Did you know it’s healthy to observe ‘Sabbath’? Martin Doblmeier’s new film shows how ‘Sabbath’ revives us

May 28, 2023 by

Pastor Michael Mickens walks down a hallway in Jackson, Mississippi, in a scene from Martin Doblmeier’s documentary “Sabbath.” (Clicking on this photo will take you to the filmmaker’s website where the film is streaming in addition to its release on public TV.)

‘Sabbath is the perfect spiritual technology’

By DAVID CRUMM
Editor of ReadTheSpirit magazine

There’s a whole lot of wisdom in the 3,000-year-old Commandment: “Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy.”

Anna Serviansky holds the wine while a camper holds the braided candle at Havdallah at camp Ramah Darom in Georgia, a scene from filmmaker Martin Doblmeier’s documentary “Sabbath.” (Clicking on this photo will take you to the filmmaker’s website where the film is streaming in addition to its release on public TV.)

On June 1, filmmaker Martin Doblmeier is debuting his two-hour invitation to Sabbath on public television—at a time when millions of us are overwhelmed with pandemic anxiety, loss of loved ones and fears about the future of our country and our planet’s resources. We all wonder if we’re running out of time.

“Time is our only non-renewable resource,” J. Dana Trent—a pastor, scholar and author of For Sabbath’s Sake—tells us early in this new documentary. Dana is among 26 interviewees from various religious traditions featured by Martin in this film.

Because the film is debuting on public TV channels nationwide starting on June 1, Dana and Martin talked with me in a Zoom interview this week and Dana expanded on the film’s central theme:

Sabbath is good for us!

“This film could not be more timely,” Dana said. “We are just coming out of this devastating pandemic and we now have an epidemic of loneliness. Our Surgeon General Vivek Murthy right now is talking about the need for a healthy culture of connection. Isolation, loneliness and a lack of connection is dangerous. This film ‘Sabbath’ shows us how people are embracing this ancient practice of Sabbath as a way to rest, renew and reconnect. We all want a healthy culture of connection, as Dr. Murthy is saying—and I like this phrase that I heard from a rabbi describing the importance of Sabbath. He said, ‘Sabbath is the perfect spiritual technology.’ ”

“Technology?” I asked Dana in our interview.

“Yes, I like that word. That word points out how Sabbath works with us and through us,” Dana said. “Practicing Sabbath can be a spiritual technology.”

As a publishing house, we wholeheartedly agree with Dana. If you are a regular reader of our online magazine, then you have seen at least a dozen columns over the past two years about our book: Now What? The Gifts and Challenges of Aging. Based on research into the Social Determinants of Health, that book even includes a chapter titled “Connecting with a Congregation” that lays out all the research into the public health benefits of regular participation with congregations.

In this new documentary, Martin crisscrosses America showing us vivid ways that men, women and children are celebrating Sabbath all around us—translating that ancient wisdom every week into healthy and spiritually enriched living. In fact, this film’s production and its release through public TV is so focused on practical benefits that Martin also is providing these free online resources for his audience:

How You Can See This Film—
and Contribute to the Nationwide Effort

Right now, under an agreement with the documentary’s funders, Journey Films is allowing individuals to stream the entire documentary for free online. You can watch the film on your smartphone, tablet or computer. Or, the film could be played on the main TV in your home if that TV is internet-enabled or you might be able to screencast from your digital device to your TV.

Starting June 1, the film also will be available on public television websites, as well. Some public TV stations will schedule broadcasts of the film, which viewers could save to their DVRs, if they wish.

“These offers really are based on scout’s honor that people will visit our film for a site license if they want to show this film to larger groups, which I would say is 20 people or more,” Martin said. “We realize that people could use their individual access to show this film to their classes or small groups at church, but we are asking people to visit our website and pay a public screening fee of $250 if you are planning to show this as a public event.”

That’s a reasonable fee to help support Martin and his small filmmaking crew.

If you would like to view and discuss this documentary in your community, please visit the “Screening Store” at Journey Films for the link to pay this film’s $250 fee. When you visit that page, you can learn about paying similar fees to publicly show other inspiring documentaries Martin has produced.

If you already are familiar with Martin’s work for Journey films, you may wonder:

Can I buy a DVD copy? “There is no DVD or Bluray available of this new film. We’re hearing that those formats are not what they used to be,” Martin said. “So, we’re only offering the streaming or, if you pay the fee, you can download the film.”

Is this film 1 or 2 parts? It’s both. Martin has released a version of the documentary divided into two parts that can be shown in two one-hour time slots on public TV. That version has transitional material added to the end of the first part and the start of the second part to help orient viewers. However, the version streaming from Journey Films runs straight through without a break.

Are there multiple tiers of fees? In the past, Journey Films did offer a higher-priced tier for larger public showings. This film is being released with a simple one-price fee.

“We’re telling people: Pay this one fee and you can stream it or download it, if you want, and you can show it as many times as you like in perpetuity,” Martin said. “We know there are ways around this, but we also know our viewers and we know they appreciate and support the good work we are doing. We’re asking people to help us by paying the fee—it’s a reasonable fee—if they want to use the film in their communities.”

Care to Learn More?

Religion News Service reporter Yonat Shimron has published an in-depth Q&A with Martin, headlined, “A new documentary takes a deep dive into the ancient and modern practice of Sabbath.”

That article begins:

(RNS)—In his book The Sabbath, Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel wrote that Jews did not build great cathedrals into space. Their great accomplishment was a cathedral in time—the Shabbat, or 24-hour period of rest. “Six days a week we live under the tyranny of things of space; on the Sabbath we try to become attuned to holiness in time,” Heschel wrote. That cathedral in time is part of filmmaker Martin Doblmeier’s latest two-part documentary called “Sabbath.” 

Yonat’s article also was picked up and republished in The Washington Post.

Anita Nowak shows us how ‘Purposeful Empathy’ can change the world

May 8, 2023 by

“Purposeful Empathy” author Anita Nowak in the midst of her global travels. (Photo provided by the author.)

‘Empathy is the innate trait that unites us in our common humanity’

By DAVID CRUMM
Editor of ReadTheSpirit magazine

Click the cover to visit the book’s Amazon page.

I decided to interview author Anita Nowak the moment I opened her new book, Purposeful Empathy, and found the Foreword by one of my own global heroes: Nobel Laureate Muhammad Yunus. He is the Bangladeshi-Bengali banker who pioneered the “microfinance” idea for helping neighbors in impoverished communities with small loans. One of the most memorable hours in my life was sitting in a small circle of American journalists in a home in Asia, listening to Yunus talk about his life.

“What lessons do you want us to share with our readers?” we asked him at the close of our hour together.

He said simply, “We must care what happens to each other—then we must learn to trust each other,” and then he was silent. What a clear answer! Two steps: Caring. Trusting. So simple, yet such a world-changing idea! And those same two principles are the reason Yunus agreed to add his considerable authority to the first page of Anita’s new book. In that Foreword, he writes:

Purposeful Empathy is a timely and inspiring read that carries an important message—one that aligns with my vision for a better world, animated by mutual care, respect, cooperation and solidarity.

So, because of Yunus’s words, I read Anita’s book. And, after just a few chapters, I was impressed with the considerable resources she has organized for readers—resources to help us learn to care and learn to trust. As Yunus writes in his Foreword, this is a book so practically designed that it can “swing you from cynicism to hope, from selfishness to selflessness, and from apathy to action.”

I also enlisted my reading-and-interviewing partner for this series of ReadTheSpirit stories about books on resiliency and overcoming trauma in healing communities. That partner is my son-in-law, the Rev. Joel Walther, the pastor of a mid-sized United Methodist congregation in Michigan. Together, we are working this spring on a series of interviews and columns about some very helpful new books appearing this year, including last week’s story about Trauma-Informed Evangelism.

Question: What is empathy?
Answer: It’s not as simple as you may think!

As Joel and I read Anita’s book, then compared our notes, our collective first question for her emerged: So, what is empathy?

You may already be responding to our question: Oh, that’s so simple!

Well, it isn’t. And I proved that point by using the much-heralded new AI image-generator Dall-e to request illustrations of “empathy.” Turns out: The word “empathy” stops Dall-e cold in its tracks. The vast Artificial Intelligence behind Dall-e apparently can’t discern the word’s meaning! Based on my request, Dall-e gave me illustrations of everything from an outright angry old man to a young woman wearing a blindfold. As Anita points out in her book, the word “empathy” is only about a century old in common English usage and it is often misunderstood. Clearly, based on my Dall-e AI experiments, that confusion is widespread.

I said to Anita in our three-way Zoom conversation, “Joel and I agree that the first big question in our conversation about your work is pretty basic: What’s empathy?”

The best answer to that question is: Read Anita’s book. As her book opens, she explains that, years ago, she wasn’t thinking specifically about “empathy” as she worked in social-change organizations in various parts of the world and collected interviews with social entrepreneurs. She was researching a doctoral thesis about the motivations behind “the next generation of change makers.” It was only after her thesis advisor pushed her to dig deeper into her growing body of research that she realized the core motivation was: empathy. That insight forever shifted the focus of her life’s work. In 2023, after the main title of her new book, Purposeful Empathy, is the subtitle: Tapping Our Hidden Superpower for Personal, Organizational and Social Change. We can guarantee that you will enjoy all 253 pages.

But, from our Zoom author interview, here’s a much shorter answer to our basic question. In Anita’s words, transcribed from our interview, she said:

“When I began my research, I was interviewing people who are creating positive change in the world to find out what has shaped their lives and their work—so I did not come to this research thinking that empathy was the answer. The answer ’empathy’ came out of the research. I realized that, across all of the stories I was collecting in my research, there were two things in common: One was that service was modeled in their home. They had a family that valued benevolent service to something greater than yourself. That was a value that was embedded in their childhood. And the second thing they all had in common was that they couldn’t turn a blind eye to whatever was going on around them that left people marginalized or disenfranchised or was hurting people in some way. And so I called this ‘empathic action.’

“Then, after discovering that they were all animated and inspired by empathy, I did a deep dive into ’empathy’ to understand it better. And what I came across in the literature was these words like ‘pity’ and ‘sympathy’ and ‘compassion’ that often were treated as synonyms with empathy. Then, I studied the etymology of these words and the evolution of the word ‘empathy’ in the English language and discovered that these words really form an emotional continuum. So, on one side of the continuum you’ve got ‘pity’ and then the continuum moves through ‘sympathy’ and ‘compassion’ to ‘empathy.’ But when you’re at the ‘pity’ end of the continuum, there is a power asymmetry in the relationship. When you pity someone, you look down on them. But as you move across this continuum all the way to ‘empathy,’ there’s a recognition of our shared humanity.

“So that’s why I refer to ’empathy’ as the innate trait that unites us in our common humanity. Empathy puts us on a level playing field. It takes away the ‘separateness’ and the ‘otherness.’ … Because we have these shared emotions like love and fear and shame and joy, that’s what makes empathy possible. And that’s why in the subtitle of this book, I call it our ‘superpower,’ because it connects us in our oneness in humanity.”

Adding ‘Parenting’ or ‘Family’ to Anita’s subtitle

Anita’s answer, above, is a wonderful summary of what readers will discover as they move through chapters that she packs with supplemental questions and activities for individual readers and small groups.

But it was Joel who pointed out one important value of this book that is not listed in Anita’s subtitle: Parenting and family life in general. Of course, the power of empathy to grow within families is right there in her answer, above—as well as in the pages of her book.

Because the words “Parenting” or “Family” didn’t make the cut for her subtitle, though, we asked her to talk about that aspect of her work and her daily life.

“One of the most important lessons I learned from interviewing social entrepreneurs is that they grew up in families that modeled service behavior. That lesson has stayed with me. I became a parent late in life. I had my daughter when I was 42 and she’s now turning 7.

“So, recently, my daughter and I were buying Harry Potter décor for her birthday and, as we ran our errands, we happened to pass an unhoused man on the street. My daughter asked, ‘Do we have time to buy a sandwich for this man?’

“I said, ‘Yes, we definitely have time to buy a sandwich for him.’

“But, when we went and bought the sandwich, then went back out to where we had seen him, he was no longer there. So, she insisted that we walk a couple of blocks to try to find him. We couldn’t find him and eventually she ate the sandwich.

“Even though we didn’t reach him with the sandwich, I was so touched by my daughter having that reflex. And I need to say: I’m not claiming to have a perfect angel living in my midst. Around that same time, I got a call from another parent saying, ‘Your daughter was mean to my daughter today.’ So, I’m not claiming our lives are perfect!

“I tell this story about my daughter and the sandwich to say that I think we need to focus as parents on raising kind children. We need to talk to our children about social issues from a young age. In our world today, there are children who are living through war and other life-and-death hardships. I disagree with the idea that it’s somehow inappropriate to expose our children to those hard issues in our world. I’m not going to traumatize my daughter by talking about some of the ills in our world. I’ve taken my daughter to protest marches in her stroller. She’s growing up aware of some of these concerns.

“And even more than what we talk about, we need to pay attention to how we behave. One day, my daughter saw me as I was driving and pulled a big U-turn in the street and she was concerned: ‘Mom, you’ve just done something illegal!’ She was judging me. The point I’m making is that our children are watching us all the time and we need to model for them behavior that we hope they will follow, just like the social entrepreneurs I mentioned at the start of this answer. When they were children, they saw their parents doing things that they are doing today. I’m not claiming to be a perfect mother, but I do think about what we are modeling every day for our children because I know that makes a big difference.”

‘How do we intentionally work toward empathy?’

The reason Joel is partnering with me in this particular series of interviews is that these new books really are aimed at community leaders, including pastors trying to lead resilient, compassionate, loving congregations. He’s a great source of grassroots insight and, in this interview, he asked Anita to particularly address: “As a pastor reading your book, I understand that you’re really talking about empathy as connection. And I keep wondering: How do we convince people to encourage connection rather than division. We’re obviously in a place now where we need something new?”

Anita answered:

“That’s a great question, Joel. And the answer really is: practice.

“As I learned about the neuroscience of empathy, it shows that we can become more empathic with practice just like doing bicep curls at the gym to strengthen our arms. In the book, I mention Jamil Zaki at the Stanford Social Neuroscience Laboratory. He’s done research that shows just the belief that we can become more empathic actually has real implications on our behavior. There’s so much evidence now that empathy can be purposeful. We can choose to be more empathetic. So, as I learned about all of this, I did all kinds of experiments myself that you can read about in the book.

“I often tell people about this experience I had at a FedEx store: It was a holiday season some years ago, before we had cell phones—so there was nothing to distract us as we waited. I was standing in this FedEx store with other people all becoming bored and annoyed. Then, I finally got to the counter and the woman at the counter was rude—not just a little bit rude, but nasty. I felt this trigger, like: How dare you talk to me like that?! But, instead of saying that and making the situation worse, I took a second to say: ‘Are you OK?’

“Then, she took a second to discern if I was being sarcastic and mean, kind of passive-aggressive. She realized I was serious and she just burst into tears. She said, ‘I’ve been doing double shifts for two weeks straight, my son’s at home with a fever and now I think I’m getting sick. We haven’t had a lunch break here. I’m just exhausted.’

“And I get goose bumps when I tell this story because I actually reached across the counter and we held hands. Now we’re both crying. Here we are—perfect strangers—in this empathic embrace. I could remember being on her side of the equation many times in my life. All of us have been! And haven’t we all, also, been on my side of that counter that day?

“But we usually don’t take a step that leads to a moment of empathy like that.

“Now think about how many times these things happen to us over and over again, these days, until we’re all frazzled. We’re triggered by the Twitter-sphere, by people driving poorly, by other people who are upset. We’re stressed out—and here’s the problem: We cannot live in a state of stress and a state of empathy at the same time. Our brain does not do that. So, it’s a matter of making a decision to lean into empathy. And, when you do, it’s amazing what opens up!

“So, my answer is: Practice. Practice. Practice.”

Question: Why try empathy?
Answer: It feels so good!

Here’s the best news about Anita’s book: After her advice, above, about “practice, practice, practice,” this book could sound like bitter medicine. You know you should read it, even if you don’t feel like it.

In fact, reading her book is the opposite of that: It feels good.

And it feels good to read these pages, and think about the questions she asks—and try the activities she suggests—because it feels good.

Empathy feels good!

Finally, Joel and I asked Anita to talk about his wonderfully refreshing “pay off” for doing something so good in the world. She began by explaining the two kinds of empathy she describes in the early pages of her book. Here’s what she said:

“We have access to both kinds of empathy: affective and cognitive empathy.

“The affective empathy, the emotional empathy, is like an emotional contagion. Affective empathy happens to us. When you see a child playing in the park and you hear that child giggling and laughing, you can’t walk by without that lifting your spirit. You’re feeling a resonance with that child just like when you see somebody crying at the airport, you wonder what those tears are about because you feel it.

“Cognitive empathy is different because it requires our choice. We’re actively involved in perspective taking: I wonder what that experience is like for somebody else? Sometimes it involves projection: I wonder how I would feel in this circumstance? It’s intentional empathy and that’s why it’s purposeful empathy.

“So purposeful empathy, cognitive empathy, is the thing that gives us the most power. We can choose to turn it on. And we can choose to turn up the volume of purposeful empathy. When you’re listening to somebody tell a story and you’re holding space for that person to share something—and you’re listening with engagement—that triggers your purposeful or cognitive empathy.

“That actually feels good! The research shows that when we are feeling emotionally connected to somebody, even if they’re sharing a sad story, our brains light up in the same pleasure and reward centers as if we were having chocolate cake. We want to feel connected to one another.

“And when we choose to lean into empathy more regularly in our lives, we strengthen our empathic responses and we can help strengthen the empathic responses in others. We need to remember that kindness is currency—that we can choose to practice empathy and that it feels sooo good!“

.

Care to read more?

GET HER NEW BOOK: Purposeful Empathy, is available from Amazon, Barnes & Noble and other booksellers across the U.S. and around the world.

CONNECT WITH HER ONLINE: Visit Anita’s website, which includes this page about her public speaking. That page includes a clickable button “Want me to speak?” that reaches Anita with your inquiry.

READ MORE BOOKS ABOUT CARING AND RESILIENCY: The good news is that there are many helpful men and women publishing books that contribute to this overall message of hope and caring. One book we’re highly recommending this year is Howard Brown’s Shining Brightly.

Howard Brown: ‘You’ll want to learn from these two power-house women: Nim Stant and Orit Ramler’

May 4, 2023 by

Nim Stant presenting the International Impact Book Award to Howard Brown in Toronto.

How do we find and focus on our life’s purpose?

By HOWARD BROWN
Author of Shining Brightly

After producing dozens of Shining Brightly podcasts, I want to call special attention this week to two power-house women whose unique missions in life involve helping people to make our world a better place. And, of course, that’s the core message of my own memoir, Shining Brightly. So, I feel as though these women are sisters as we share this common hope.

Please, take a few minutes to listen to their stories. I know you’ll feel inspired yourself after listening to their ideas and I hope you’ll wind up wanting to share this column—and these podcasts—with friends on social media.

Who is Nim Stant?

On her website, Nim describes herself this way: “I am an entrepreneur, author, and influencer on a mission to help elevate the human experience of living with full potential. I founded Go All In Media and Go All In Fest in 2020, intending to bring together global thought leaders and teachers to educate, heal and create support for our community as a whole.”

As I am traveling and speaking to groups myself, this year, I have now worked cooperatively with Nim in appearances both in the U.S. and Canada, where she presented me with an award for my book. She’s featured in the podcast you can hear below.

Here’s what impresses me most about Nim: She’s resilient! In this podcast, we discuss her journey to the U.S. from Thailand—and we talk about how she now is committed to giving back to families in poorer communities around the world. One example: She funds playgrounds for children who need a safe place to play.

Who is Orit Ramler?

Orit has developed a unique process to help men and women “live with purpose.” She calls this process the “Box of Life.” On her website, she describes the Box of Life this way: “Through The Box of Life Project, Orit will coach you to curate meaning in your life by preserving the memories and objects you cherish and the stories that make them—and you—special. Honoring your most treasured accomplishments and objects will preserve your legacy for future generations. We help you capture your stories, curate your memories and live with purpose.”

What impressed me most about Orit? She’s a power-house of fresh ideas! Her Box of Life concept as a way to focus our lives? That’s genius. In our podcast conversation, we discuss some of the core questions she raises in her work with professionals nationwide.

Charles Kiser and Elaine A. Heath offer valuable help in ‘Trauma-Informed Evangelism, Cultivating Communities of Wounded Healers’

May 1, 2023 by

‘Love should be the Guiding Principle’

.

Click on the cover to visit the book’s Amazon page.

By DAVID CRUMM
Editor of ReadTheSpirit magazine

First, the bad news: Americans are experiencing more trauma after three years of the pandemic than ever before and that means our communities—and, in particular, our congregations within those communities—are facing challenges that many religious leaders are not equipped to meet.

How do I know that? There’s research about the growing scope of the problem conducted by institutions ranging from Pew to our national health agencies. In addition to that data, like so many of our readers, I hear about this from my own family and friends, as well.

The Rev. Joel Walther, my son in law who serves a mid-sized United Methodist congregation in Michigan, suggested that ReadTheSpirit feature a Cover Story about this new book, Trauma-Informed Evangelism: Cultivating Communities of Wounded Healers, because he felt it was a valuable resource on a subject he’s hearing about frequently.

In our interview by Zoom with authors Charles Kiser and Elaine A. Heath, Joel explained that he’s got some members of his church who “openly talk about trauma, spiritual trauma, religious harm and things like that. I’m trying to figure out how we create a church that begins to deal with this and doesn’t just pretend it isn’t there and doesn’t try to gloss it over and doesn’t try to deny the lament of it. When I saw this book titled Trauma-Informed Evangelism, I thought: That’s something I need to read!”

As a pastor himself, Charles immediately responded, “For my part, all of this work we’ve done came from relationships with friends in my neighborhood and folks who ended up in my church—relationships through which I also found out about the spiritual harms that are just below the surface. That’s why I wanted to get this book out into the world to share these stories that are transformative to me.

“That’s my hope whether the reader is a church leader like you, Joel, who has folks in a church who have experiences of spiritual trauma—or the reader may be a clinical psychologist who works with spiritual survivors. Whoever reads this book will find language and insight and understanding that can help folks who have experienced religious trauma.”

We asked Elaine the same question: Who are the ideal readers for this book?

”In writing this book, I especially had in mind theological education, thinking of people in seminaries who have to take a class in evangelism or they won’t get ordained—or they’re taking classes in practical theology, pastoral theology and pastoral care classes,” Elaine said, drawing affirming nods from both Charles and Joel.

“So, on one level, this book comes out of my decades of working in academic realms,” Elaine said. In those years teaching in seminaries, “I taught a theology of evangelism that is healing and is inclusive and is trauma informed, principles you’ll find in our book. And that approach came out of my own journey growing up in a violent home where our parents were not people of faith and my siblings and I had to fend for ourselves. I wrote a memoir with my sister who is a therapist, called Loving the Hell Out of Ourselves, in which we told our story. As we encountered Christians along the way first as children and then as we grew up, we encountered various kinds of Christians, some of whom were helpful to us and some of whom preyed on us. … So, the passion I feel around the principles you find in this book emerges from my own experience personally and professionally.”

In fact, that’s the personal invitation readers will find in the introduction of their new book. On page 4, they write, “We come to this conversation not only as pastors, evangelists and theologians but also as survivors of spiritual abuse and trauma ourselves.” In the following 200 pages, Charles and Elaine become our companions as much as our teachers.

Herein lies the good news

And now the good news: There’s help out there. And more is coming! Major public institutions are offering resources for coping with trauma, including helpful online information, counseling programs, recommendations for small-group discussions and opportunities for professional training. In addition—and specifically focused on congregational life—most faith-based publishing houses right now are launching new books by experts like Kiser and Heath on a wide array of issues within the broad subjects of trauma, compassion and resiliency. These authors are trying their best to “network” religious readers with books, publications, online links, training opportunities and suggestions for further training.

As a publishing house, we are part of that healing process: Our own publishing house, Front Edge Publishing, already offers Lucille Sider’s Light Shines in the Darkness about the challenges of surviving sexual abuse and mental illness. We publish Howard Brown’s inspiring Shining Brightly, which includes keys to resiliency in overcoming the family-wide trauma of life-threatening cancer. We also publish the Michigan State University School of Journalism Bias Busters series to confront racism and other forms of bigotry. We’ve got more books on related themes in production.

Our online magazine ReadTheSpirit already has published interviews with authors of related books:

So, what’s in this new book by Kiser and Heath?

Trauma Informed Evangelism: Cultivating Communities of Wounded Healers captures the main intention of these authors in the title. In our interview and in the book itself, they describe their mission as helping to foster “a form of Christianity that heals the wounds of the world.”

Of course, that idea of a “wounded healer” leaps from the pages of the Christian New Testament. This new book really is aimed at men and women who care about their Christian congregations: pastors, lay leaders, Sunday School teachers, counselors, educators. Although they focus primarily on Protestant congregations, given their professional backgrounds, there is a lot of valuable information in this book that also applies to Catholic, Jewish, Muslim and other congregations—as well as to secular professionals and community leaders.

Charles Kiser is a scholar and pastor of Storyline Christian Community in Dallas, Texas, a network of Christian communities that he helped to form. Elaine A. Heath is a scholar, a former dean of the Divinity School at Duke University and the author of many other books. She also is the leader of The Church at Spring Forest, a unique approach to cooperatively developing a farm-based intentional community.

In our interview, I asked them: “Are you comfortable with my describing your new book as both a resource-filled toolbox, packed with ideas for congregational leaders—as well as a Christian manifesto for faithfully following Jesus’s teachings today? Specifically, what do you think about that word ‘manifesto’?”

“I like that word choice a lot—manifesto,” said Elaine. “I think that’s true especially of the sections of the book I wrote.”

“I agree,” Charles said. “That’s what we are trying to say from the start.”

In the opening pages of their book, Charles writes about this hopeful vision of compassionate change sweeping through many grassroots congregations across the country:

We seek to join in what God is doing in and through the church in our time … framing a larger vision to which we hope to contribute through this project.

Then, Elaine adds the next paragraph on that introductory page:

We are at the forefront of a new reformation, one that is freeing the Christian faith from the sinful structures of patriarchy, racism, classism, many phobias, and exploitive forms of mission and evangelism. The new reformation is all about the emergence of a generous, hospitable, equitable form of Christianity that heals the wounds of the world. I believe much of the work of the church in the years ahead must focus on healing the wounds inflicted by Christendom so that the beauty and inclusive goodness of the gospel can be heard, seen, and experienced.

Those ambitious and hopeful visions they describe on page 6 of their book explain the book’s structure. They designed this 224-page book as it were a basic training program for concisely addressing many forms of trauma. And “concise” is a key term. To give readers a sense of the breadth of this challenge, they sketch many ways individuals and families may be coping with forms of trauma from generational wounds—such as slavery and Native American boarding schools—to fresh wounds from psychological, physical and even spiritual attacks.

One of the most thought-provoking sections of their book argues against some evangelical ways of preaching about Jesus’s crucifixion that can, in effect, become traumatizing. They are not asking readers to agree with every argument they pose in these pages—but they do ask readers to think in new ways about how some preaching can become spiritually abusive.

In almost every case, either within the main text of the book or in a very useful 38-page resource section at the end of their book, they do not simply rely on their own scholarship. Page after page, they point readers to additional helpful scholarship, research and professional resources.

On the subject of abusive and manipulative preaching, they introduce readers to the cutting-edge work of Dr. Kathryn Keller, a researcher who has developed useful ways to talk with people about negative experiences they may have encountered in churches or other religious groups. As it turns out, Dr. Keller’s doctoral research, which describes ways to question people about spiritual abuse, is one of many additional resources available online. That’s how the covers of this book open up like a tool chest, pointing toward a wealth of additional reading. If you want to dive much deeper into Dr. Keller’s research, you will find that her online work actually is longer than Charles’ and Elaine’s book.

What else is in this toolbox?

Think of this new book as a condensed manifesto, a well-stocked toolbox and a seminar-series all packed neatly between the covers of a book. Among the other notable insights you’ll find here:

DIFFERENTIATION in LEADERSHIP: The authors write about the challenges community leaders face if they do want to provide compassionate care. How do leaders both assist and remain a proper distance to safeguard against becoming overwhelmed? They don’t attempt to provide pat answers, but they do identify these complex issues that readers may want to explore further.

12-STEP CONNECTIONS: Charles and Elaine don’t delve into the 12-step movement, but readers who are involved in that realm will find sections in their book that parallel the hard-earned wisdom gleaned in the 12-step history. Readers interested in 12-step movements are likely to find this book fascinating.

FLIPPED HOSPITALITY: Even secular community leaders will find their section on “flipping hospitality” quite thought provoking. How often do we confuse “hospitality” with what amount to predatory practices? How can we open up our communities to welcoming people on their own terms? This is one of the authors’ most intriguing passages. They even touch on ethnography as a model for leadership, a professional discipline that points readers toward becoming a part of a community without a manipulative agenda.

How could this book change readers?

At the end of our time together on Zoom, we asked Charles and Elaine how they hope their book could affect readers?

Charles said he hopes readers will find helpful answers to the question he was asking, when he began work on this book with Elaine: “How can I engage and relate to my non-religious friends, many of whom have experienced religious harm? In those situations, I hope we can learn to listen first, to listen almost entirely as we hear their stories, as we receive their stories. One expression of love is listening to each other’s stories. Part of the pathway toward healing from trauma is that acknowledgement and then making space for these experiences, perspectives and stories that are painful. So, I hope readers of this book will begin to ask themselves: Can we listen ourselves into a new kind of connection?”

Elaine said, “I hope we can learn and practice a hermeneutic of love, asking ourselves: How do we read other people’s writing? How do we read other people? How do we approach conversations as a result? In that process, love really should be our guiding principle. Loving our neighbors and knowing that God is love should be our guiding principles. More than all the other rules and regulations and moral imperatives, we need to love our neighbors in a way that feels loving to them—and that’s important: what feels loving to them, not what I think feels loving to me. If we’re not doing that, then we’re missing the mark.”

She paused a moment, then said, “I know some people will respond to my saying that with: ‘Oh, that’s too mushy. It’s not an ethically clear enough way of expressing this.’

“But to that, I just say, ‘Baloney! Jesus said this is the heart of everything: Loving God with all our heart, soul, mind and strength and loving our neighbors as ourselves.'”

.

.

Care to learn more?

GET THE BOOK: Trauma-Informed Evangelism: Cultivating Communities of Wounded Healers is available from Amazon and other booksellers.

RELATED TRAINING: Brenda Rosenberg’s international efforts to promote healing from religious, racial and ethnic trauma follow very similar principles to those outlined in Charles’s and Elaine’s new book. Brenda is Jewish and works with Muslim and Christian partners, often young people. Her work can be found in Harnessing the Power of Tension and Reuniting the Children of Abraham. The latter book focuses on her work with teens.

CDC RESOURCES: The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is the national public health agency of the United States and has brought together a wide range of helpful resources related to abuse, racism and trauma. Among the CDC gateway pages are:

NATIONAL SUICIDE HOTLINE: In addition, caring community leaders should keep the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services National Suicide Hotline handy: 988. That’s a program of the department’s Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA). In addition, SAMHSA maintains its own online gateway to resources related to trauma and violence.

IF YOU FIND THIS ARTICLE HELPFUL, please share it with friends and colleagues via social media and email.

 

‘Sit in the Sun, And Other Lessons in the Spiritual Wisdom of Cats’ is Jon M. Sweeney’s Tour de Feline

April 23, 2023 by

,

“When the student is ready, the teacher will appear.”
Often attributed to the Buddha

.

By DAVID CRUMM
Editor of ReadTheSpirit magazine

Click on the cover to visit the book’s Amazon page.

After Jon M. Sweeney’s more than 40 books on faith and spirituality, his readers around the world have noticed a curious twist: Five of his most recent books are about cats—and, now, it’s a total of six with the April 2023 release of what amounts to his Tour de Feline, a book called Sit in the Sun, And Other Lessons in the Spiritual Wisdom of Cats.

The book is dedicated to the nine cats who have shaped his life, to date. In the course of 17 chapters, we meet these furry gurus along with more than 50 other human saints and sages.

As a well-known journalist, author and teacher about his Catholic faith, Sweeney takes seriously the concept of “vocation,” a term that comes from the Latin “to call” or “to summon.” (For more on vocation, you may want to look back at last week’s cover story about Father Ed Dowling, who helped to shape the AA movement and who also believed strongly in identifying one’s vocation.) You can learn more about Jon Sweeney’s vocation in his new book that has taken this surprising turn: After dozens of more sober books about saints, theology and other spiritual themes—Jon finally felt his life-long feline companions “summoning” him.

Jon first answered this call with a fanciful children’s book about a Roman street cat named Margaret who finds a home at the Vatican. Then, he kept that popular series rolling through five volumes until he concluded that series in 2021 with a prequel to the Margaret saga, titled Before Margaret Met the Pope, a Conclave Story. Then, inspired by the warm reader response to those books—and suddenly finding himself isolated with his cats by the pandemic—he launched into his Magnum Felis Catus aimed at bringing adults along for the ride in his cat’s eye spiritual adventures.

Cats Crossing a Line?

In our interview this week about his new book, Jon said, “I think I crossed a line with the Pope’s Cat series—and maybe it was just a line I crossed in my own imagination—but I think in some real sense I discovered that I was willing to do work that some of my readers might think is—well—” and Jon paused as he searched for the right word before settling on—”well, some of my readers of the earlier books might think these books about cats are frivolous.”

“They’re playful. They’re humorous. They’re wise and winsome,” I countered. “But they’re not frivolous.”

“I like the words ‘playful’ and ‘humorous,’ and that’s why this transition was kind of a big deal for me as a writer and editor. I’m human like everybody else and I consider what people are thinking about me. I’m a writer with an audience I care about serving. For a lot of years, readers followed me through books that are serious—sometimes spiritually earnest and sometimes scholarly rigorous—so when I decided to write the first in what became the Pope’s Cat series, I realized that I was throwing that reputation for seriousness to the wind to some extent. Then, after I had crossed the line with that series, and seeing the response I was getting, I was able to cross another line into writing Sit in the Sun.”

I said, “That’s certainly true. You’ve crossed the line into some truly playful suggestions to your readers. For example, I don’t think readers can try your Chapter 2 spiritual suggestion to actually purr like a cat while praying and not chuckle—or at least smile.”

Breaking Down Barriers in Meditation

In Sit in the Sun, Sweeney wants readers to fully embrace what may seem more like a Buddhist approach to breaking down barriers in our daily meditations by not taking oneself too seriously. In Chapter 4, he urges readers to embrace a cat-like freedom to sometimes look foolish.

He calls this Chapter 4 advice: “A Cat Practice.” That page begins: “Be foolish, just a little bit. You can do it. Practice foolishness. Maybe for you that means walking backwards down your sidewalk, around your block. The practice is not meant to be an exercise in feeling insecure or unsafe, but, rather, a way of discovering a new vision. … Or try this—a practice that has helped me over the years. Mess up your hair and then leave it that way for at least an hour. … How do you feel when something about you is a little unkempt, playful, wild?” (Again, if you’ve read last week’s story about Father Ed Dowling, you’ll see a connection here about appearance and deeper truths.)

If you are curious to know more about what “a Buddhist approach to breaking down barriers” means: In preparing for this cover story about Sweeney’s new book, I pulled off my shelf two of Buddhist writer Geri Larkin’s best sellers: Close to the Ground and The Chocolate Cake Sutra. To appreciate another dimension of Jon’s new book, readers could embark on a parallel reading with either of those books by Geri. The journeys lead to many similar spiritual adventures.

The Consensus of the Commonplace

There also is a clear consensus in comparing Geri’s and Jon’s writing—and a third new spiritual memoir we recently wrote about by Barbara Mahany, The Book of Nature. In our cover story about Barbara’s book, Barbara and I talked about the centuries-old tradition of the “commonplace” or we might say the spiritual practice of “commonplacing.” For Barbara, that amounts to literally copying and assembling memorable citations, valuable bits of wisdom, until they begin to form a community of insights she can share in a book like her new The Book of Nature.

For Jon Sweeney, that “commonplacing” dwells more in his library and his expansive memory from decades of research, writing and teaching.

In our interview, I said, “I actually made a chart on a legal pad of everyone readers will meet between the covers of your book and I think the total is 53 or 54, depending on whether you count E.B. White and his Stuart Little as 1 or 2 folks.”

“Is it that many? Fifty-four?” Jon said. “I hadn’t counted but I made those connections as I wrote intentionally to lead readers toward other sources.” His helpfulness extends to the final 24 pages of this book, which suggest additional books and ways to delve into many of the references within these chapters. Like Jon and his beloved cats—this is a very friendly book.

In our interview, I described it as “a very helpful book. I turned down the corners of dozens of pages where I want to dig deeper in my own future reading. I was pleasantly surprised by the diversity of folks you drew on for illustrations. Like the window that lets in the sunlight, this book really is a gateway.”

Who are some of the people we can meet through Jon’s gateway? Standing in this book’s “great cloud of witnesses,” we might say, are the Sufi poet Hafez, science fiction writer Ursula Le Guin, novelist Iris Murdoch, Benedictine teacher Christine Valters Paintner, the Buddhist monk Thích Nhất Hạnh, sculptor Candice Lin, the beloved Rabbi Nachman of Breslov and Native American sage Nicholas Black Elk, whose life Jon explored in a 2020 biography.

Jon said, “Most of the 50-or-so people you can meet in this book are an integral part of my own life, like Nicholas Black Elk, who I wrote about for Liturgical Press’s People of God biography series. When I draw from the Quran in this book, that’s a part of my life, too. I’m in the middle of a monthly series of meetings with a Muslim refugee to learn more about the Quran. When I draw from Judaism, I’m married to a rabbi so we’re involved in Judaism all the time. The way this book is written really is an expression of my life.”

And Finally: Facing the Francis Problem

“Because I love your new book, I’m not sure if I should bring up the one problem you’ve encountered since writing about cats,” I said, trying to soften my question even as I posed it.

I could see Jon already nodding on the Zoom video.

“Of course, this is the Francis question,” I said. “Or maybe the double-Francis question.”

Readers familiar with Catholic tradition and Vatican news will recognize that both the world-famous St. Francis of Assisi and his contemporary namesake Pope Francis are not fans of domesticated animal companions. Even though St. Francis is famous for finding wisdom among wild animals, he did not want his own friars to live with domesticated animal companions. And the saint’s current namesake at the Vatican does not have animal companions. Moreover, Pope Francis has publicly warned Catholics against showering excessive care on animals at the expense of care for the millions of needy humans around our planet.

Jon said, “The first thing I need to say is: I didn’t know anything about real cats at the Vatican, except that so many cats live in Rome. It was only after I published the first Pope’s Cat that I began hearing from readers, ‘Oh, this is about Pope Benedict and his cat!’ I honestly did not even know that Benedict had a cat. So, I have to keep telling readers: This pope series is fiction. It’s a cat’s-eye view of life at the Vatican, like other writers have imagined animals’ perspectives on life.”

“Like Robert Lawson’s children’s classic, Ben and Me, which imagines a mouse’s view of Benjamin Franklin’s life,” I said.

“That’s the idea,” he said. “Those Margaret stories are fiction. And, I had to be careful as the Margaret series continued because there were at least a few illustrations that I saw pre-publication that were looking too much like the current pope and we had to make sure we weren’t being that literal.”

“I do think that your approach to carefully observing animal behavior—in this case the behavior of cats—does have an echo of St. Francis’s approach to observing animals,” I said.

“Yes, I understand why Francis didn’t want his friars to keep cats or other animals as a part of their daily lives, because Francis really wanted to free his friars from daily domestic duties that come along with animal care. He wanted his friars to be freely active in the world. He was resistant of contemplative tendencies early in his movement,” Jon said. “And I also can understand what Pope Francis meant when he warned people about going nuts over their animals while they may be ignoring the human needs around him. I’m well aware of these concerns.”

‘Appreciating what is right in front of us’

The last question in author interviews is always: “How do you hope readers will be changed by reading your book? What new awareness do you hope your book will spark?”

“I hope that readers will come away with a richer understanding of their ordinary domestic lives. We all could use a lot more of that awareness,” Jon said. “Especially those of us who are involved in religious life find ourselves devoting a lot of time to texts, a lot of time to listening to spoken words, a lot of time traveling to places that are supposed to be religious.

“We don’t spend enough time appreciating what is right in front of us,” he said. “And, if you do live with cats as I do—that includes appreciating the wisdom of your cats.”

.

.

Care to Learn More?

GET THE BOOKS:

CONNECT WITH JON: Buy his new book and you’ll find links to his social media. Although he is a well-known author and sought-after speaker, he’s easy to find online.

RESOURCES from SPIRITUALITY AND PRACTICE: Our longtime friends Frederic and Mary Ann Brussat, cofounders of the online hub Spirituality & Practice, were supportive of Jon’s new book even before he finished writing it. Early in his writing, Jon taught an online Spirituality & Practice course that’s now available “on demand.” Then, closer to the release of his final book, the Brussats also posted a review of his book.

.

.

Cynthia Vacca Davis’s ‘Intersexion’ explores the traumas and the hopes of Christian community

March 13, 2023 by

Click on the cover to visit the book’s Amazon page.

By DAVID CRUMM
Editor of Read the Spirit magazine

Yes, as the cover of Cynthia Vacca Davis’s memoir proclaims, “sex” is a major theme in this book.

But if you read her title—Intersexion, A Story of Faith, Identity and Authenticity—all the way to the end, you’ll find another major theme of this book: Authenticy. And, beyond that, there’s a third major theme that matters deeply to millions of American people of faith these days: Community. The larger story within these 234 pages is about the fulfillment so many Americans are seeking in warmly embracing communities of faith.

The main narrative in this book describes the dramatic changes in Cynthia’s life through a close friendship at her church with Dani/Danny—who is part of a largely misunderstood gender minority and was going through even more titanic changes at the same time. As Dani moved toward embracing an authentic life as Danny, both Cynthia and Danny met the harshness of Evangelical exclusion. However, both of them refused to hide their own true stories in the shadows. Danny was experiencing physical and emotional changes as an intersex person and Cynthia was discovering the buzzsaws that friends of LGBTQ+ folks can face, as well.

Ultimately, that’s the reason millions of Americans should read this new book. Cynthia’s memoir tells us what it feels like inside the daily lives of both her friend and herself and their families—when faced with the harsh reality of Evangelical judgment. And, even though this particular book is about exclusion due to gender and sexuality, this echoes stories about exclusion due to race or ethnicity or simply an openness to questioning the almost fundamentalist doctrines held by many Evangelicals in America.

The most compelling reason to read this book—for most readers nationwide—is to learn what it feels like when people find themselves exiled from the iron gates of such rigid religious communities. There are millions of these refugees all across America, as we know from Pew Research. And, if you are not one of those refugees yourself, Cynthia’s book explains to the rest of us—including active members in the many churches that welcome minorities—that some of our Christian neighbors may be carrying profound wounds as they try to find new homes. Even as we extend a welcoming hand to these exiles, years may pass before those wounds heal, if ever.

Cynthia herself makes this case in the opening two paragraphs of a free downloadable-PDF she offers to folks who visit her website—CynthiaVaccaDavis.com. The PDF is a check list that she calls “5 Ways to Find Community after Leaving Church.” She writes in those opening paragraphs:

One of the biggest fears I had about walking away from church was losing my community. Church for me was never something I did halfway: It was a way of life. I was involved in church happenings multiple days each week. My social circle was derived almost entirely of people from our congregation. My emergency contacts? Church friends. Surrogate family for holidays? Again, church people. I couldn’t imagine how I would be able to rebuild community from scratch by myself. It was terrifying.

But the reality was way different than I feared. My social circle expanded exponentially after I stopped attending church. And the relationships I developed were deeper, richer, and more authentic than many of my Christian friendships had been. Although the process seemed organic and fairly effortless, in hindsight I can identify several shifts in my thinking and behavior that opened me to new and unexpected friendships.

These two paragraphs tell us a lot about Cynthia’s life and also the themes she explores in her new memoir. Among the details to note in these paragraphs: She’s still among the walking wounded. And, Cynthia assumes that the terms “church” and “Christian” refer to a kind of razor-edged, almost-fundamentalist Evangelical community. The fact is that, today, lots of mainline churches—and millions of Christians—fully welcome racial, ethnic and gender diversity. Her definition of “church” and “Christian” refer to claustrophobic circles in which she lived a lot of her life—and that will shape her worldview of those two terms for the rest of her life.

In an interview with Cynthia about her book, this week, she said, “As I began working with Danny on writing this book, I realized—and Danny realized—that writing our stories could be a gift to the larger community, giving people an authentic sense of what so many of us are going through. Of course, I realize there are other kinds of churches out there, but this book describes our church and our experience—because we know that so many others have had these experiences.”

The Lonely Curiosity of the Exiles

Cynthia Vacca Davis. (Photograph used with permission of the author.)

In our interview, I said to Cynthia: “You know one ray of sunshine related to your story is that, by and large, the battle for gender inclusion is all but over across America. There are still very active battlegrounds in states where conservatives are trying to chip away at civil rights. But overall, for example, a solid majority of Americans now support legal recognition of same-sex marriage and majorities also support a range of other LGBTQ rights. I live in Michigan, where our legislature finally voted, this month, to include LGBTQ rights in the state’s civil rights code. Yes, there are millions of former Evangelicals who are exiles precisely because of their concern for either their own gender identity or that of relatives, friends, coworkers and neighbors. It’s heartbreaking to think of so many people adrift because of religious bias. And, yes, there will continue to be heart-breaking battles for years to come—but that hard-edged Evangelical minority in America keeps shrinking each year.”

I said, “That’s a bit of a long-winded summary of the state of these issues—but the basic point I’m making is: Hopefully, the loneliness of the Evangelical exiles will be increasingly greeted by congregations with open doors and open arms. Do you think you might return to some kind of church?”

“I do think about this a lot,” Cynthia said. “I know there are churches out there right now who have very solid allies. But, because of what I’ve been through and what Danny’s been through, I don’t know if attending a brick-and-mortar church is in the future for me. I still don’t know if that will be possible for me in the future.

“Once we had made it through the kinds of experiences with church that we describe in this book, I think there’s a natural hesitancy about accepting the constant filter of a church again,” she said. “And, with this new freedom, I’m discovering new things to do with my Sunday mornings. I love my Sunday morning yoga, now, and I love meeting different people and trying different practices that are both meditative and are connected to community—just not inside a brick-and-mortar church.

“After my experiences, living outside those old boxes and walls is giving me something I’ve never experienced before and, right now, I want to explore that,” she said and paused for a moment before adding, “I do not want to say that I will never go back to church. But I am saying: Not now.”

She paused. Then, she added. “But ever? Church? For me? I do get curious.”

A Helpful Book for Caring Congregations

That is why, in my Amazon-book-page review of Cynthia’s book, I write:

This story does not end on a down note. The book’s concluding chapters describe the happier path these friends have charted beyond that insular world they once thought of as home. Although their story is grounded in the specifics of their own lives, their story mirrors that of millions of Americans who have walked away from Evangelical churches for a wide range of reasons, including racial, cultural and political biases that have become litmus tests in many churches.

This book is a great choice for individual reading or small-group discussion. At the moment, Cynthia is working on a discussion guide that she plans to post on her own website in coming months. Even if you are not part of the Evangelical world from which this book springs—this is an intimate and caring look at how lives are turned upside down by these all-too-common biases. That means this is a very helpful book for readers from more caring congregations, so they might be better prepared to welcome these battle-scarred folks into a healthier form of spiritual community.

I was pleased to hear from Cynthia’s publisher, David Morris of Lake Drive Books, that he agrees with my overall “take” on this book. That’s why he wanted to publish Cynthia’s memoir and that’s what he hopes readers will discover in these pages, he told me.

Here’s what David Morris said about the book: “As Cynthia went through all of these experiences she describes in her book, she realized that her community was at risk—and in some ways it was. She experienced some rejection and hard choices. But, through this process of deciding to be fully authentic and open, she found more connections, more community, than she had expected. What she discovered is that, once we are living authentically, our community may not look like what we thought it was going to look like. Our community can expand and change. And that’s true for so many of us these days—because our sense of community itself is growing and developing in this changing world.”

In my interview with Cynthia, I promised I would give her the last word in this story. Together, we chose the final paragraph of her new book as that last word:

“Danny taught me that being known is worth fighting for. It’s worth betting everything on. It’s risky. It’s terrifying. But it’s the only thing that matters. I don’t have all the answers, but what I do know is, for the rest of my life, anyplace I go—church, job or otherwise—it will be as me, authentically: insides and outsides all in alignment.”

.

Care to read more?

GET THE BOOK—Cynthia’s Intersexion is available on Amazon in paperback, Kindle and audio versions. 

VISIT CYNTHIA ONLNE—Visit her website, CynthiaVaccaDavis.com.

MORE LAKE DRIVE BOOKS—Find books on similar themes at David Morris’s website for Lake Drive Books.

EXPLORE TWO LANDMARK BOOKS—These two books are landmarks in the effort to welcome LGBTQ Christians:

MEET THE BIAS BUSTERS—Check out the 20 guidebooks to overcoming bigotry produced by the Michigan State University School of Journalism Bias Busters. Those books are available in Kindle and paperback editions. Volumes 12 and 14 in this series specifically explore sexuality and gender.

.

.

Dr. David Gushee on the Importance of ‘Introducing Christian Ethics’ in an era of ‘Global Killers’

February 26, 2023 by

Q&A: How does ‘Christian Ethics’ translate into a ‘guide for daily living’?

Click the cover to visit the book’s Amazon page.

A year ago this week, only four days after Russia invaded Ukraine with the blessing of the Russian Orthodox church, our publishing house released Dr. David Gushee’s magnum opus: Introducing Christian Ethics: Core Convictions for Christians Today, which currently is available with a striking new blue cover via Amazon in Hardcover, Paperback, Kindle and Audible audio.

Our magazine headline that week, one year ago, was: With Christianity in crisis, Dr. David Gushee’s ‘Introducing Christian Ethics’ lays out a faithful path forward.

Soon, Russia began rattling its nuclear sabers, millions of new refugees were moving across Europe, global fears rose and many of us became more aware than we were before of threats that Gushee describes as “global killers”—threats to our future as a planet.

To mark the one-year anniversary of this timely book, Read The Spirit Editor David Crumm sat down with Dr. Gushee for this Question and Answer session.

QUESTION: What feedback have you heard from readers of Introducing Christian Ethics over the past year?

ANSWER: I continue to hear very encouraging things from readers. For example, Shane Claiborne sent me a new endorsement as we reached the one-year anniversary of the book.

QUESTION: We got a copy of Shane’s endorsement at the publishing house and we’ll add it to our conversation right here. He wrote:

Honestly, David Gushee is one of the most important voices on morality in our generation. I keep this book on my top bookshelf and it never gathers dust. David is one of the most wise, comprehensive, kind people I know. I could not more highly recommend Introducing Christian Ethics, especially in this current age where morality, truth, history and the future are all in jeopardy. It’s gold—actually, it’s even better than gold.

In relatively few words, Shane managed to hit on several of the key points readers are making about this book, didn’t he?

ANSWER: Yes, he did and that was very kind of Shane. He sums up a lot of the things we’re hearing from readers around the world.

First, readers tell us that this book is accessible and readable in a way that they’re not used to seeing in academic writing. I’ve also heard a lot of appreciation for the balanced presentation of the field as a whole—readers are pleased that they do not find just one perspective on these questions. And, I’ve heard from readers who appreciate learning more about Howard Thurman’s approach to the teachings of Jesus.

A Deep Dive into the Nature of Truth

QUESTION: We’re hearing those same things at the publishing house, but I would say that one of the most urgent questions readers are raising concerns the nature of truth itself. Did you expect to have to write about that so prominently in this book?

ANSWER: You’re right, this book takes a deep dive into the meaning and importance of truth. People realize that we are living in an era when truth is challenged, threatened, contested in ways that are new to those of us who have been around for a while. We have not seen this kind of manipulation of words, disinformation, misinformation—and now we have fewer if any agreed-upon arbiters of what is true. When I first began working in Christian ethics years ago, these were not the kinds of central issues they are now.

I also have heard from readers who appreciate the way I name Donald trump as having abused the truth in his presidency—and he continues to do so even now. I do not hold back or try to write in generalities about this. I feel strongly that his name needs to be named if we are going to be at all honest about what we’re dealing with right now.

The value of the truth, the significance of the truth, matters if we are going to maintain truthfulness as a laudatory character quality that we want to inculcate in our children and in our churches. That used to be taken for granted, but now people boldly tell bald-faced lies if they feel it can benefit them—and there do not appear to be substantial consequences for doing so.

In this new book, I get deeply into the question of truth—in fact more deeply than anything I have written before.

A ‘Magnum Opus’ with the emphasis of audio and video

QUESTION: We also are hearing from readers who are impressed that this is a uniquely multi-media book with options to read the text—or to listen to the audio or watch the video version with the click of a QR code. That’s something new for you, isn’t it?

ANSWER: Yes, and I am so pleased that we were able to put all of that content, including the audio and video, into the book without jacking up the price until it’s not affordable to most readers.

People tell me that they like to hear me read the book or to see me on video, if they choose to use those links. Hearing me or seeing me that way gives readers a better sense of my convictions, my passions, as I was writing these chapters. Most readers still want an ink-on-paper version of a book like this, so they can mark it up and add notes and so on. But, in this case, they also have those multimedia options.

It’s been fun, even in my own family. My grandson Jonah thinks it’s wonderful that he can click on a code and hear me, or see me.

QUESTION: Those multi-media options seemed important to all of us as we worked with you in developing this book. After all, this book has been described as your magnum opus—a major work summing up your decades of teaching. Do you agree?

ANSWER: Yes, but it’s more than a summation. One way to think about this book is that it represents an extended meditation on my own prior thought, including my earlier book Kingdom Ethics, which many readers also have on their shelves, as well as my other books.

If people already know my work, they will find in these pages a fresh engagement with that work over the decades. I graduated 30 years ago with my phD, which is a nice round number as a point to think back on three decades of work. So, it’s not just a summation. There’s fresh reflection here on all that has come before.

The Centrality of the Holocaust in Christian Ethics

QUESTION: Some of your reflections have changed, over time. But some of the major themes in your life’s work remain constant. For example, you continue to lift up the importance of minority voices. And you continue to emphasize the remembrance of past crimes and injustices—the Holocaust comes to mind. That’s central to your own life story, right?

ANSWER: I was born in Germany in 1962. There were war criminals and survivors walking the streets of Frankfurt when I was a baby. The centrality of the Holocaust to understanding Christianity and God’s relationship to the world is so clear to me that it surprises me to see how students I am working with today do not see the Holocaust as such a central issue in their studies. It’s as if the salience of the Holocaust is fading in our culture and in academia. I feel my generation has a sacred responsibility to keep this memory alive.

My dissertation was on Christians who rescued Jews in the Holocaust and that was significant in setting a trajectory for me. The Holocaust comes up in this book periodically because it’s a feature of all of my work.

QUESTION: You also emphasize the importance of our individual points of view—the lenses of our individual lives—even as we try to reach out to build bridges with minority communities. You’re talking about the importance of Black scholars like Howard Thurman and the importance of remembering Christian guilt in the Holocaust, but we’re well aware as readers that you are neither Black nor Jewish yourself.

Why is that question of personal perspective so important?

ANSWER: I am increasingly aware of the white Christian-centered world in which I was educated and into which I emerged. Now, I’m much more aware than I was years ago at the structural problems that European-American-colonial-White Christianity has caused. I’m more aware of the sins and the damage caused by this community out of which I come. The only hope for redemption, I think, lies in consciously trying to move outside of that world so we can listen to those who have been trampled on by our forebears. We must listen to those who have been on the margins and whose lives and voices have not mattered to the dominant groups. By situating Howard Thurman early in this new book, for example, I’m saying: I want us to read and think about Christian ethics through the experiences of people like Howard.

Why is ‘Introducing Christian Ethics’ a ‘guide for life’?

QUESTION: You have described Introducing Christian Ethics as a “guide for life.” At first glance, this looks more like a textbook than what we might think of as a daily “guide.” How are you hoping this book can guide everyday readers?

ANSWER: I think that we live in a time of a great deal of moral confusion and moral conflict. We are less and less clear about even the most basic things that have helped to structure Christian moral thinking—and that’s true whether we are “Christian,” “ex-Christian,” “Evangelical” or “ex-Evangelical.”

In this book, I take the reader on a journey through a series of questions: What is ethics? What is morality? Why is morality important? Is there any substance and solidity to our moral beliefs? How do we know what we know? How do we deal with the inevitable moral differences between people?

Confronting an Aggressive and Unjust War

QUESTION: Let’s talk about differences between Christians. Right now, for example, the head of a major branch of Christianity—the Russian Orthodox Church—has aligned himself completely with the Russian invasion of Ukraine. The global consensus on Christian ethics clearly is divided, isn’t it?

ANSWER: That question illustrates the importance of thinking about differences we may encounter in Christian ethics, but I do not think the Christian world really is divided on the question of the Russian invasion. What this example illustrates is the problem of leaders who sometimes are not trustworthy. My reading of the Patriarch of Russia is that his loyalty to his country and to his president is outweighing his clarity of thought that ought to be there when he thinks about this war. This is an aggressive war against a country that the world recognizes as an independent nation. I would say that 99.99 percent of all Christian ethicists and Christian leaders in the world understand this to be an aggressive and unjust war.

One of the things my colleague Glen Stassen helped me to see—and this point is included in Introducing Christian Ethics—is that it’s quite a struggle to think clearly faithfully and biblically in a Jesus kind of way when our own interests are at stake and our own loyalties are implicated. If our own family members are involved in something, we’re not going to think about it in the same way as someone whose family is not at the heart of it.

What are ‘Global Killers’?

QUESTION: Considering all the ethical issues you cover in this book, which ones would you place at the top of a list of “Most Urgent” issues today?

ANSWER: That’s a difficult question to answer because so many of these issues relate to daily headlines we all are reading from around the world.

So, I’m going to answer that question by grouping some issues together under what I would call “Global Killers.” By that I mean that “most urgent” are threats to the survival of human life—and planetary life as a whole. So, that puts global environmental challenges at the top of my list and the potential use of weapons of mass destruction from nuclear to chemical and biological weapons. There are more weapons of mass destruction now in the hands of dangerous leaders than ever before.

In responding to these “Global Killers,” we must affirm that life is God’s gift. This planet is God’s—and we humans have been entrusted with stewardship responsibilities.

Right now, we are wondering: Will our positive and creative potential prevail over our negative and destructive potential? A lot of pessimistic scholars today are saying that humanity is suicidal and even homicidal in terms of our treatment of God’s creation.

QUESTION: And yet you remain optimistic. This ultimately is a hope-filled book, isn’t it?

ANSWER: As a Christian, I have to believe that God is alive, that Jesus is not finished with us, that the Holy Spirit still moves—and that humanity and the church can continue to learn new things.

In fact, a good example of that is the way I describe how our tradition can be open to new insights in my earlier book, Changing Our Mind.

Care to Read More?

FOLLOW DR. GUSHEE’S WORK through our ongoing coverage at Read the Spirit weekly magazine. Click on the “get updates” link in the upper-right corner of our website to sign up for free weekly email updates. Don’t worry—you also can cancel those emails anytime. When Dr. Gushee has important new columns, new public appearances and even new books, our magazine will let you know.

ORDER YOU OWN COPY of Introducing Christian Ethics from Amazon now.

ON AMAZON, you’ll also find Dr. Gushee’s earlier best seller, Changing Our Mind.