, many want nothing to do with it. But is it possible for the exploited and their allies to reclaim the Bible from the dominant powers?
When we realized because of COVID19 we couldn’t sing together, we refused to give up the use of music in our Gatherings; it is just too important. So we turned to the only source of music we thought could offer the same experience even if it didn’t involve singing along: YouTube.
Here are some of our resources about racism and the global protests in the wake of George Floyd's death while being restrained
In this volume of essays, I turn toward images of Christ on the cross. As I continue my exploration of the wholly holy female face of God, I ask a deeper question. What does God’s femaleness and blackness practically mean for my particular black female experience?
"Something new to say" is a collection of liturgy resources for the season of Advent and Christmas. Author Bronwyn White lives in Aotearoa New Zealand, where Christmas comes at summertime.
I (try to) lead an hour or so Bible Study before each of my two-Sundays-a- month preaching gigs… and am amazed at (and grateful for) their participation, receptivity, and curiosity… about the coming Sunday’s texts. How can I offer a more systematic, “remedial,” wholistic approach to the great Biblical stories, promises and callings?
A hymn text specifically for congregations currently doing virtual worshipping. It is to the tune of Come, Thou Fount of Every Blessing (Nettleton 8.7.8.7.D.)
Singer/songwriter Christian McIvor serves as the Minister of Music & Worship at College Park Baptist Church in Greensboro, NC. He writes progressive Christian songs centered around themes of love, justice, compassion, and community that are intended for both solo/small group and congregational use in worship.
A compilation of modern call and response litanies intended for congregational use. Whether your community is liturgical and looking for fresh language, or contemporary and looking to incorporate liturgical elements, this volume contains relevant, reflective prayers that call congregations deeper into the story of Divine Love.
Most congregational leaders find it difficult to resist the dominant cultural expectation that different cultural and ethnic groups should stick to themselves–especially when it comes to church.
Awakening to At-One-Ment Volume II
These liturgical prayers feed my heart and my spirit. Grounded in the theology of baptism, and rooted in the ancient Christian and the Anglican-Episcopal traditions, Forrester’s liturgical texts will appeal to the weary pilgrim and the faithful church-goer, as well as all those seeking a deeper experience of the Beloved.
I Found God in Me is the first womanist biblical hermeneutics reader. In it readers have access, in one volume, to articles on womanist interpretative theories and theology as well as cutting-edge womanist readings of biblical texts by womanist biblical scholars.
The Center for Open and Relational Theology exists to promote... open and relational thinking, networking among like-minded people, projects that build upon or advance open and relational ideas, announce news, and provide open and relational theology resources.