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Tag: social justice

Christian Folk, Let’s Stand Up Against Abuse!

Christian Folk, Let’s Stand Up Against Abuse!

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We’ve spent a few weeks discussing the toxic patterns that can be enabled by conflict-avoiding “Christian nice” spiritualities and the ways they can make us sick. It’s high time we discuss what healthier spiritual responses to conflict look like. In this post, I’ll outline what I see as an excellent constructive way to approach conflict in abuse situations by jumping off an excellent reflection by Abbot Tryphon, the leader of the All-Merciful Saviour Monastery of the Russian Orthodox Church on…

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"Never, never be afraid to do what's right, especially if the well-being of a person or animal is at stake. Society's punishments are small compared to the wounds we inflict on our soul when we look the other way." --Martin L. King, Jr.
Christian Folk, Please Stop Enabling Human Rights Violations!

Christian Folk, Please Stop Enabling Human Rights Violations!

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Note: This post is an example of me enacting Assertive Spirituality. It is doing so about the recent zero tolerance US immigration policies. If you’re new to this site and want to know what Assertive Spirituality is, check out my part 1 and part 2 of the site’s definition posts. If you want to know what’s going on at the US border, please google major news outlets that fact-check their work and admit to errors when they accidentally commit them….

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The Toxic Spirituality of “Christian (Midwest Middle Class White People) Nice” (Part 1)

The Toxic Spirituality of “Christian (Midwest Middle Class White People) Nice” (Part 1)

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Okay, so as I think I’ve said before, I grew up as a pastor’s kid (in church slang, a PK) in the Midwest. I’m not saying my life was the plot of Footloose or anything, but it was a cultural climate that was VERY white, very tribal-Christian, very “Christian-Midwest nice.” It was also pretty patriarchal. And honestly, I think the particular brands of conflict avoidance I’m about to discuss enabled that and other unhealthy societal structures quite a lot. Let…

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Christian Folk, Can We Please Stop the Swear-Policing?

Christian Folk, Can We Please Stop the Swear-Policing?

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I used to be one of those Christians that would roll my eyes and dismiss anything you had to say if you said any “four letter words.” And h*ll, sometimes I miss those days. Life was simpler then, living in a world where the avoidance of particular words meant I got to ignore other opinions and feel more holy. It was simpler to think that I was better and others who didn’t follow that code were lesser. It was simpler…

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In Which I Cut Open a Vein and Speak about My Divorce

In Which I Cut Open a Vein and Speak about My Divorce

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Surely you’ve heard what Hemingway said about writing, haven’t you? You know: “Writing is easy. You just cut open a vein and bleed.” (Or something like that.) At any rate, I was asked to speak in the “Encounters with the Risen Christ” short talks my local PCUSA church has as part of the Easter season services last Sunday. I wanted to share the talk I gave in part because I really feel like I practiced assertive spirituality in that talk….

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