One of the most common T-shirts, caps and banners displayed during the Jan. 6 insurrection says, “Jesus is My Savior, Trump is my President.” But Donald Trump erased the line between savior and president last Sunday evening by posting an…
Psychedelics offer a path for healing the church should join
In the midst of our current mental health crisis, the Christian church, its leadership and members should be deeply curious about the renewal of widespread cultural interest in psychedelic healing and the possibility for ministry within it. While the so‑called…
Caring for ourselves during change-making conversations
Here we are, more than a month after the release of my “Non-Disclosure” podcast. And now that we’ve had some time to digest the lengthy, heavy and grief-filled material, I’d like to process some of that with you. The No….
April Ajoy has the receipts on her journey out of Christian nationalism
When critics accuse April Ajoy of not ever having been a conservative Christian, she shows them the receipts. One of those she showed for the first time at the Summit for Religious Freedom April 6 was a video of her…
United Methodist bishops called to craft ‘narrative of hope’ amid harsh break-up realities
The president of the United Methodist Council of Bishops called his sibling episcopal leaders to “craft a narrative of hope” in the coming months before the 12-million-member worldwide denomination gathers next spring for its first legislative assembly since the UMC…
‘God’s plant’ has cured kids, now the new frontier is psychedelics
The six Stanley brothers were taught that marijuana was bad news, both at church and at Colorado Springs Christian School. But after pot helped their cancer-stricken cousin Ron, the brothers entered the medical marijuana business to work with “God’s plant.”…
A Matrix Thanksgiving: The red pill, the blue pill or… ?
“We’re thankful God protected us.” When I was in seminary in the early 1990s, Mount Pinatubo erupted, devastating Luzon, the largest and most populated island in the Philippines. In the 1980s, I twice had served as a summer missionary on…
Peter’s un-healing of Petronilla’s holy ‘palsy’ in the Coptic Act of Peter has a lesson for us today about disability
The Acts of Peter is a fragmented, early Christian text made up of three parts: the “Coptic Act of Peter,” the “Acts of Peter the Apostle,” and the “Martyrdom of the Holy Apostle Peter.” These writings are not included in…
Did hosting the Africa Cup of Nations competition help to heal the wounds of the Cameroonian crisis?
In a tweet she shared last year after a virtual meeting with FIFA President Gianni Infantino, the United Nations Deputy Secretary-General, Amina J. Mohammed, described football (soccer in America) as a “humble ball that knows no borders, opens dialogue and…
There’s no time like the present to be a present
“I learned from a 5-year-old prophet on my run this week that every day is a gift from God because that’s why it’s called ‘the present,’” a pastor said recently during the greeting time at church. The present of every…
Can God be found outside Christianity?
A few weeks ago, I attended my very first “energy workshop.” It’s taken years of deconstruction and healing from religious trauma for me to open up and allow myself to explore the energy work of more Buddhist traditions. My former…
If Jesus could be changed by a sass-mouthed woman, maybe legislators and governors can be too
In Texas, vehement castigations of Critical Race Theory are being thrown around when a last grasp at holding onto white supremacy is what was actually passed in the Legislature. This bill seeks to deny our hard truths, our painful history,…