The following blog post was originally posted on my blog, “Letters to the Jaded Evangelical”. The blog is geared towards those who have become discouraged by the church’s intermingling with conservative politics and American ideology and who seek a purer faith. There is another way forward – and we’ll find it by focusing on Jesus. You can read more at: Blog | The Jaded Evangelical (webador.com) or on Substack: The Jaded Evangelical | SM Reed | Substack.

Anyone else have picky eaters in their house? My oldest has been a continual challenge. When he was around five, there were only about five things he would eat. Anything else would make him gag or we would have to fight over, and it just wasn’t worth it to me. I figured we could be patient in introducing new things little by little. 

That has worked… some. He eats more than five things now, but he’s still very picky about his food. For example, his food cannot touch in any shape or form. There can’t be any kind of sauce or juice or gravy. He doesn’t like food mixed together, so no pasta dishes or casseroles or even tacos – everything has to be separated and in its own place.  

Vegetables have been particularly difficult. Fruit he loves, but veggies? Nope. Until we discovered a little trick.

The key to our trick? 

Salt. 

Carrots? No, disgusting! Carrots with salt? Oh, yeah! Cooked broccoli? No, gross! Cooked broccoli with salt? Cool! Avocado? Ewww! Avocado with salt? Yummy!

It amuses me to no end. We have even gotten him to eat boiled eggs this way. Such a small thing makes a big difference.

What is it about salt that makes things taste better? What is it about salt that makes something otherwise undesirable now appealing? Who among us would eat potato chips if they weren’t covered in salt? Or French fries? Or popcorn? These beloved treats just aren’t the same without a whole bunch of salt. 

Salt is a mineral and a naturally formed compound. There is tons more salt in the world than we need for human consumption. That’s why it’s so cheap to buy in the grocery store. 

Salt is essential for human health. In any given time, we have about 250 grams of sodium running through the fluids of our bodies.

It is one of the oldest food seasonings in the world. When added to the food we eat, it can bring out the flavor. It also helps as a preservative, to keep food from spoiling so quickly. 

They had salt back in Jesus’ day, too. It was used much as we use it now, though it was more expensive back then. Sometimes Roman soldiers would be paid in salt. Which makes sense, if you know these famous words of Jesus: “You are the salt of the earth” (Matthew 5:13a). 

Interesting. We are the salt of the earth? Not God? Not the gospel? No. We are. 

What does it mean to be the salt of the Earth? 

The gospel to unbelievers can sometimes seem rather… unpalatable. The idea that we are sinners and held accountable to God. The idea that we are in need of a savior when so many of us pride ourselves on being self-sufficient. The idea that one day we will have to give account for everything we’ve done before our Creator. The idea that those who reject God and live for themselves, have chosen hell. These may be hard pills to swallow. 

Perhaps we are the salt of the Earth because it is our job to make the gospel more tasty. Not by watering it down or covering over the bad parts or changing the message. But by showering it in love, mercy, and compassion. By showing and living the positive difference it can make in one’s life and in the world. 

I fear many times our message, instead of making the gospel more desirable, has made it less so. Instead of flavoring the gospel with our love, we poison it with politics and nationalism and white supremacy, with hate and commercialism and privilege. We add a whole lot that doesn’t belong in there, making the gospel truth seem more like a lie.

It’s no wonder others are not convinced by or interested in our message. I wouldn’t want to stomach something sprinkled in cyanide, either. 

How many of us know the second part of verse 13, where Jesus says, “But if the salt loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled underfoot.”

What causes salt to lose its saltiness? Impurities. When other things get mixed in with the salt, it no longer has its flavor. It no longer serves as a preservative. It’s worthless.

When our message is polluted by the things of this world, it loses its saltiness. It loses its truth. It’s worthless. It’s unpalatable. Worthy only to be thrown out and trampled underfoot.

The salt of the gospel should be about giving life: a better life here now, as well as life everlasting. The gospel should be about love. Love is not mere lip service and a few dollars thrown in an offering plate. Love is caring about someone’s well-being and promoting good in their life. Love is caring about those who are suffering in unjust systems. As Cornell West has said, “Justice is what love looks like in public.” The gospel should look and sound like Jesus.

We have so much to do to reclaim our message. I believe the Evangelical Church in America – those who truly believe in following Jesus Christ, needs to come together and make a very coherent and very public statement against Christian nationalism, fascism, white supremacy, and all the other things that have been associated with us because of our intermixing with conservative politics. We need to be clear to all the world – this is not who we are. This is not who Jesus is. We need to repent and turn back to the way of Jesus. 

But also, I think each and every person who claims to follow Jesus, needs to actually do just that and follow Jesus. Follow the way He loved and the way He cared for people. Follow His words to bring His kingdom come on Earth through meeting needs and establishing a more just society. 

If each of us were to do that, we would be the salt within our own circles. And, eventually, that salt would spread. The ripples of influence would grow. 

Until we truly were the salt of the Earth.

Everyone searched frantically, but nobody found their balloon. 

The teacher told all the students to pick up a balloon and hand it to the person whose name was written on it. Within 5 minutes, everyone had their own balloon. 

After they all settled down, the teacher said, “These balloons are like happiness. We will never find it if everyone is just looking for their own. But if we care about other people’s happiness, we’ll find ours too.”

Too much of Christian history has been us as individuals focusing on ourselves. 

Our own “Personal Salvation.” 

God is always trying to move us beyond that. 

To pay attention to the whole. 

To pay attention to the collective. 

In Exodus 3:7, God says to Moses

“I’ve clearly seen my people oppressed in Egypt. I’ve heard their cry of injustice because of their slave masters. I know about their pain. I’ve come down to rescue them.”

God shows up because God has “heard their cry of injustice.”

The Myth

There is a myth out there that people who are strong don’t complain. 

They don’t complain about the things that are wrong. 

They just grin and bear it.

Now, nobody wants to be around someone who is just complaining all the time and never does anything to try and change things. 

But being silent about issues, injustices, and things that are wrong also doesn’t change them. 

Sometimes people have a rule – “Don’t bring me a complaint unless you also bring me a solution.”

That may be the right move in some situations. 

But most of the time, the solution only comes because of the cries of injustice. 

And we’re in a culture that doesn’t want to hear it. 

It’s embedded in all kinds of little comments we make. Like the comment, “You can’t complain if you didn’t vote.” 

The sentiment behind that comment is that if you want to make change, voting is a good way to do it. 

Except, that phrase is typically geared toward one group of people…people who are left out and ignored. Usually, people who are poor, low-income, and minority groups. 

Even though people are trying to inspire other to vote with comments like that, what they actually do is silence people. 

I know countless people who do not vote because they aren’t feeling heard and nobody cares about them. 

They complain hoping somebody will listen to the injustice and harm they are experiencing. 

Actually, I lied. I don’t know “countless people.” We know the number of people who don’t vote. 

“Forty-seven percent of the voters are poor or low-wage workers.” (1) They have the lowest turnout of all groups of voters because nobody is talking about the issues and struggles they are dealing with. (The turnout among low-wage and low-income voters today is 20-22% below the average turnout).

Nobody is listening to them. Instead, in subtle, and sometimes unintentional ways, (but also in very intentional ways) they are silenced and told to not complain. 

But the very reason God shows up to rescue the Israelites from slavery in Egypt is because people who are suffering, oppressed, and in unjust situations cry out about it. 

Things change because we cry out. 

This is even true in our immediate relationships. Two people tend to have a lot more conflict when they don’t share their complaints or the ways they feel slighted or wronged. How would someone ever fix that? How would change ever come about if those things aren’t voiced? How will people ever see what’s going on?

Those things matter. 

Zora Neale Hurston was an author, documentary filmmaker and a central figure in the 1920 & 30s Harlem Renaissance (this was an explosion of African-American art, literature, music, and nightlife in NYC that was sparked when many Black people from the south fled up north).

She focused on the African-American experience and her struggles as an African-American woman. 

She said, “If you are silent about your pain, they’ll kill you and say you enjoyed it.”

Staying silent is a myth. 

God “comes down” when people cry out.

But God doesn’t show up and start hurling lightning bolts down from heaven or show up and automatically set things right.  

God comes down and gets involved by sending Moses. 

A person.

When God wants to get involved, God sends people. 

And if people are going to be sent, then people have to know that something is happening. 

We need the protests. We need the cries of injustice. We need the videos and tweets, sermons and newspaper articles. 

God is going to send people, but only if we continue to cry out about the injustice, oppression, and harm being done. 

Crying Out

My own tradition, United Methodism, calls this “Social Holiness.” We take a stand on issues of injustice and oppression, and invite people to work to better these situations. 

We literally write down and call out injustice like lack of clean water, gun violence, hunger, poverty, the death penalty, the importance of a living wage, responsible lending practices by institutions, national budgets, education reform, and the disarming nuclear weapons.

We even call out the injustice of Israel and Palestine. 

We don’t always know the answers for how to fix things…but we know that if we don’t speak about it – nothing will change.

The students protesting on college campuses are crying out about the injustice, knowing that this is how things will change. 

If we don’t say something, how will people know God is calling them?

If we don’t say something, how will people know God is sending them?

Archbishop Desmund Tutu was a Christian leader in South Africa during the time of Apartheid – when Black people were oppressed in South Africa. He helped lead the work for justice.

I love this statement that’s attributed to him: “Every church should be able to get a letter of recommendation from the poor in their community.”

Are we paying attention to the cries? Are we crying out ourselves? 

It’s easy to ignore this stuff. But we are all connected. All of these issues matter and impact all of us. 

We rise and we fall together. 

God’s Representative

Sometimes I find that being God’s representative is difficult, not because I don’t care…but because I don’t know what to do.

It all seems too complicated and more than I can handle, take on, or have the understanding for…

But a lot of times that’s because I’m trying to take on a role that isn’t mine. 

College students across the country have been protesting on their campus to call on the U.S. and their schools to stop funding Israel’s war on the Palestinian people. Thousands of innocent children, women, and civilians have been killed and are being killed. 

The students are paying attention to what they can do. They’re crying out about it and crying for change to happen, for this slaughter to stop. 

They have heard the cries and they know this is a way they can respond. 

It may not be the whole answer. 

But they know they are called to this role at this time. 

Conclusion

We can’t stay silent. 

This is the way God “comes down.” 

This is how the Kingdom of God shows up. 

It’s not a “Personal Salvation Project.”

It is about all of us being saved together. 

So may we cry out and trust God will “come down” to save us all.  

(1) https://www.commondreams.org/news/poor-people-s-campaign

You don’t need me to tell you that Mother’s Day is complicated for many. A two-second pause to contemplate the people in your life for whom the holiday might be painful would yield evidence enough that the day (and the church-backed events that it often brings) can be tricky. Instead, maybe we can ask why is that so?

My hunch is that the labyrinth of emotions accompanying this holiday has to do with the elevation and highlighting of a very specific relationship. And relationships are layered, sometimes strained, always unique. They are formed between people, and no two people are alike. A day to “celebrate mothers” feels not altogether different from declaring a day to “celebrate health.” Can you imagine? The pain that would come from those whose bodies have received diagnoses? From those who have learned from their faith communities to not trust their physical selves? From those trapped inside of addiction, or those raging against the institutions that compromise our wellness, or those who have been traumatized by diet culture? Health is complicated because it has to do with a relationship between a person and their body. “Celebrating health” would be an oversimplification of such a complex human experience.

So too with mothers.

Here’s a Mother’s Day litany that is also simplified for such vastly different connections and experiences that surround us. But, I hope it makes a little more room for a few more people.

 *****************************************************************

Needed: A candle and lighter, something to represent bread and wine for communion (a cracker and juice, toast and milk, etc), and a little cup of dirt (plus a seed, if available). If reading with people, one voice will read all unbolded sections while the group joins in for the bolded sections.

“If ever there is a tomorrow when we’re not together, there is something you must always remember. You are braver than you believe, stronger than you seem, and smarter than you think. But the most important thing is, even if we are apart, I will always be with you.” –Winnie the Pooh

ONE: Right now, we push aside all the feelings we “should” have and people we “should” be, and we open wide our doors to what is

ALL: Welcome, old grief; 

Welcome, new reality; 

Welcome, fear; 

Welcome, worry; 

Welcome, exactly who we are right now

ONE: As we light this candle, we declare this space for remembering and honoring the children and parents we miss during Mother’s (and/or Father’s) day(s)

ALL: Be with us, saints; 

Be with us, Spirit

Song: Let It Be

ONE: For children who had to say goodbye to parents when they should have had so much more time

ALL: We hold you now: (name any names aloud)

ONE: For children who have watched the minds and bodies of parents deteriorate, no longer able to recognize or remember

ALL: We hold you now:

ONE: For children whose parents were unable to offer their presence or resources, children who ached to know a different kind of paternal or maternal love

ALL: We hold you now:

ONE: For children who have lost parents to suicide, disease, estrangement

ALL: We hold you now:

ONE: For children who wrestle with the complexities of their birth parents, adoptive parents, and foster parents

ALL: We hold you now:

ONE: For children who are navigating the milestones of life without their mothers or fathers there to call for recipes and family histories and old stories that have faded with years

ALL: We hold you now:

ONE: For LGBTQIA+ children who do not have homes to which they can return

ALL: We hold you now:

ONE: For children who were abused in a multitude of ways:

ALL: We hold you now:

ONE: For children who dread the holidays because of their voids

ALL: We hold you now:

Scripture: Matthew 5:1-12

ONE: For parents who birthed babies straight into the arms of God

ALL: We hold you now:

ONE: For parents who have lost young children to disasters that make this life seem too unfair for the human heart

ALL: We hold you now:

ONE: For parents who have raised their grandchildren or other relatives because of a lost life or reality

ALL: We hold you now:

ONE: For parents who have lost children to suicide, disease, estrangement

ALL: We hold you now: 

ONE: For parents whose children were unable to offer their presence or connection, parents who ached to know a different kind of familial love

ALL: We hold you now:

ONE: For parents who have received a gutting diagnosis

ALL: We hold you now:

ONE: For parents who are raising children, and working jobs, and running households by themselves

ALL: We hold you now:

ONE: For birth parents who wrestle with the complexities of hard decisions and limited resources

ALL: We hold you now:

ONE: For adoptive and foster parents who wrestle with the complexities of hard questions, identity narratives, and ethics

ALL: We hold you now:

ONE: For migrant and refugee parents who are risking everything (even separation) for a better life for their children

ALL: We hold you now:

“If I had lost a leg—I would tell them—instead of a boy, no one would ever ask me if I was ‘over’ it. They would ask me how I was doing learning to walk without my leg. I was learning to walk and to breathe and to live without Wade. And what I was learning is that it was never going to be the life I had before.” –Elizabeth Edwards

ONE: To those who are not biological parents, but who step in to mother and father so many around them

ALL: We honor you now:

ONE: To those who chose not to be parents in a culture that so often pressures otherwise

ALL: We honor you now:

ONE: To those who would choose to be parents, or parents again, but who grieve the loss of a dream

ALL: We honor you now:

ONE: To those who have redefined family to go past lines of biology, nationality, and economics

ALL: We honor you now:

ONE: To those who did the best they could with what they had when they had it

ALL: We honor you now:

ONE: To those versions of ourselves that we never turned into, and the versions of ourselves that we did

ALL: We honor you now:

ONE: To the voices we wish we could hear say “Happy Mother’s and Father’s Day”

ALL: We honor you now:

ONE: To the ears to which we wish we could say “Happy Mother’s and Father’s Day”

ALL: We honor you now:

Scripture: John 1:5

“Sorry, but you don’t really get a choice—you keep waking up and you keep breathing and your heart keeps on beating. And because your blood hasn’t stopped moving through your body, your stomach gets hungry, and then your mouth eats. This is how it goes. Your sad little heart becomes a force of nature. Despite the depth of its wounds, it just keeps going and then the rest of your body has to follow. You eat. You sleep. You sit, and stand, and walk. You smile. Eventually, you laugh. It’s like your heart knows that if it keeps going, so will you. And your heart hasn’t forgotten how good it is to be in the world, so it pushes on, propelling you along to the fridge, the shower, a family dinner, coffee with a friend. In doing these things, your spirit catches up with what your heart already knows; it’s pretty good to be alive. I guess what I’m getting at is that if you too are mired in the early days of unimaginable loss, the only thing to do is follow your heart. Then listen to your body. And keep…going.” –Jamie Wright 

Song: Great is Thy Faithfulness

ONE: Hear our words to those we miss

ALL: Meet us in our celebration and in our grief 

Communion

ONE: The body of Mary’s son, broken for us

The blood of God’s son, poured out for the world

ALL: Thank you Jesus for the bigger picture of resurrection

ONE: God’s family table is open to all who wish to partake, in your homes, on these screens, though separated we are one.

(Participants hold cup of soil—and a seed if possible—in their hands.)

Remind us, God, that our faith makes room for death, that our faith can hold endings, though they are excruciating and devastating.

(Participants push seeds into dirt.)

Remind us that in a backwards kingdom, end is beginning, last is first, and burial is birth…eventually.

ALL: Thank you for love that was, is, and is to come. Amen.

Go now in the peace that passes our understanding.

Another evangelical acquaintance asked where in the scriptures are Christians called to be humanized and reported a quick Google search showed “humanising” being not a particularly Christian thing. Perhaps the Google algorithms found more examples of fundamentalist, evangelical Christianity’s record of dehumanizing the gospel even though admirable pockets of evangelicalism still engage in humanitarian enterprises. The challenge to expose the humanizing motif in the Christian scriptures prompted me to review my post-evangelical journey of thirty-plus years with the figure of Jesus.

The lack of explicit references to the humanizing focus of the gospel in the Christian scriptures is not unique when it comes to claims of scriptural support for beliefs in the Christian faith tradition. There are many things those who claim the identity of Christian do that are not explicitly called for in the scriptures. For example, there is no call for Christians to construct buildings and call them churches and plant them all over the planet. But it is something of an obsession in the Christian tradition. It grew from seeing adherents of other religious traditions erecting places of worship and Christians wanting to compete (despite fairly strong hints in the early New Testament writings for followers of Jesus to not create communities of faith dependent on man made artefacts as the focus of the worshipping community). But, churches in buildings have a history of doing much good so the tradition continues. More confounding are the many things that are explicitly called for in the scriptures that Christians do not do – like communities of faith sharing their resources to ensure all members enjoy prosperity and do not experience poverty.

When it comes to the claim that the gospel presented by Jesus was mostly about humanising people, I start at the beginning of the Jewish and Christian scriptures. The creation story consistently emphasises that humans are made in the image of the creator. The humans created were judged by the creator to be the perfect expression of humanity due to their unimpeded relationship with their creator. The story of the fall is a description of the perfect humans being seduced into believing independent, self-preservation was the point of life (the serpent’s tantalising offer) rather than the communal care of all people to enable them to experience the humanity with which the creator imbued them.

Over the next few thousand years, according to the Old Testament scriptures, people identified as prophets continually called those who claimed to follow Yahweh to return to treating all people as human and stop treating some (or many) of them like animals to be used and abused for personal gain and preservation. In other words, the call was to humanise others to enable people to have an experience as close as possible to that of the first humans before the fall.

When the prophet project manifestly failed to bring people back to the creator’s vision of humanity, the New Testament scriptures announce a new strategy. The use of the terms “new creation,” “new Adam,” “son of God,” and “oneness of Father and Son” indicate the presentation of a repeat, perfect expression of humanity from the creator. This expression provided a perfect example of humanity for people to follow through his uninterrupted communion with the creator. Moreover, it included the ability to lead all humans to be engaged in becoming better expressions of perfect humanity and helping others become the same through entering into closer communion with the creator.

When we read the stories about Jesus’ sayings and actions in the gospels in this light, we see him explicitly and deliberately opposing the beliefs and acts of the Judaist religious tradition the prophets had called out that had dehumanised many in their communities through deprivation, exclusion, marginalisation, and dogmatism. The theme of Jesus’ words and actions shows a strong commitment to provision, inclusion, incorporation, and openness to other perspectives on previously non-negotiable beliefs. One of the strongest calls for followers of Jesus to be engaged in the enterprise of humanising others and themselves is in Matthew 25:31-46. Here Jesus as the judge is portrayed as excluding from eternity in the presence of the creator those who simply believed the right things but dehumanised others. Even those who appeared not to believe the right things but manifestly engaged in Jesus’ humanising enterprise were welcomed into eternity.

The lack of results in a Google search on “humanizing and Christianity” is bewildering. There is a reasonable body of literature that argues somewhat compellingly that authentic following of Jesus produces the truest form of humanism founded on an understanding of a creator whose desire was to create perfect humans with whom to have a meaningful relationship. However, this is one perspective on what the gospel is and there are many more that make sense also. I prefer this perspective but accept that it does not make sense for everyone who claims the identity of Christian. They are welcome to whatever perspective enables them to explain why they call themselves Christian. I no longer claim the identity of Christian and prefer to identify as a humanizing follower of Jesus – but that is just what makes sense to me.

I was – and still am – inspired by the idea of building God’s kingdom and working for him. However, I always found work at the missionary organisation hard, even though I loved the people I worked with and believed in what we were doing. But towards the end of my time there, the responsibilities of my role got exceptionally tough. I couldn’t manage the day-to-day tasks, let alone the long-term ones, and it was having a hugely negative effect on my health. I rationalised it to myself, telling myself that God had called me to the organisation, and that the pain and difficulty I was feeling were part of the necessary sacrifice to follow his call. I needed to ‘take up my cross’; I just needed to push through this next bit of difficulty. Jesus hadn’t promised me an easy life, right?

Burnout is increasingly common in our society, particularly in the aftermath of the COVID pandemic. It’s defined by the World Health Organisation as ‘a syndrome […] resulting from chronic workplace stress that has not been successfully managed. It is characterised by three dimensions: feelings of energy depletion or exhaustion; increased mental distance from one’s job, or feelings of negativism or cynicism related to one’s job; and a sense of ineffectiveness and lack of accomplishment.’ (1)

What would Jesus say about burnout? How does the reality of burnout sit with the Bible’s call to be ‘living sacrifices’, and the reality of Jesus coming so that we could ‘have life, and have it to the full’?

I think there are three aspects to this:

1. our worldview: the narratives we tell ourselves about who we are and why we’re here
2. Our praxis, in other words, how we put into practice what we believe 
3. The community that we do that with

1. Worldview

I spoke to Jan de Villiers – the founder of youth charity e:merge and the social enterprise Futurekraft, which has helped incubate and develop more than 150 justice projects – about this. He is no stranger to burnout:

‘As a young man, I was quite a zealot to “go and proclaim the gospel in all the world”. For me, there was a real physical element to sacrifice: I gave up all that I had, jacked in my job, went into missions. I trusted God like in the scripture where Jesus sends out his disciples without a purse, just with the clothes on their back. That was the kind of sacrifice that meant something to me.’

‘Right now though, my view of sacrifice is this: I think all of us have been called, and all of us have purpose. I’m called to work in inner-city deprived areas for example.  We are learning about our purpose along this journey in life. God does the inner work in us. We each fill a space that is unique to us. Sacrifice in that context is knowing your calling, your purpose, and being true to that.’

Jan highlights the importance of understanding our specific calling – the difference between the view that we must do the maximum to ‘bring God’s Kingdom’, and the view that we should be faithful to the specific role that God has given us. This makes a big difference. It seems obvious, but sometimes we forget that we can never meet all the need we see around us. Instead, our role is to be faithful to the calling God has given us: to become the person He has made us to be.

This realisation entails a recognition that, in Jan’s words ‘it’s not all about the stuff that we do, it’s about being: being in this world, being transformed on a daily basis. That’s the calling. That’s how we become light to the world.’ When we are on this journey of becoming, we are able to challenge injustice both through what we do and who we are, and we are also more resilient to burnout. We need to be open to this growth and change, to find the freedom in being who God made us to be.  

To what extent do you think who you become is more important than what you do?  These beliefs have tangible impacts on how we live. They also affect how we handle struggle and difficulty. It’s unusual to be an activist, or indeed a human being, without experiencing failure to some degree! And if we think that what we do is by far the most important thing, then failure has few redeeming qualities. However, if we are focused on becoming, failure can be part of our journey of becoming – the uncomfortable furnace in which godly character is formed. 

2. Praxis

Often, our lives don’t match up with our beliefs! Paul talks about this in Romans: ‘what I want to do I do not do, but what I hate I do’.(2) When it comes to outworking our worldview, it’s helpful to have a set of rhythms and practices to follow – like a trellis or set of garden canes that guide and support us as we grow into the person God has made us to be. These practices will look different for each of us, because we’re all different! However, there may be a few things we have in common. 

Perhaps the most important practice of all is setting good boundaries. The research professor, social worker and author Brene Brown said that one of the most shocking findings from her research was that ‘the most compassionate people… were also the most boundaried’. (3) Setting good boundaries – saying no to things, prioritising space to connect with God, yourself, those close to you; making time for life-giving activities; deciding what is ‘too much’, all these things are deeply connected with maintaining our ability to be compassionate. 

Boundaries are the natural outworking of the recognition that, as Jan says ‘ultimately it is more about becoming our true selves than about what we do’. 

3. Community

It took months of me getting steadily more fragile before some good friends said over a pub lunch, “Rach, I don’t think it’s meant to be this painful and hard to just go to work. We don’t think this is what God has for you.” Somehow, though others had been concerned, it was their words that hit home.

Sometimes those closest to us see what is going on with us clearer than we can ourselves. Community can keep us accountable. And, living and working in community gives us extra resources and wisdom to draw on when things get hard. When I asked Shane Claiborne about this, he illustrated it this way: ‘The way that you put out a fire, a campfire, is you scatter the coals. And the way that you keep a fire alive is by stoking those coals. That’s why community and movement are so essential. If you’re just a little candle, you can be blown out by the wind, but a fire is actually fueled by the wind. When the winds come, it only makes the fire stronger.’

Who is your community? Do you have trusted friends that can challenge and keep you accountable? In my case, following this challenge from my friends, I took a step back and spent a while asking God if he was really wanting me to make this type of sacrifice to build his kingdom. Turns out, he wasn’t – and I handed in my notice shortly after that, stepping into the unknown to find out what he did want me to do.

Even today I am still figuring this out but using this ‘transformation triangle’ (worldview/praxis/community) is helping me work through how changes in my worldview are supported by a trellis of rhythms and practices, and by a community, so that they lead to wider change in my life.

(1) https://icd.who.int/browse/2024-01/mms/en#129180281
(2) Romans 7:15.
(3) Brené Brown, ‘Boundaries, Empathy, and Compassion’, https://youtu.be/xATF5uYVRkM 

Rachel Walker is a co-author, together with Rich Gower, of The Hopeful Activist: Discovering the vital change you were made to bring, published in May 2024 by SPCK. She is also part of the team behind the Hopeful Activists’ Podcast, alongside Abi Thomas, Rich Gower and Beth Saunders.

For months, community members and grassroots organizers had been protesting the genocide occurring in Gaza and the complicit role played by the U.S government in it. They employed various tactics, ranging from galvanizing elected officials and staging street protests to attending presidential events to maintain pressure on President Biden to listen to the demands of the people. 

However, it seemed that their voices were being disregarded by the President and large swaths of congress. It was then that the strategy of mobilizing community members to vote ‘Uncommitted’ was initiated. 

History teaches us that the strategic tactic of voting ‘Uncommitted’ was utilized previously in 2008 when former President Barack Obama was initially excluded from the ballot in Michigan during the democratic presidential primary. His supporters voted Uncommitted as a form of protest, with 40% of voters in Michigan casting their ballots in this manner, many of whom were Black and young voters. Numerous African American leaders, many who were also leaders of faith communities, encouraged community members to vote Uncommitted as a protest gesture. 

The cries of the people would not be stifled, and Obama would go on to win Michigan in November by a margin unheard of since Lyndon B Johnson ran for office. History teaches us that when we fight, we win; it might take time, energy, sacrifices and consistency but when we fight, we, the collective people, win. 

Throughout history, Christian protest and voting have served as disciplined avenues for expressing both lament and prophetic imagination. Grieving over the current reality while actively praying with our feet for a resurrected one. Echoing the call from God in Micah 6:8 to embrace faithful love, do justice, and walk humbly. This passage compels us to ask, What does faithful love look like in the face of militarism? When more than 30,000 people have died and U.S tax dollars are sacrificing the innocent on the altar of militarism and settler-colonialism.

Christian protest and collective voting power emerge as potent manifestations of faith, love, and hope, reminding us that our neighbor is us. Compelling us to remember that what happens to one person in the world, happens to all of us. Many of us are engulfed in grief due to our government’s emphasis on funding militarism and violence in Gaza. While at the same time many of us are advocating for a ceasefire, the release of all hostages, and an end to settler-colonialism in Gaza. It is in this liminal space that Christian protest embodies the proclamation that the principalities of militarism will not have the final word, that we believe that love can and will win.

Once again, we are confronted by the evils of militarism, settler-colonialism, and capitalism intertwined like a nightmarish orchestra playing a piece all too familiar in our bones and country’s history. These systems thrive on fear and silence, nourished by complicity and a commitment to the status quo, persisting as the current reality unfortunately under the guise of it being ” too complicated”.

Throughout history, moments of crisis have often catalyzed the prophetic Christian imagination in protest and solidarity. In the 60’s when many faith leaders and civil rights activists fought for civil rights and expanded voting rights, we saw the mobilization of the faith community in action, the voices of those most impacted by the evils of the time leading followers of Jesus and the wider country into contending for their beloved neighbor. Again, in the 70’s when many faith leaders—famously including Dr. King—were opposed to the ongoing investments in militarism and the ongoing war in Vietnam.

Protest beckons us, intimately connected to one another, to unite in personal and collective grief, remembering one another in everyday political acts of solidarity.

It is a communal prayer through action, propelling us to advance collectively while providing mutual support in shared sorrow. This movement guides us away from a scarcity mindset, leading us towards the abundance found in collective solidarity and mutuality.

The Uncommitted movement at the ballot box is a forceful and intentional rejection of the trinity of evils: militarism, racism, and poverty. It is an act of prophetic imagination that shifts us from scarcity to solidarity, from fear to embrace, and from complicity to action. It invites us as followers of Jesus to respond to Jesus’ call in Luke 4, to participate in our collective liberation and the freeing of those held captive by militarism’s chains.

This movement is an invitation for the American church to embrace solidarity with our Palestinian siblings, as well as with those impacted by war around the world. It is an opportunity for the American church to reject militarism and the ways that it manifests in our common collective body both domestically and internationally.

We are being invited to turn our swords into plowshares and begin co-creating a new world, a world where militarism breathes its last breath, and our infants safely can breathe their first. 

Co-creating a world where the sacred ordinary of life and love, safety and security can be experienced by all rather than a privileged few. We are the leaders of faith that we have been waiting for, the people of faith who will pray with their feet in a prophetic response to the principalities of militarism, capitalism and settler-colonialism actively harming our fellow beloveds. 

The world is watching, and the question remains: How will we, as the American church, respond in this moment?

A simple answer comes quickly, like a response whispered back to my doubts: I’m here to live a life of community, prayer, and service. I want my life centered around those three things. With community, prayer, and service at the center of my life, I might grow into a better version of myself, a better Christian and disciple of Jesus. These are the quick answers, in this inner conversation I go through every week or so.

I daydream about how it could work. Maybe I could gather a group of my friends and we could get a place together, then let people who are homeless live with us too. We could offer meals around our table and host prayer and workshops about social justice for the public. I guess what I want is a life like how Catholic Workers I know live. Would the Catholic Worker lifestyle fit me better? Would it feel more natural to live in a Catholic Worker house than hanging out in these old buildings, between these institutional walls?

Some friends have been sending messages, asking me if I’ve read The Irresistible Revolution: Living as an Ordinary Radical, by Shane Claiborne. Once I do, I weep as I take in Shane’s story and learn about the “new monastics.” I’m enamored by the description of how Shane and his friends live in an intentional community in one of the poorest neighborhoods in Philadelphia and serve their neighbors. I want to live simply with other Christians. I want to serve the marginalized too. That’s what Jesus modeled for us. I want to be close to the poor, close to Jesus. How is being a novice helping me to become a more radical Christian?

How could the structures, expectations and traditions of the Franciscan Sisters offer me freedom to serve the poor and radically follow Jesus like Shane and his friends are doing? I feel stuck and confused as I try to think it through, try to imagine how being a Sister will free me.

Sitting in the silent adoration chapel, I muse about my confusion and bob my head in prayer. Then, one afternoon, something happens inside me: I can only describe it as a widening in my heart. It feels like an opening, a gap that allows some light to soften the doubts tangled inside. This is where I am. I’m here with these good women. I’m lucky to be with them. They’re amazing! In the rays of light falling into me, a cavern is created for the Spirit to whisper. As quickly as I wondered why I haven’t yet left, I know why I’m here.

It’s the mothers. The spiritual mothers. The roots, the depth, the way that this form of religious life means I’m now in a beautiful web of connection, tradition.  The spiritual mothers are the women I’m interacting with daily. They are the gray-haired and stooping ones, who embrace me with their hugs, prayer, and notes of encouragement and love.

Then my mind flips through timelines and zooms to the spiritual mothers of the Middle Ages. It is St. Clare of Assisi and her Poor Ladies, in San Damiano. The mystics, and bold voices who spoke to power and advocated for reforms. Go back to Rome, St. Catherine of Siena told the pope who was lingering at Avignon! St. Teresa of Avila, outgoing (like me), and deep and intense, who was sought after for her spiritual wisdom, for her Interior Castle.

Being part of the Franciscan Sisters means I’m amazingly part of this lineage too.

These holy women are my mothers, my church, they are the reason I stay. Somehow, they help me know that I belong to this mystery, this communion. Somehow all of them are mine. I stare at the altar, the Blessed Sacrament gleaming behind the glass of the monstrance and I know: I’m their daughter, a little restless and weak, but I’m here for them, ready to learn.

Several years ago, I wrote Shane Claiborne and thanked him for writing The Irresistible Revolution. He wrote back, on the back side of a piece of scrap paper a hand-written response:

January Something 2009
Sister Julia —
Your letter warmed my heart. Thank you.
Sorry for the delay, it seems I stay behind on letters, but love writing—after all,
it’s an important Christian past time.
I admire your hope and discontentment—and certainly the Church needs both—it
is a beautiful thing to hear in your words the fiery passion of Francis and Clare—and the
humility to submit and seek the wisdom of elders. I’m also on an unfolding journey of
spiritual direction and discernment as I seek our Lover Jesus. Our communities and “new
monasticism” has its charm and fresh charism it also has its challenges and
vulnerabilities—and I think stability and supporting celibate singles, formation…are all
things we still are figuring out. So pray for us—I certainly will keep you in my prayers as
you continue the work of Francis and Clare “repairing the ruins of the Church.” You are
a gift to the FSPA. Send my love to all the saints and sinners there. May we continue to
become the Church we dream of.
Your brother—Shane Claiborne

Tucked inside the envelope I find a prayer card—with the classic peace prayer of St. Francis printed on one side and an image of Francis on the other—a tiny little plastic baggie filled with about a teaspoon of sand, and a rectangle of white paper with words printed on it: “This dirt is from outside San Damiano in Assisi, where little brother Francis heard God whisper: ‘Repair my Church which is in ruins.’” And he started working. May the repairs continue in us.

I want to scream with joy, to run around and tell all the neighbors about my mail. But I sit still, reading the letter over and over, soaking in its message of encouragement along with the affirmation of what I’ve been praying about: I’m here, I’m a Franciscan Sister, not because the community or the Church is perfect, but because, somehow, it is home. In this home, I get to serve. I give of myself and try to help the suffering parts of Christ’s body be healed, repaired. I hope I do; I hope I can.

Excerpt from For Love of the Broken Body: A Spiritual Memoir, by Julia Walsh. Rhinebeck, NY: Monkfish Publishing, March 2024. Used by permission of the publisher.

When you read the obituaries, you notice patterns in how people talk about life and loss. There are some key phrases in particular that, while fading over time, are still prevalent. Statements such as “died at home.” In the community in which I live, it is not uncommon for such a phrase to accompany death from overdoses.

I, like many of you, live in a community that the opioid crisis has deeply impacted. A situation that the Church universal seems to be falling in the face of. Before the pandemic, I have always had a congregation that has hosted Narcotics Anonymous or Alcoholics Anonymous meetings. One Church went so far as to offer their building to any group that would like to use it to share what had been entrusted to them. However, following the pandemic, I do not see as many churches willingly reopening their doors to these critical groups. 

The Church I currently serve is temporarily hosting an NA group. The group dismantled shortly before COVID, but in the face of the stress of the pandemic, we resumed meeting for the good of the community. The building they had been using had limited space, so they asked if they could return to our building, the very place they launched from, during the months when their new home was being used as a warming shelter. 

To many in the congregation, this was a given. They had forged deep, albeit unusual, relationships with participants from this group in the past, as group members forfeited their right to be anonymous in order to be prayed with by church members as they entered meetings and served home-cooked dinners from time to time. However, that does not mean this was a given for all in the congregation. 

One Sunday, I walked into loud complaints about how the social hall and downstairs bathrooms were messy and that water had been left running. While those issues certainly needed to be addressed, they did not need to be aired to the congregation. A bit later, I spoke with the person voicing such complaints, and I was dismayed when he said, “I just don’t understand why we need to help those people, Pastor.”

His words echoed in my head and heart for days to come before finally penning this article to all churches about why we need to reach out to people in need, people suffering from the devastating effects of addiction. First, it is not “those people” but beloved children of God who have a name and a story and deserve to be treated with the dignity that we would afford anyone else. Jesus is pretty clear in articulating that we are to love God with all we have and all we are and to love our neighbors as ourselves. I would propose that this command includes our neighbors struggling with addiction. So, what does it look like to love our neighbors as ourselves in such instances? Perhaps it begins by asking about their story and creating space where the vital work of recovery can take place and not putting the sacredness of our buildings over the sacredness of human life. 

Second, treat everyone who enters your doors as if they know someone who is struggling with addiction because they probably do. There is so much shame and stigma that surrounds addiction, which extends both to the person working with the disease and their family and friends. Churches can play a role in dismantling such stigma. Thinking about the conversation that was happening one Sunday morning about the disappointment some congregants felt towards how the building was being treated – what if someone who struggled with addiction walked through the door and heard them having that conversation? Or a loved one? Or someone who was a part of the NA group? Would they have felt like they could have stayed and been part of this community, or would it have been unsafe for them?

Third, get training. Get mental health first aid training to help understand addictions. Get trained in using Narcan and carry it with you. Be informed and be prepared. As I worked through my gut reaction to hearing the statement, “I just don’t understand why we need to help those people, Pastor,” I realized that a particular family came to my mind—a beloved couple from my last Church who lost their grandson to addiction. I didn’t have the words to bring them comfort as their pastor, but I could get trained, and to this day, I carry Narcan in my bag in his memory. 

Lastly, return to the red letters in scripture. Two of the requests that came out of the disgruntled conversation about NA using the space we are stewards of as the local Church were to ask them not to park where other people want to park (i.e., on a public street but where people have their “spots”) and to ask them not to swear outside of the building. Both of these issues made the neighbors talk about what was happening at “that” Church. I said I would do neither. Why? Because I don’t want my words or actions to turn anyone away from the love of Jesus or the help in the church basement. If even one person finds a place where they are supported on their recovery journey, it is worth it to me. The scripture that kept running through my mind was Luke 5: 31-32, where Jesus said, “It is not the healthy people who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to invite good people but sinners to change their hearts and lives.” What if we measured our words, actions, and responses to discomfort around these red-letter words? What could change in our communities and the world? And what could change in us as the body of Christ? 

The disturbing origins of this custom Bible and the campaign to stop its proliferation.

During Holy Week, Donald Trump posted a video promoting sales for the “God Bless the USA” Bible.

The name is borrowed from a 1984 song of the same name by country singer, Lee Greenwood.

Trump’s shameless peddling of God’s word for profit garnered intense backlash and commentary online, but the saga of the “God Bless the USA” Bible goes back further than the former president’s ad.

Three years ago, I was part of a group of Christian authors who successfully lobbied our publisher Zondervan, a division of Harper Collins publishing, to refrain from entering into an agreement to print the “God Bless the USA” Bible.

HarperCollins Christian Publishing division, which includes Zondervan Publishing, owns the licensing rights to the New International Version (NIV) translation—the most popular modern English translation of the Bible.

The company, Elite Source Pro, petitioned Zondervan for a quote but never entered into an agreement. Nevertheless, marketing for the “God Bless the USA” Bible advertised it as the NIV translation.

Hugh Kirkpatrick heads up Elite Source Pro and spearheaded the effort to produce the “God Bless the USA” Bible.

In an article at Religion Unplugged, where this story first broke in May 2021, Kirkpatrick explained the origins of this custom edition of the Bible.

The idea began brewing in fall 2020 when Kirkpatrick and friends in the entertainment industry heard homeschool parents complain that public schools were not teaching American history anymore— not having students read and understand the U.S. Constitution and Bill of Rights.

“We noticed the divide in the public where some people started seeing pro-American images like the flag, the bald eagle, the statue of liberty as weaponized tools of the Republican party, and we didn’t understand that,” Kirkpatrick said.

Then in the height of Black Lives Matter protests, activists began tearing down or destroying statues and monuments they connected to racial injustice.

“In past civilizations, libraries have been burned. Documents torn down. We started seeing statutes coming down and we started seeing history for good or bad trying to be erased,” Kirkpatrick said. “That’s when we started thinking, okay how far does this erasing of history go? Love it or hate it, it’s history. But how far does it go…? Part of having these statues … is so that we don’t repeat those same mistakes.”

A custom Bible inspired by reactionary sentiment opposing Black Lives Matter protests is concerning on its own.

Kirkpatrick apparently failed to understand why Black people and many others would want to remove public homages to slaveholders and the violent rebellion they led against the United States.

Nor did Kirkpatrick manage to spot the irony of printing a Bible that honors the United States while defending statues of Confederate leaders who attacked the Union.

Once the news that Zondervan was in talks to print this Bible came out, several Christian authors who had published with them approached me about publicly opposing the deal.

All of my books, so far, have been published through Zondervan, including my forthcoming book The Spirit of Justice: Stories of Faith, Race, and Resistance.

I was eager to join in the protest.

The effort to stop the deal included an online petition that said,

Zondervan/HarperCollins has a been a great blessing to Christian publishing for many years. But a forthcoming volume damages this fine record. To commemorate the 20th anniversary of 9/11 Zondervan has licensed releasing the “God Bless the USA” Bible that will include the U.S. Constitution, Bill of Rights, Declaration of Independence and pledge of allegiance, in addition to the lyrics for the song of the same name by country singer Lee Greenwood., “God Bless the USA.” This is a toxic mix that will exacerbate the challenges to American evangelicalism, adding fuel to the Christian nationalism and anti-Muslim sentiments found in many segments of the evangelical church.

The campaign to stop Zondervan from printing the “God Bless the USA” Bible also included a letter by Shane Claiborne of Red Letter Christians and several other Christian authors, including me, as co-signers of the statement.

The letter read,

This customized Bible is a reminder that the “Christian industry” must do better to stand against the heretical and deadly “Christian” nationalism that we saw on full display on Jan. 6.  It is like a spiritual virus, infecting our churches, homes and social institutions.  Just as we take intentional actions to stop the spread of COVID, like wearing masks and staying six feet apart, we must take concrete steps to stop the spread of this theological virus.

The letter continued with a theological and pastoral word about the Bible.

We don’t need to add anything to the Bible. We just need to live out what it already says.

And if we are to be good Christians, we may not always be the best Americans.  The beatitudes of Jesus where he blesses the poor, the meek, the merciful, the peacemakers – can feel very different from the “beatitudes” of America.  Our money may say in God we trust, but our economy often looks like the seven deadly sins.  For Christians, our loyalty is to Jesus.  That is who we pledge allegiance to.  As the old hymn goes – “My hope is built on nothing less than Jesus’ blood and righteousness/ On Christ the solid rock I stand, all other ground is sinking sand.”  Our hope is not in the donkey of the Democrats or the elephant of the GOP… or even in America.

Our hope is in the Lamb.  The light of the world is not America… it is Christ.

Our endeavors were successful, and Zondervan did not enter into an agreement to publish an NIV translation of the “God Bless the USA” Bible.

That’s when Kirkpatrick decided to pursue a King James Version (KJV) of the Bible because that translation does not require copyright permission in the US.

The fruit of Kirkpatrick’s effort is an official endorsement by Donald J. Trump and Lee Greenwood and the latest push to sell “God Bless the USA” Bibles at a cost of $59.99.

The purveyors of this custom Bible fail to see, refuse to see, or simply don’t care that the United States is not a church or God’s holy nation.

They continue to spew myths that the United States was founded as a Christian nation and that the government should favor one religion for special privileges above all others.

Including political documents in a Bible translation is as blatant a blend of religion and politics as it gets. It is a physical flouting of the separation of church and state.

The multi-year crusade to produce the “God Bless the USA” Bible demonstrates that white Christian nationalism is not going away, and its advocates have the will and the means to secure their desired ends.

As we hurtle closer to the 2024 presidential election—likely a rematch between Biden and Trump—Christians must loudly and consistently oppose any movement to make Christianity synonymous with the political power structure.

We must oppose the “God Bless the USA” Bible as white Christian nationalist propaganda because Jesus said, “I will build my church,” not “I will build this nation.”

In June 2008, I and several hundred others of my radical anarchist-leaning Christian friends at PAPA (People Against Poverty and Apathy) Festival camped out on a Mennonite farm in rural Illinois. Days of sessions about everything from community to living to circus tricks culminated each evening with fantastic concerts. I distinctly remember one night in particular where we all stood transfixed and transported by a silky falsetto, hip-hop-infused rhythms, and lyrics that seamlessly wove themes of God’s justice with an intimate, affective spirituality. After singing an anti-capitalist anthem called “Zion and Babylon,” the singer was called back for the only encore demanded by the crowd of PAPA Festival that year. He sat down and riffed on one word—“Hallelujah” for 3 minutes straight, to rousing applause and cheers. 

These were my people. I had just graduated from college a few weeks before and had always felt an outsider among evangelicals in my college fellowship who seemed preoccupied with private sin and faith and gave a pass to President Bush despite his war-driven presidency. Finding other Christians on and off campus who seemed to connect faith and justice gave me hope that the faith I professed wasn’t doomed to irrelevance in seeking the kind of world the Bible declares is God’s true vision. PAPA Festival was my Mecca; here were hundreds of people who loved Jesus deeply while shouting down hierarchies and capitalism and war and for a few days tried, in the words of Catholic Worker co-founder Peter Maurin, to create a mini-society where it was easier to be good. It was the first time in my life that I felt like I had found my true kindred. 

Josh Garrels was the singer who took the crowd to a mystical place that night at PAPA. When I got home, I found his MySpace page and started telling everyone I knew about this fantastic musician who had found a way to invite listeners on a compassionate spiritual journey that involved rejecting the material violence thrust on us by a corrupt system. For years afterward, I listened to his music and invited others to do so. On one of our first dates, my now-wife and I spent the evening listening to a new album from him. Josh Garrels symbolized something important to me: there was some good left in evangelicalism. 

Fast forward to March 12, 2024: Garrels posted on social media that he had been on the Wild at Heart podcast with his “dear friend” John Eldredge to talk about his new single, “Watchman.” Eldredge’s mark on evangelicalism comes from his book on Christian masculinity, Wild at Heart, and its companion for women Captivating. Eldredge’s books and focus on “biblical manhood”— another term for palatable patriarchy— are much at odds with the spirit of PAPA Festival and its anti-hierarchy values. 

In Jesus and John Wayne, Kristin Kobes Du Mez includes Eldredge in a group of influential men who have shaped evangelical views on gender:

“[They]all preached a mutually reinforcing vision of Christian masculinity—of patriarchy and submission, sex and power. It was a vision… that worshiped power and turned a blind eye to justice, and one that transformed the Jesus of the Gospels into an image of their own making.” 

Eldredge and Garrels spoke about Garrels’s new song “Watchman,” with Eldredge declaring it an anthem for the current moment. It is a song inviting listeners to hold on to a simple faith in Jesus, to keep their “lamp burning through the night” and through Jesus, make their “garments pure and white.” It laments that “darkness is upon us” and a culture where “Truth is looking stranger than the lies.” The conversation on the podcast circles back to these themes.

The podcast illuminates that people like Eldredge—and now, sadly, once-prophetic voices like Garrels—genuinely believe that threats to true Christianity are equal from the left and the right. I have a suspicion that both men do not like Trump and the brand of Christian nationalism that his evangelical followers embrace, but I am convinced that they see the threat of liberal “woke” issues around race, gender, and sexuality as equally or more so detrimental. 

I say “suspicion” because in the entire podcast, neither speaker actually gave any concrete examples of the cultural forces at odds with Jesus-loving people, and yet the whole thing felt like a wink and a nod to the assault on “Christian” gender norms and traditional views about sexuality.  The effect of vague allusions is to give the listener the impression that what true Christians ought to be doing is getting out of culture and politics altogether so that they can focus on a pure Christian life and watching out for the second coming of Jesus. There was no discussion of the role Christians ought to have in justice or what meaningful engagement might look like. If anything, Garrels only seems to reference his earlier flirtation with his PAPA friends as an illusory time when it seemed like there was overlap between the world’s values and that of a Christian. Now, he shared with Eldredge, that illusion is shattered.

The conversation sheds light on an oft-overlooked part of the Christian evangelical demographic: moderates. I use this word for lack of a more specific term for people who are opting out of engagement with politics and secular society. These are people who read books like The Benedict Option and fear the corruption of their deeply held Christian faith by liberal forces, even while disagreeing with extremists on the right as well.

Their answer is to circle their wagons and pull back from things that might align one too closely to a political ideology by doing things like homeschooling or moving to a farm in Indiana and taking stepping away from public life almost altogether, as Garrels and his family have. My encounters with this growing demographic have been with people who would have leaned Republican previously and those who would have voted with Democrats. More and more churches that may have once been called moderate are doubling down on a faith that is primarily personal and spiritual with only secondary (if any) attention to the world’s physical needs.

This type of retreat fills me with a deep sadness, because the tragedies in the world require deeper engagement with issues of justice, not pulling back. The immigrants being bussed from the border to cities need families willing to help house and support them. The ongoing brutality of the war against Gaza needs Christian voices that reject the way the Bible is being used to enable the horror there. The prison system, gun violence, and so much more need all people of faith to join in and get a little messy, not wash their hands and rely on a pure and untouched faith as a ticket to heaven. And people like Josh Garrels have a creative voice that once helped others reject the either/or of loving Jesus or loving the world. Instead, in what can only be described as shameful cowardice, they have retreated to the safe havens of other-worldly platitudes about Jesus. By pulling away from the messiness of life that comes with being “resident aliens”—the term coined by Stanley Hauerwas and Will Willimon for a countercultural Christian identity without abandoning the world—the very faith that they hope to preserve is in danger of becoming even more obsolete. 

In Garrels’s own poignant words from his song “Resistance:” “How do good men become a part of the regime? They don’t believe in resistance.”