Podcasts about indwell

Come As You Are Series - Your Sin Did Not Cause Your IllnessJohn 9:1-3 "As he walked along, he saw a man blind from birth. His disciples asked him, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?”  Jesus answered, “Neither this man nor his parents sinned; he was born blind so that God's works might be revealed in him.”Another reason we might struggle to come to the Lord is that we think our sickness is somehow a punishment for something that we did. We were awful teenagers, so God is repaying us with this chronic pain that we have. We think that our sins from the past are catching up to us, and that is why we got cancer or why our child is sick now, why our loved one is sick. If we look to the Bible, Jesus addresses this for us in today's verse.You are not sick because of your sins or because God is punishing you? What if you are sick so that God's works might be revealed in you? What if God is going to use this illness for something amazing? God did not cause you to be sick. God does not cause illness. God is a healer, it says so in Exodus 15:26, which says, “He said, “If you listen carefully to the Lord your God and do what is right in his eyes, if you pay attention to his commands and keep all his decrees, I will not bring on you any of the diseases I brought on the Egyptians, for I am the Lord, who heals you.” However, God can use your illness for all kinds of reasons.  I heard a story in a book written by Heidi Baker and her husband. They were trying to heal a man from the Middle East. I can't remember where exactly she said he was from. Her friends asked them to come because they had had great success in praying over people and having them be healed. The man whom they were praying for was muslim, and so were all of his family members. Heidi and her husband thought that the man would be healed when they prayed over him, and it would be a lot of Glory for God because all those in the room would see him healed and know it was God who did it. They prayed and they prayed, but the man was not healed. They had a trip planned, so they had to leave. However, when they got back, they heard that the man was still alive. They went to visit him, and this time he had twice as many people to visit him because they were sure he was going to die. So all his relatives came, even those from out of town. Their friends asked them to come and pray one more time. So then they prayed over him again, and this time he was healed, and all of his family members became Christians. God used his illness, and he healed him, but he healed him in his timing, not our timing, not like when we thought he would have healed him. And so the same can be true for us.Another saint who had to deal with a lot of illness was St. Teresa of Lisieux, who is another doctor of the church. And yet she died at age 24. She had tuberculosis. Again, she was very dedicated to the Lord. She loved Jesus. She spent so much time in prayer, and she really wanted to be a missionary. That was her goal. That was her dream for how she thought God would use her to take her all over the world to spread the love of God. And yet she never got to go anywhere because she was so sickly.And yet she is the patron saint of missionaries because she prayed for all the missionaries who were there. And her writings and her work are now spread throughout the whole church. So even though she wasn't able to go herself and spread the word, God used her, even with her illness, to become a doctor of the church and to spread the word of the Lord.I just want to encourage all of you that if you're thinking that you can't come to the Lord because you have too much sin, or you're thinking you're sick because of something you did, or you're thinking that God can't use you because of what you've done or because of your illness, I just want to assure you that none of that is true. You're not sick because of your sins. You're not counted out because of anything you've done. God still wants to use you. And all the sins or the illness that you feel have discounted you, God could use them for good. Don't give up on your hopes and dreams. Don't let anyone tell you they won't happen. You have a miraculous God who can make anything happen. Just keep bringing it to the Lord! Just keep coming to the Lord, and He will be there for you!Dear Heavenly Father, I ask you to bless all those listening to the episode. Lord, you are the almighty one. I ask that you help us realize we are not the cause of our illness. I ask you to help us know that you are not punishing us. Our illness is not from you and is not because of our actions. Help us to know how loved and wanted we are, just as we are. Help us to know how much you truly love us! We love you, Lord, and we ask all of this in accordance with your will and in Jesus's holy name, Amen!Thank you so much for joining me on this journey to walk boldly with Jesus. I am sorry I didn't bring you an episode at the beginning of this week. I was in Ecuador. I got back very late Tuesday night. I look forward to sharing about the trip with you next Wednesday. Remember, Jesus loves you just as you are, and so do I! Have a blessed day!Today's Word from the Lord was received in June 2025 by a member of my Catholic Charismatic Prayer Group. If you have any questions about the prayer group, these words, or how to join us for a meeting, please email CatholicCharismaticPrayerGroup@gmail.com. Today's Word from the Lord is, “Build up, prepare the way. Remove the stumbling blocks from my people's path. For thus says He who is high and exalted, living eternally, whose name is the Holy One, on high. Indwell in holiness, and with the crushed and the dejected in spirit, to revive the spirits of the dejected, to revive the hearts of the crushed.” www.findingtruenorthcoaching.comCLICK HERE TO DONATECLICK HERE to sign up for Mentoring CLICK HERE to sign up for Daily "Word from the Lord" emailsCLICK HERE to sign up for my newsletter & receive a free audio training about inviting Jesus into your daily lifeCLICK HERE to buy my book Total Trust in God's Safe Embrace

BIO: Sandra Van OpstalEXECUTIVE DIRECTOR AND CO-FOUNDER OF CHASING JUSTICESandra Maria Van Opstal, a second-generation Latina, is Co-Founder and Executive Director of Chasing Justice, a movement led by people of color to mobilize a lifestyle of faith and justice . She is an international speaker, author, and activist, recognized for her courageous work in pursuing justice and disrupting oppressive systems within the church. As a global prophetic voice and an active community member on the west-side of Chicago, Sandra's initiatives in holistic justice equip communities around the world to practice biblical solidarity and mutuality within various social and cultural locations.https://chasingjustice.com/sandra-van-opstal/ Giving in Chicago: https://newlifecenters.org/ Ordg to follow in chicagohttps://www.icirr.org/ Tshirt https://secure.qgiv.com/for/peoplearenotillegalt-shirt/Danielle (00:09):good afternoon, y'all. I have a second video coming to you from my dear friend and colleague in Chicago, Humboldt Park area, a faith leader there that collaborates with the different faith communities in the area. And she's going to talk about some ways she's personally affected by what's happening by the invasion there and how you can think about things, how you might get involved. I hope you'll join me in this conversation and honor yourself. Stay curious, honor, humanity, get involved. Take collective action. Talk to your own neighbor. Let's start caring really well for one another.Oh wow. Sandra, you know me. This is Jenny McGrath. This is my colleague. She's a bible nut. She wrote out the Bible How many times?Like scripture nut and a researcher, a therapist and purity culture, kind of like Survivor, but did a lot of work with women around that. And we talk a lot about race and current events. And I restarted my podcast and I asked Jenny if she'd want to join me. She has a great love for justice and humans and making a difference. So that's kind of how Jenny joined up with me. Right. Anything else you want to say?Sandra, I saw your post on social media and I was like, I could do that. I could contribute to that. And so that's what I'm here to do. Want to hear about your experience. What does resilience look like for you all over there? What do you need from us? How can we be a part of what's happening in Chicago from wherever we are? And if there's practical needs or things you want to share here, we can also send those out.Yeah. Can you tell us a little bit about who you are, what you do, where you're located in Chicago, and just a little bit even about your family, if you're willing?Sandra (01:40):Yeah, sure. So it's great to be with you guys. I'm Sandra Van Opal and I'm here on the west side of Chicago in a neighborhood called Humble Park. It's if you see in the news with all that's happening, it's the humble Hermosa, Avondale kind of zone of the ice crackdown. Well, let's not call it a crackdown. The ice invasion(02:06):Here in Chicago. I am the daughter of immigrants, so my mom is from Columbia. My father was from Argentina. They came to live in Chicago when they were in their twenties and thirties. They met in English class, so they were taking TOEFL exams, which is an exam you take in order to enter into college and schooling here in the US to show your language proficiency. And so they met learning English and the rest is history. I grew up here. I've lived here my whole life. I'm raising my family here. I'm married. I have two kids that just turned 11, so they're in fifth grade and sixth grade. And the school that they go to is a primarily immigrant school immersion, Spanish immersion. So it's a school where you take classes basically 90% in Spanish when you start and you move every year a little bit more English until you graduate when you're 50 50.(03:03):And so the school context they've been in has been receiving a lot of new neighbors, a lot of new classmates. And for that reason, actually most of their classes are still almost fully in Spanish, so they should probably be 60 40 right now. But I think a lot of their curriculum is still in Spanish, or the children have the option of having the math book in Spanish or English if they want it. If they're supposed to be English Spanish, or sorry, English math this year, then they might choose to have a Spanish book even if the instruction is in English. So that's the context I live in. I am here. I live in a home. I have chickens and a garden, and I love to be outside watching my neighbors and connecting with people. And we have a black club in our community, so a lot of our information that we're sharing with each other is through our email list and our signal group. Yeah. Oh, also what I do, I run an organization called Chasing Justice, which is focused on the intersection of faith and making the world a better place. And I am a local pastor and author on issues of worship and justice. So that's my function in this world.Danielle (04:31):I think we talk about what's happening in one sense, it seems like social media and other ways like Zoom, we're on a screen with Zoom and we're all in three different locations right now. We think of ourselves as really connected. But then when tragedy strikes or trauma or an invasion, for instance, strikes, we're connected, but it seems like we're also disconnected from one another and the practical needs and storytelling on the ground, and what does resilience look like for one person versus another? Or what does survival versus thriving look like for one person versus another? And how do we kind of join together and form a collective bond in that? I've been thinking a lot about that after I read your post Sandra on Instagram and what does that mean for me? And just as I'm talking, what does that mean for you or what are thoughts that come to mind for you?Sandra (05:27):Yeah, I am think I remember what posts you're referring to, but I think part of it is whenever something happens in our world, I believe that because of the highly digitally connected world that we're in, it feels like we are all supposed to say something. That's how we respond. Something happens and we all go, that's not right, which I think is good, we should say that, but I think the frustration, I'm sure people in LA and DC felt that, but it's like something is happening in your real life every day to your neighbors and everybody all around the country is commenting on it and commenting with such confidence and commenting with such expertise, and you're like, wait a minute. That's not how I would say that. And I think the reason that maybe that post came up for me as a kind of, it was less frustration and more sorrow, I think it felt more, more sorrow that the people that are most impacted by the issues are not the ones that are given the voice to talk about how those systems of oppression are impacting them. And I think the reason I think about things like that is I remember when I first started pastoring locally here. I mean, I had been working for a parachurch organization doing national and international work. I really felt like it was time for me to become a local pastor to understand, hey, if I'm going to be writing to pastors and speaking to pastors and challenging pastors, I should probably know what it's like to be one. And so I was supposed to be a five year stint, which ended up being 12 years pastoring locally.(07:08):And in my discussions with my staff team, I would often have one of them very respectfully, I was the executive pastors in a community with hierarchy. So they would very respectfully say, Hey, your friends that are out there blogging and writing articles and books, they're talking about stuff in ways we would never talk about it. They're talking about it in a tone that we would never use to talk about our situation and with words we would never use to describe our situation. And it's not that my friends maybe didn't have a perspective, it's that it didn't reflect their perspective. And so I think I became very sensitive to that, paying attention to, oh, how do expert justice people talk about issues of justice versus the people that are most impacted by those issues of injustice? Or how do people from within a community express their journey in ways that maybe even have a different tone than mostly anger that was coming out from the justice space?(08:10):And they're like, we wouldn't say it that way. We wouldn't talk about it that way. So I think because of that, it's really important when something happens in a local space and it is impacting us all nationally, national news, that we ask the question, how can I hear the voices of the people that this is most impacting? And so that's why I think I wrote that post. I was like, A lot of y'all have a lot to say about Chicago who don't live here and thank you, but no thank you. Invite us to talk for ourselves, invite us to speak for ourselves because there are local pastors and priests and imams and mental health providers who are experiencing this in a very real way that they probably could shed some light on what would be helpful to us. I called a bunch of friends in Los Angeles when things were happening there, and I was like, oh, how are you guys doing?(09:05):What's really happening? How can we help? If you don't have time to reply back, just know that I'm here praying for you, and I'm like with you and I'm sending money to the orgs. I see you posting and don't know what else to do. Obviously, the ice raids are impacting all of us across the country, but they're impacting each city in very different ways. Each city is a very different city with a very different ethos and a way of handling things. And as you guys know, Chicago is the best. I'm so proud of us right now. I'm so proud of us. We're like, no, you can't talk to us like that. No, you can't have our streets. But it also gets us into trouble because it's rooted in our philosophy of community organizing, though the linsky method, which is agitation, agitation, agitation. So we have stuff to learn too. But that's what you're seeing in Chicago is a lot of agitation. But yeah, that's why I wrote it. I wrote it like, I know 20 community leaders you could talk to here in Chicago that would give you a good idea of what we're experiencing and what would be best for us if you wanted to come alongside of us and help in prayer. So yeah.Jenny (10:27):Yeah, I think just a sense of wanting to hear more, whatever you feel. Well, and whatever feels safe to share in this podcast setting of just what it has been like for you to be on the ground in the community that you're in, in the roles that you're in with the family you're in. I just find myself curious about your experience.Sandra (10:52):Yeah. Okay. So I think about this in three different areas. One is, how is this impacting me as a parent, the other in my family and connected to family members. The other one is how is this impacting me as a neighbor? And then the other is, how is this impacting me as a civic leader, as a faith leader here? And so the hardest one has actually been, as a parent, if I could be honest with you, it's really been hard. Those of us that have raised kids, especially younger children or well all children, they each have their own season of development. But raising kids and being a village for children right now I think is really hard. They've gone through lockdown, George Floyd protests, watching multiple genocides, a war in Ukraine, and now this locally. And I believe in talking to your kids about what's happening and talking to them about it in ways that is appropriate for their age. So that has changed for me since my children were five when the pandemic started and now they're 11. That has changed for me what that looks like.(12:32):But there are many families, dozens of families in their school that have not returned since the ice raids have started. Their friends are missing from class. Ice has repeatedly been around their school. Ice has been on our corner where we grocery shop, get tacos, go to therapy. My son asked me the other day, will they throw me on the ground? If they see me, will they throw me on the ground? And this is one of my sons already struggles a lot with anxiety and he has anxiety, and he's also a black child. And so he's already been processing being black in the context of law enforcement in our city and what's happened. And so I think he kind of went through that season and he's like, so will they throw me on the ground if they see me? And I'm like, no, buddy. They're not going to. Hopefully there's enough cameras around that they'll throw you on the ground.(13:42):And so I think trying to figure out how to answer those kinds of questions. How can we think about our friends? How can we pray for our friends? We've done a lot more prayer in the 15 minute commutes to and from school, I think just for very specific needs that our neighbors are going through. And neighbor that I live in close proximity to the other day was running an errand and was detained by ice and was let go on the spot in the parking lot of the Home Depot, but its someone our kids know really well and helping them to process that. Their friend, a neighbor has gone through this, I think requires a different set of parenting skills and I believe are in most parenting books.(14:48):And so I find myself almost, man, I wish there was a resource for that man. I wish there was a place to talk about that. Let me talk to my neighbor about how they talk to their kids about that. And for those of us that come from Latino cultures, we don't really talk about hard things a lot. We're not really taught to talk about them. It's like we endure them and we go through them, but we don't give them space for processing. And so both of my children are in therapy. I don't know what they talk about in therapy, probably girls and love interests and bullying and all the rest of the things that kids talk about, but I think they probably unpack some of what they're going through with their friends. They are also wanting to make a difference. So we're trying to figure out what does that look for them to make things good in the community they live in.(15:42):So that's the first area is parenting. I don't know if you guys have anything to add advice to give me on that, but I think the hardest thing for me is what do we do with our children? What do we do with a generation that is growing up, watching their government step over so many boundaries, doing things that are completely illegal or unethical or dangerous for our society and feeling like, Hey, we're living in a time, I know a lot of people posted the quote from Ann Frank talking about what was happening in their streets. And I'm like, yeah, my kids are watching that. And I don't know how they're processing it or where they see their faith in the midst of that. I mean, luckily we have an amazing church. We talk about stuff like that all the time. So I mean, yeah, the mayor goes to our church and the pastor's an amazing person, and we have lots of civic leaders and law enforcement in our church. So I think they're watching, they're able to have some mentorship in that area, I think because spoken about from the pulpit, but man, being little must be really hard right now.Danielle (17:09):Maybe we don't need to press too fast, even though we're in a podcast right now. I think it bears the weight of just a little bit of space to just hang with that comment. I have older kids than you. As recently, I told my 20-year-old son who we are not suffering yet, the street raids. For some reason, Seattle hasn't been the focus point yet, but he did lose his federal aid and his Pell grants and everything for college this year. And so him and a lot of other kids had a significant do have a significant college tuition to make up. And we were talking about it and I was like, well, this will be the normal for you. This will be what's normal. This will be what's normal for our family. And my husband actually stepped in and said to me in a moment of despair and lament, because my son wants to be a music teacher.(18:21):He said to me, he's like, but you always tell me nothing's impossible. We can figure it out. And I was like, yeah, I do say that, but I don't believe it right now. He is like, well, he's like, I believe it right now. So I don't know what it looks like to come up with an extra for us. It's an extra $6,000, so we don't have the money yet, but what does it look like? But I think it goes back to that sense of finding some balance with our kids of what's real, what's not giving. What I hear for you, Sandra, and I'm kind of fumbling through my words, so maybe Jenny can step in, but offering our kids the validation of their reality that's so important in age appropriate and the different steps we're in the validation of reality. But I also find myself searching and grasping for where's the hope? Where are the strands of faith for our family? Where are the strands of hope searching for? Like you said, what are the practical actions your boys can do that also kind of I think plant seeds and generate hope in their hearts when we can step out and do actions?Sandra (19:43):Yeah. No, I think the hard part is I can't promise them things will get better. I can't promise them there's going to be an end to genocide in Palestine. I can't promise them. I keep telling everyone, when we pray at night and we talk about our days and stuff, and I just tell 'em, we, my husband and I tell 'em, and the only thing we can promise you is that God is with us. And I think the reality is when you've had proximity to our global siblings, that suffering didn't just start two Octobers ago or even for our own families. The suffering as my African brother once told me at a conference, he said, what do you mean when we suffer? Life is suffering and suffering is life. Or if we suffer, someone said, yeah, if we suffer, it's like some pretty from the west if we suffer.(20:35):It's like no, life is suffering and suffering is life. So I think part of it is we have within our story as people who follow the Jesus way, we have a story of people who have really always suffered. The story of scripture is a story of marginalized, persecuted, displaced people that are wandering in a land looking for home. And in those stories, you find God's presence with them. You find the worship of their creator. You find moments of joy, rhythms of feasting and fasting. You find all the traditions we do now that come out of the story of the people. So I can tell them, baby, I can only promise you that God is with us the same way that God was with, we go through the stories and the same way that God has always been with the black church in America, the same way that God has always been with our Latino community, the same way that God is with our siblings in Gaza, God is with us.(21:35):And so it doesn't take the pain away, but we can know that God is there. I try to teach my kids, lemme tell you, this is so bad parenting. Sorry, you can cut this out if you need to. But the other day we were praying for our country and I said, God, I just pray. Pray for Trump. I pray God, either you would change his heart or you would help him to go to sleep and just not wake up tomorrow. And then my son was like, I can't believe you prayed that prayer. Mom, I can't believe you said that. That's such a bad prayer. I was like, have you read the Psalms?(22:12):I was like, tonight, let's read a psalm. I'm going to read to you what David prayed for his enemies. And just because the Bible calls us to love our enemies and to see them as human does not mean we cannot pray that they will fall asleep. And so I said, I'm not saying I'm going to do anything bad. I know my phone's listening to me right now. I'm not saying I'm going to take matters into my own hands. I'm just saying I wouldn't be sad. That's all. And he's like, he just could not get over it because, and he just kept digging. Papa, Papa would never pray a prayer like that. He would never, I said, Papa hasn't read the Psalms. I read the Psalms. I know exactly what the Psalms say. And I was like, and the thing is because God is for good, because God is against evil and because God knows my heart, he knows God knows how much I love him, and I'm asking him to please take this evil away from our neighborhood.(23:04):Please take this evil away from our country. Please take this evil away. We're living in evil times, Terry. These are bad times. And this is not only a bad person. This is somebody that's raising up all of the badness to be allowed. And so I'm going to pray that prayer every day. And I know that you think it's not good, and I'm so sorry, but tonight we'll read the Psalms. Then that night we read some Psalms. I was like, see what David prays for his enemy. I said, and the thing is, God is there with us in our prayers. He's not like, what? I can't believe she cussed. I can't believe she said that bad. I can't believe she want to be friends with this guy that's too evil. And so I think part of it's processing faith with them. It's like, I don't know what kind of, let's just talk about Jesus and what he said. Let's talk about what the Bible models for us and prayer. Let's talk about It's okay to be mad. It's okay. It's okay to want evil to end. It doesn't mean we take things into our own hands, but it's okay to want the evil to end. And so those are the kinds of conversations where I go home, I'm like, okay, let me just look at my stuff. Is that wrong? Is that theologically correct? I called my husband. Do you think this is theologically okay? Am I mal forming our children? But I feel like it's an okay prayer, isn't it an okay prayer? Those are the kinds of things that are happening. I don't know,Jenny (24:37):I mean, I am not a theologian, but I think it's an okay prayer to pray. And I'm just thinking about, I've had two thoughts going through my mind, and one of course I couldn't and wouldn't want to put on some type of silver lining and be like, kids are going to be fine. They're resilient. And something that we say in the somatic trauma world a lot is that trauma isn't about an event. It's often about not having a safe place to go in the midst of or after an event. And what I just keep hearing is you making yourself available to be a safe place for your kids to process and reimagine what moving through this moment looks like. And also holding that in families that are being torn apart, that don't have those safe places to go in this moment. And I think part of what we're experiencing is this term, the boomerang of imperialism, as you said, these are not new things happening to families all over the world. And the ricochet of how we are now experiencing that in the heart of the empire, where I find my sense of hope is that that is the sign that the snake is eating its head and it will collapse. And I believe in rebirth and regrowth and hope that we can create a world that is different than a world that builds empires that do this to families. And as where my mind goes.Sandra (26:39):Yeah. And I think for ourselves, for our children, for in the work that I do with chasing justice with activists, it's like the only thing I can do, I'm not going to be able to change the world. The only thing I can do is change the little world that I'm in. So what can I do to make a difference and make things good in the world that I'm in? And so it boils down to very, very practical, tangible, embodied unfancy. Things like calling your neighbors and checking in on them to see if they need you to take their kids to school, finding out if everybody got home, okay. When there was a raid in a particular area, asking, or not even asking, but dropping food off for people and saying, Hey, we made a grocery room. We just thought we'd pick up some essentials for everybody.(27:27):Because part of it too is how do you do that without asking your, how do you help your neighbor without asking your neighbor their status? And that's not appropriate. And how do you help your neighbor without assuming they don't have money or making them feel like some kind of project? And so I think part of it is figuring out how to practice mutual aid in ways that are communal that just says, Hey, we picked up this. We figured this week we'd drop it off to five different families, and next week we'll do five other families. Who knows if they need it or not, but at least they know you're thinking of them. I think something you said about trauma, which I think is really important when you work in communities where you have communal, collective, complex generational trauma, which is we're just always living in this.(28:19):I have status, so I don't worry about leaving my home. I also am white. I'm a white Latina, so I'm not like, well, maybe they'll pull me over. Well, I don't know. But I know if I was browner my other family members that would definitely be like, please carry a copy of your passport and your ID at all times. But now I don't leave the house without, I used to leave the house with my keys and my phone, maybe a wallet. I don't know where a wallet is. Now I'm like, oh, I better have my ID on me(28:48):Mostly because if I intervene, I'm afraid if I get arrested, I won't have ID on me. But I think about all the ways that you have to leave the house differently now. And this is for people that they already felt vulnerable in their TPS, in their temporary protective status status or in their undocumented status or in their green card holder status or whatever status they had, that they already felt vulnerable in some way. And now if they don't go to work, their family doesn't eat, so they leave the house. But how do they leave the house? If you go to school every day and you're wondering if your parents are going to pick you up because now you're aware you have this emergency family plan, what does that feel like day in and day out, decade after decade to feel vulnerable? That kind of trauma is something I don't understand in my body, though I understand it as a concept.(29:47):It's the trauma of feeling vulnerable at all times of sending your kids out into the world. And because our US Supreme Court and because our government has decided it's okay to racially profile people, so I keep telling my mom, you better not be speaking Spanish at Target. She's bilingual. I'm like, please do not speak Spanish at Target. Do not open your mouth. And I would never have said that ever in the past, super proud of being a Latina and being bilingual, but I'm scared for my mom. And so I'm checking in on family members who have vulnerable status. I'm trying to find out if everybody's okay. So I think there are, it's like I told my husband the other day, and the car was like, can you imagine having this kind of fear day in and day out for decades at a time in a country and building a life?(30:44):And all of a sudden, many of our DACA recipients or young undocumented folks that are in college, all of a sudden they're not going to finish their degree. They're now in a country they don't even know. They didn't grow up there in a language they don't understand or their spouse is missing. And now they don't know if they're in Swatee, they don't know if they're in Mexico. They don't know where they are. And so I think that, I don't know that I fully understand what to do about that as a neighbor or as a pastor, but to say there must be something within the community like some gift or strength or accessing that helps them endure that kind of trauma when they cannot reach out for help.(31:44):My brother also told me the other day, he's an ER doctor. He's like, man, the county ER is so empty right now because people go to the county hospital for services when they don't have insurance. And many, many of them are Asian, south Asian, Latino, and African immigrants, and now they're not going or Ukrainian or Russian or whatever. So now it's emptiness and churches. Some of our churches are used to be 300 people now. There's like 40 people on a Sunday. So the reporting that I'm hearing from, whether it's the hospitals or just the stores, if you drive down our street, it's like empty nest. It is never empty. There's always people walking around on the street, whole family is going grocery shopping now. There's just nobody out. It's like a ghost town. Nobody's leaving unless they have to leave. And so it changes the feel of a community. It changes the environment. People that need access to healthcare aren't going for their follow-up appointments or their treatments because they're afraid to go to the hospital. People that would normally go to law enforcement if there's domestic violence or something happening, which already would feel very, very difficult to do, are unwilling to do it because they're afraid to leave and afraid to report to any law enforcement. Even in a sanctuary city.(33:18):I don't know what's happening to these families that aren't going to school. I'm assuming that the school has some kind of e-learning doing for them or some kind of packets they're making for the kids in the meantime while they're missing school. But there's all these things that daily rhythms of life that aren't happening. And so for many of us are like, I don't feel like going to church today. Oh, well, I feel like I'm many Sundays. I don't feel like going to church for other people, the privilege of attending worship in a congregational setting is something they'd love to have that they just can't access anymore. And so there's all these things that have changed about our daily reality that I don't know if we're going to fully understand how that's impacted us until years from now. We just don't see an end to it. We're not sure when this is going to end.Danielle (34:13):I have a flurry of thoughts going through my mind as you're speaking. One is when I did a consult with my analyst that I consult with, and we were talking about anxiety around different things with clients, and she was like, well, that's not anxiety, that's terror. And this person should feel terror because that's the reality.(34:45):That's not a pathology. So that's number one just in the therapy world, we don't want to pathologize people for feeling this terror in their bodies when that's actually the appropriate response. When immigration is sitting outside on your street, you should feel terror. Your body's giving you the appropriate warning signal. So I think about just even the shortcomings of Western psychological frameworks to address what's happening. We can't pathologize. It's not about prescribing enough medication. It's not about that. I do think you're right. I think there's some sense of, I've even felt it in my own body as you talk, a sense of, I'm going to engage what Sandra's saying and I'm also going to separate myself just enough in case that happens in Seattle so I can be just distant enough. So I got to get up, I got to eat. I got to feed my kids, I got to make sure everything's happening, got to go to work.(35:40):So I can almost feel it happening. As you describe it, we call it dissociation in psychology world, but in my analyst world, she would call it a psychic retreat, which I really like. Your psyche is kind of in a battle. You might come back from the front line to preserve yourself. And that's kind of how I think of the collective mentality a bit come back from the front lines in certain ways. So you could preserve, I need to eat, I need to sleep, I need to drink some water. I need to breathe air. So that's one thing I'm thinking about that's maybe collectively happening on multiple levels. The other thing I'm thinking about is if you're listening to this and you're in a body, even mine, a same as you, like a light-skinned Latina, white Latina, and our family has a lot of mixed identities and statuses, but if you're not in one of these situations, you can help mental health by going out and getting shit done.Sandra (36:50):Yes, absolutely. Get it done, get it done, get it done. It's like show up, put yourself. I think that's half the battle is how do we show up in spaces? I think white folks have to ask themselves. That's why all the protests, it's like, yes, it's diverse, but it's a whole lot of white people.The reason is because a lot of black folks, brown folks, vulnerable folks, we're not going to put ourselves in a position where we can have an encounter with law enforcement. So one of the things I have to say, talking about church, one of the things our pastor said the Sunday before, not the No Kings, but the immigration protest, it was like maybe a month ago, he said, listen, some of us should not be at that protest because we have a record, because we are prone to be maybe, what is it called? Oh my gosh, we're prone to be singled out by the police. We should not be there. We should pray. We should stay at home. We should host people when they come back and feed them. We should not be there. Others of us, we should be there. And you know who you are.(37:55):And so I think that's part of the discernment, which I think that's literally, it's half the conversations I'm having with people is should my children go to this protest? I fully intended to go to the No Kings protest with my full family, all of us. And I also saw these amazing alternatives like a rally for families and children. And so all these parks all over the city of Chicago, which again, were an amazing city, they had all these alternatives for if your child, someone in your family does not do crowds well, right? You're immunocompromised or you have anxiety, or I thought about, oh, maybe we shouldn't take my son to this protest. Maybe he's going to actually get an anxiety attack. Maybe we should go to this. So we had all those options till the very last minute we're decided to go to Kids Rally, but there were options for us to show up.(38:43):So when you can show up, show up if your neighborhood, there's a ton of activities in, I hope other cities are doing this too, but they're packing these little zines and these little whistles and they're telling people what to do. It's like, okay, now there's this Instagram blast about, oh, the ice is over here, and everyone shows up in their cars and they all honk their horn. You can show up in a neighborhood, honk your horn, you can blow a whistle. And we're fully intending to give away free whistles for every person that buys. The people are not a legal t-shirt for chasing justice. We're like, have a whistle. Get ready. If anything, even if you never blow that whistle, no ice in your town, you're trying to show people that I'm prepared. I'm prepared to raise my voice for you. I'm prepared to show up for you.(39:34):And so it ends up being maybe an artifact or a symbol of our willingness to ally if the time should come. But yeah, some of us, we have more privilege and showing up because I definitely have two lawyers in my speed dial right now because my husband knows that I'm prone to show up in spaces and say things that maybe will get me in trouble. So we had a meeting with a lawyer three weeks ago. He's like, please tell me what to do if my wife gets arrested or if something happens to a neighbor or he's just prepared our community block club emails and texts and signal threads. We have rapid response ready things that are rapid response. So it's like, Hey, where do you see something? I see this is the license plate. Here's a video. I saw just even informing people and praying alongside of one another.(40:29):So we have this group of pastors we gather called Pastors Rabbis and Imams called Faith Over Fear. And so in this group, someone posted like, look at Ice was heavily in our neighborhood. They said arrests that were made or the people that were detained. This is the situation, let people know. So we're just letting people know this is what's happening. Teaching people to use their phones to record everything and anything they can always being ready to show up. So I'm the type of neighbor that would anyway, if I would see law enforcement pulling over a young black or brown man, I would pull the car over and I would get out of my car and I would say, hi, I am Reverend Sandra and I'm here. I live down the street. I'm wondering if everything's okay. Here is everything. And the reason is just to show them that I'm watching. They said, no, everything's fine. I said, okay, I'm just going to sit in my car. Let me know if you need something because I'm letting them know that I'm watching.(41:37):And so I think part of it is the accountability of a community. And I love to see the walking school buses, the ride shares that parents are doing the grocery dropoffs because you can't stand in the food pantry line anymore. The GoFundMe's for particular legal fees, the trying to utilize your networks to find out if you can figure out what district or what holding location you, your loved one would be in offering mental health services. Like, Hey, here are the three organizations that do group therapy or circles or there's going to be a meditation and yoga thing offered at this center. A lot of them have a lot of embodied practices too. So I think those things are great. But yeah, we still have to, we're still living life. We're still submitting book reports for school, we're still having birthday parties and christenings, we're we still black and brown communities have been living through trauma for so long, they can't stop living.(42:53):So the question is how do we invite one another to more wholeness in our living, within our own communities, and then how do we help one another? This is affecting everybody. It's affecting not only Latino communities and not only Asian immigrant communities, but it's also affecting black communities because there's more enforcement and they're not more law enforcement and they're not necessarily targeting black communities, but where there are brown communities, sometimes there are black folks also. And so it's impacting them in just the militarization of our city. I mean, everywhere you go, there's just people marching with weapons and it could be Michigan Avenue in the shopping area downtown near the Bean, or it could be in our communities. And so I think how people are trying to, I think a city like Chicago, because it's got such a rich tradition of community organizing and community development and advocacy, I think it's very set up for what can I do in my world for my neighbors?(44:08):And then for those of you that aren't in Chicago, I think knowing which organizations are doing fantastic things, I think that's really helpful. Within the faith and justice space, I think organizations like New Life Centers that are kind of spearheading some of the new neighbors initiatives already, but they're doing this whole care system for, they're already new neighbors from Venezuela, Ecuador, and Central America who are now more vulnerable. And so they have systems in place for that. There are organizations live free Illinois who are doing more of the advocacy, raising awareness stuff. I can give you a couple, I can put in the show notes, but I think there's organizations that are doing fantastic work. Some people are just, I have a friend who's in Houston who's just like, there's a refugee family who's vulnerable right now and I need to take them groceries. Who wants to give Venmo?(45:06):Me? I think you have to trust your friends aren't going to go out for a nice rooftop beverage and 300, $400 later. Then there's groceries for this. So it's like you may not know anyone, but you may know someone who knows someone who's vulnerable. And so maybe you just are giving money to, or maybe you, I've had people send me money and be like, Hey, maybe someone who needs something. And I'm like, great. And we little, we put it cash and we put it in our car and when we need it, we help a neighbor who's in need. I think I'm calling our friends to, another one I thought of was calling our friend, inviting our friends to action. So sometimes I don't think it's that we don't want to do anything or that we're unwilling to do something. It's that we just feel so stunned. So that news that came out this week in Houston about the 15-year-old autistic boy who was taken by ICE and who has the capacity of a 4-year-old, and I was thinking about him all day long. So I just started pinging all of my friends in Houston and Austin and Dallas. I was like, anybody in Texas? I have a lot of friends in Texas. I'm like, not just, Hey Texas, do something directly. Sending it to them and saying, what have you done?(46:28):Is there a number you can call? Can you gather your small group? They're always asking, I don't know what to do. I don't know what to, I'm like, so I was like, I have something for you to do, and it's in Texas. I'm like, do you know what's happened to this kid? Is he back at home? Can you do something? Is there a GoFundMe for the parents? So I think when we're activated in small things, we develop the discipline of just being activated in general. So it's like if there's a thing that somebody invites you to give to and you give to it, then you get into the practice of giving.(47:06):If you don't start well, then where is it going to happen? So we're thinking right now, I dunno about you guys, but there's nothing in me that wants to do anything fancy right now. I rest for sure. We went to Michigan, we walked around, we took hikes. It was great. It was super free because we stayed with a friend. But there's nothing in me that's like, let me just plan a fancy vacation right now. It's not in me. And I think part of it is, it's almost like a detoxing from an American consumeristic way of seeing celebration and rests. I don't need fancy things to have rest. I don't need, doesn't have to be expensive. I don't know who came up with this. And I think it's a sensibility in us right now, and I've talked to a couple of friends about it, but it's like it's a sensibility in us that feels like it's really tone deaf to start spending a whole lot of money right now when there are so many needs in the world. And no, we can't give away our whole salaries, but we might be able to give more. For example, I don't think our friend should be saying, Hey, my son can't go to college this year. He needs $6,000. I think somebody in our friend groups could be like, actually, I am getting a bonus of $12,000. I'm going to give you three. We should be able to do that for those of us that have access.(48:27):And there are many people who have access, many other people who think they don't have money, but they do. And I think if we invite each other to say, Hey, I want to give to this person's legal fees, or I want to give to this person's college fund, or I want to give to will you give with me? And we are practicing then the kind of mutual aid that's collective that I know our grandparents did for the Latino culture, it's like the RIA system where y'all put the money in every month and every Monday the month. So it's like Koreans do it too. It's like everybody gives a hundred dollars a month and all goes into this pile and every month that pile of money moves around. So it's like our way of providing, I think there's a lot more we could be doing with our money that would give integrity to our voice. And I see a lot of talking and not a lot of sharing.Danielle (49:34):It's so true. It's a lot of talking and it's like, I think we have to get over that old white supremacy norm. If you see somebody on the street, you got to buy them food. You can't ever give them cash. That story rings through my mind as a child and just sometimes you just got to load up the cash, send someone cash for dinner and send someone cash for, I don't know, whatever they need, a bus fare or an airplane ticket or find the miles in your community if someone needs to fly somewhere. Just all these things you're talking about, we kind of have to just get over the hump and just say, Hey, people need help. Let's just go help.Sandra (50:12):And for some of us, I think it's particularly of those of us within our community that are no longer congregating at a local church. I don't know. Did you think the tithe justI think the call to generosity is still there. Whether you want to call your church a local formal traditional church or not, I would hate, I would've hated in our season that we were churchless to have stopped giving out would've been a significant amount of money that would've stopped going out. We still got salaries that year. Well, at least Carl did. Carl got a salary. So I'm like that invitation to generosity, at least at the bare minimum, at the bare minimum, 10% at the bare minimum that should be going out. And so the question is, what did all of us that left churches do with our 10% not to be legalistic because really we should be giving more. The question is, what am I allowed to keep? And for people making six figures, you need to be asking yourselves, why do you need six figures if you don't? Because most of the people, even in places like Seattle and Chicago, are living off of $50,000 a year. So I think as much as we need to ask our government to do well and be integrous in their budget, I think we need to think about that as a place of, and I say that not because I think it's going to solve the problems in Chicago, but I think that money does actually sharing does actually help some people. They haven't eaten.(52:06):They just haven't eaten. We know families whose kids don't eat.Jenny (52:19):Just thank you. It's been really important and meaningful to have your voice and your call to action and to community. I don't take lightly sharing your story and how it's specifically showing up in your community and in your own body and in your own mothering. So thank you for speaking to how you are practicing resilience and how we can think more about how to practice that collectively. It's been really, really good to be here. I am sorry I have to jump off, but thank you Danielle. I'll see you all soon.Sandra (53:23):Yeah, I mean even if you were to think about, you may not be able to provide for anyone, but is there someone in your ecosystem, in your friend group that could really use four sessions of therapy that doesn't have the finances to do so? Or that could really use sessions of acupuncture or massage therapy that doesn't have the money for it, it doesn't have insurance, and of someone who's willing to work with you on that as far as providing that for them. So I think even at that level, it's like if we had to put ourselves in someone else's shoes and say, well, what I want for someone, how would I want for someone to help me without me asking them? I think that is the biggest thing is we cannot, I don't believe we can rely on a person's ability to say what they need.(54:27):I mean, you've had stuff happen in your life. I've had health issues in my own family and problems with my family, and when people are like, oh, how can I help? I'm like, I can't think about that right now. But if a plant shows up at my house that is bringing me joy. Someone just sent me a prayer plant the other day. It's literally called a red prayer plant or something. I was like, yes, I love this. Or if someone buys dinner for my family so I don't have to cook for them, I can't stand up right now. Or if someone said, looks in on me and says, Hey, I know you guys can't be out and about much, so I just wanted to give you some funding for a streaming service. Here you go. Whatever they use it for, that's up to them. But I think to let someone know that you're thinking about them, I think is easy to do with baking something for them, sharing something with them, taking their kids for a few hours.(55:31):Because what if they just need a break from their children and maybe you could just watch their kids for a little bit, pick them up, take them to your house, watch them for a little bit. So I think there are ways that we can practically help each other that again, will make a world of difference to the person that's there next to you. And as always, calling your senators, writing letters, joining in on different campaigns that organizations are doing for around advocacy, checking in with your local city officials and your parent teacher and your schools, and figuring out what are we doing for the kids in our school even to be informed as a neighbor, what is it that our school's doing to protect our families and children? I think those are all good questions that we should always be doing and praying for people and praying specifically. We do that as a family. I think sometimes I don't know what else to do, but to say God to help.Danielle (56:35):Yeah, I mean, I have to go now, but I do think that's kind of key is not that God isn't going to intervene at some point practically, I think we are that active prayer answer for other people we're that answer. I'm not saying we're God, but we're the right. Yeah. Yeah. And just to step into that, be that answer, step into loving when it says, love your neighbor actually doing it and actually showing up and maybe loving your neighbor isn't bringing them dinner. Maybe it's just sitting down and listening to how their day went. Maybe you're not a therapist, maybe you're just a friend. Maybe you're just a community member, but you can sit in and you can hear how rough it was for that day and not take up your own space emotionally, but just be there to listen and then give them a hug and hang or leave. There's a lot of ways to show up and yeah, I'm challenged and want to do this more, so thank you. You'reSandra (57:36):Welcome. Thanks for having me.  Well, first I guess I would have to believe that there was or is an actual political dialogue taking place that I could potentially be a part of. And honestly, I'm not sure that I believe that.

BIO:The Reverend Dr. Starlette Thomas is a poet, practical theologian, and itinerant prophet for a coming undivided “kin-dom.” She is the director of The Raceless Gospel Initiative, named for her work and witness and an associate editor at Good Faith Media. Starlette regularly writes on the sociopolitical construct of race and its longstanding membership in the North American church. Her writings have been featured in Sojourners, Red Letter Christians, Free Black Thought, Word & Way, Plough, Baptist News Global and Nurturing Faith Journal among others. She is a frequent guest on podcasts and has her own. The Raceless Gospel podcast takes her listeners to a virtual church service where she and her guests tackle that taboo trinity— race, religion, and politics. Starlette is also an activist who bears witness against police brutality and most recently the cultural erasure of the Black Lives Matter Plaza in Washington, D.C. It was erected in memory of the 2020 protests that brought the world together through this shared declaration of somebodiness after the gruesome murder of George Perry Floyd, Jr. Her act of resistance caught the attention of the Associated Press. An image of her reclaiming the rubble went viral and in May, she was featured in a CNN article.Starlette has spoken before the World Council of Churches North America and the United Methodist Church's Council of Bishops on the color- coded caste system of race and its abolition. She has also authored and presented papers to the members of the Baptist World Alliance in Zurich, Switzerland and Nassau, Bahamas to this end. She has cast a vision for the future of religion at the National Museum of African American History and Culture's “Forward Conference: Religions Envisioning Change.” Her paper was titled “Press Forward: A Raceless Gospel for Ex- Colored People Who Have Lost Faith in White Supremacy.” She has lectured at The Queen's Foundation in Birmingham, U.K. on a baptismal pedagogy for antiracist theological education, leadership and ministries. Starlette's research interests have been supported by the Louisville Institute and the Lilly Foundation. Examining the work of the Reverend Dr. Clarence Jordan, whose farm turned “demonstration plot” in Americus, Georgia refused to agree to the social arrangements of segregation because of his Christian convictions, Starlette now takes this dirt to the church. Her thesis is titled, “Afraid of Koinonia: How life on this farm reveals the fear of Christian community.” A full circle moment, she was recently invited to write the introduction to Jordan's newest collection of writings, The Inconvenient Gospel: A Southern Prophet Tackles War, Wealth, Race and Religion.Starlette is a member of the Christian Community Development Association, the Peace & Justice Studies Association, and the Koinonia Advisory Council. A womanist in ministry, she has served as a pastor as well as a denominational leader. An unrepentant academician and bibliophile, Starlette holds degrees from Buffalo State College, Colgate Rochester Crozer Divinity School and Wesley Theological Seminary. Last year, she was awarded an honorary doctorate in Sacred Theology for her work and witness as a public theologian from Wayland Baptist Theological Seminary. She is the author of "Take Me to the Water": The Raceless Gospel as Baptismal Pedagogy for a Desegregated Church and a contributing author of the book Faith Forward: A Dialogue on Children, Youth & a New Kind of Christianity.  JennyI was just saying that I've been thinking a lot about the distinction between Christianity and Christian supremacy and Christian nationalism, and I have been researching Christian nationalism for probably about five or six years now. And one of my introductions to the concept of it was a book that's based on a documentary that's based on a book called Constantine Sword. And it talked about how prior to Constantine, Christians had the image of fish and life and fertility, and that is what they lived by. And then Constantine supposedly had this vision of a cross and it said, with this sign, you shall reign. And he married the church and the state. And ever since then, there's been this snowball effect of Christian empire through the Crusades, through manifest destiny, through all of these things that we're seeing play out in the United States now that aren't new. But I think there's something new about how it's playing out right now.Danielle (02:15):I was thinking about the doctrine of discovery and how that was the creation of that legal framework and ideology to justify the seizure of indigenous lands and the subjugation of indigenous peoples. And just how part of that doctrine you have to necessarily make the quote, humans that exist there, you have to make them vacant. Or even though they're a body, you have to see them as internally maybe empty or lacking or less. And that really becomes this frame. Well, a repeated frame.Jenny (03:08):Yep. Yeah. Yeah. And it feels like that's so much source to that when that dehumanization is ordained by God. If God is saying these people who we're not even going to look at as people, we're going to look at as objects, how do we get out of that?Danielle (03:39):I don't know. Well, definitely still in it. You can hear folks like Charlie Kirk talk about it and unabashedly, unashamedly turning point USA talk about doctrine of discovery brings me currently to these fishing boats that have been jetting around Venezuela. And regardless of what they're doing, the idea that you could just kill them regardless of international law, regardless of the United States law, which supposedly we have the right to a process, the right to due process, the right to show up in a court and we're presumed innocent. But this doctrine applies to people manifest destiny, this doctrine of discovery. It applies to others that we don't see as human and therefore can snuff out life. And I think now they're saying on that first boat, I think they've blown up four boats total. And on the first boat, one of the ladies is speaking out, saying they were out fishing and the size of the boat. I think that's where you get into reality. The size of the boat doesn't indicate a large drug seizure anyway. It's outside reality. And again, what do you do if they're smuggling humans? Did you just destroy all that human life? Or maybe they're just fishing. So I guess that doctrine and that destiny, it covers all of these immoral acts, it kind of washes them clean. And I guess that talking about Constantine, it feels like the empire needed a way to do that, to absolve themselves.Danielle (05:40):I know it gives me both comfort and makes me feel depressed when I think about people in 300 ad being, they're freaking throwing people into the lion's den again and people are cheering. And I have to believe that there were humans at that time that saw the barbarism for what it was. And that gives me hope that there have always been a few people in a system of tyranny and oppression that are like, what the heck is going on? And it makes me feel like, ugh. When does that get to be more than just the few people in a society kind of society? Or what does a society need to not need such violence? Because I think it's so baked in now to these white and Christian supremacy, and I don't know, in my mind, I don't think I can separate white supremacy from Christian supremacy because even before White was used as a legal term to own people and be able to vote, the legal term was Christian. And then when enslaved folks started converting to Christianity, they pivoted and said, well, no, not all Christians. It has to be white Christians. And so I think white supremacy was birthed out of a long history of Christian supremacy.Danielle (07:21):Yeah, it's weird. I remember growing up, and maybe you had this experience too, I remember when Schindler's List hit the theaters and you were probably too young, but Schindler's listed the theaters, and I remember sitting in a living room and having to convince my parents of why I wanted to see it. And I think I was 16, I don't remember. I was young and it was rated R and of course that was against our values to see rated R movies. But I really wanted to see this movie. And I talked and talked and talked and got to see this movie if anybody's watched Schindler's List, it's a story of a man who is out to make money, sees this opportunity to get free labor basically as part of the Nazi regime. And so he starts making trades to access free labor, meanwhile, still has women, enjoys a fine life, goes to church, has a pseudo faith, and as time goes along, I'm shortening the story, but he gets this accountant who he discovers he loves because his accountant makes him rich. He makes him rich off the labor. But the accountant is thinking, how do I save more lives and get them into this business with Schindler? Well, eventually they get captured, they get found out. All these things happen, right, that we know. And it becomes clear to Schindler that they're exterminating, they're wiping out an entire population.(09:01):I guess I come to that and just think about, as a young child, I remember watching that thinking, there's no way this would ever happen again because there's film, there's documentation. At the time, there were people alive from the Great war, the greatest generation like my grandfather who fought in World War ii. There were other people, we had the live stories. But now just a decade, 12, 13 years removed, it hasn't actually been that long. And the memory of watching a movie like Schindler's List, the impact of seeing what it costs a soul to take the life of other souls like that, that feels so far removed now. And that's what the malaise of the doctrine of Discovery and manifest destiny, I think have been doing since Constantine and Christianity. They've been able to wipe the memory, the historical memory of the evil done with their blessing.(10:06):And I feel like even this huge thing like the Holocaust, the memories being wiped, you can almost feel it. And in fact, people are saying, I don't know if they actually did that. I don't know if they killed all these Jewish peoples. Now you hear more denial even of the Holocaust now that those storytellers aren't passed on to the next life. So I think we are watching in real time how Christianity and Constantine were able to just wipe use empire to wipe the memory of the people so they can continue to gain riches or continue to commit atrocities without impunity just at any level. I guess that's what comes to mind.Jenny (10:55):Yeah, it makes me think of, I saw this video yesterday and I can't remember what representative it was in a hearing and she had written down a long speech or something that she was going to give, and then she heard during the trial the case what was happening was someone shared that there have been children whose parents have been abducted and disappeared because the children were asked at school, are your parents undocumented? And she said, I can't share what I had prepared because I'm caught with that because my grandfather was killed in the Holocaust because his children were asked at school, are your parents Jewish?(11:53):And my aunt took that guilt with her to her grave. And the amount of intergenerational transgenerational trauma that is happening right now, that never again is now what we are doing to families, what we are doing to people, what we are doing to children, the atrocities that are taking place in our country. Yeah, it's here. And I think it's that malaise has come over not only the past, but even current. I think people don't even know how to sit with the reality of the horror of what's happening. And so they just dissociate and they just check out and they don't engage the substance of what's happening.Danielle (13:08):Yeah. I tell a friend sometimes when I talk to her, I just say, I need you to tap in. Can you just tap in? Can you just carry the conversation or can you just understand? And I don't mean understand, believe a story. I mean feel the story. It's one thing to say the words, but it's another thing to feel them. And I think Constantine is a brilliant guy. He took a peaceful religion. He took a peaceful faith practice, people that literally the prior guy was throwing to the lions for sport. He took a people that had been mocked, a religious group that had been mocked, and he elevated them and then reunified them with that sword that you're talking about. And so what did those Christians have to give up then to marry themselves to empire? I don't know, but it seems like they kind of effed us over for eternity, right?Jenny (14:12):Yeah. Well, and I think that that's part of it. I think part of the malaise is the infatuation with eternity and with heaven. And I know for myself, when I was a missionary for many years, I didn't care about my body because this body, this light and momentary suffering paled in comparison to what was awaiting me. And so no matter what happened, it was a means to an end to spend eternity with Jesus. And so I think of empathy as us being able to feel something of ourselves in someone else. If I don't have grief and joy and sorrow and value for this body, I'm certainly not going to have it for other bodies. And I think the disembodiment of white Christian supremacy is what enables bodies to just tolerate and not consider the brutality of what we're seeing in the United States. What we're seeing in Congo, what we're seeing in Palestine, what we're seeing everywhere is still this sense of, oh, the ends are going to justify the means we're all going to, at least I'll be in heaven and everyone else can kind of figure out what they're going to do.I don't know, man. Yeah, maybe. I guess when you think about Christian nationalism versus maybe a more authentic faith, what separates them for youAbiding by the example that Jesus gave or not. I mean, Jesus was killed by the state because he had some very unpopular things to say about the state and the way in which he lived was very much like, how do I see those who are most oppressed and align myself with them? Whereas Christian nationalism is how do I see those who have the most power and align myselves with them?(16:48):And I think it is a question of alignment and orientation. And at the end of the day, who am I going to stand with even knowing and probably knowing that that may be to the detriment of my own body, but I do that not out of a sense of martyrdom, but out of a sense of integrity. I refuse. I think I really believe Jesus' words when he said, what good is it for a man to gain the world and lose his soul? And at the end of the day, what I'm fighting for is my own soul, and I don't want to give that up.Danielle (17:31):Hey, starlet, we're on to not giving up our souls to power.The Reverend Dr.Rev. Dr. Starlette (17:47):I'm sorry I'm jumping from one call to the next. I do apologize for my tardiness now, where were we?Danielle (17:53):We got on the subject of Constantine and how he married the sword with Christianity when it had been fish and fertile ground and et cetera, et cetera. Yeah, that's where we started. Yeah, that's where we started.Starlette (18:12):I'm going to get in where I fit in. Y'all keep going.Danielle (18:14):You get in. Yeah, you get in. I guess Jenny, for me and for you, starlet, the deep erasure of any sort of resemblance of I have to look back and I have to be willing to interrogate, I think, which is what a lot of people don't want to do. I grew up in a really conservative evangelical family and a household, and I have to interrogate, well, one, why did my mom get into that? Because Mexican, and number two, I watched so slowly as there was a celebration. I think it was after Bill Clinton had this Monica Lewinsky thing and all of this stuff happened. My Latino relatives were like, wait a minute, we don't like that. We don't like that. That doesn't match our values. And I remember this celebration of maybe now they're going to become Christians. I remember thinking that as a child, because for them to be a Democrat in my household and for them to hold different values around social issues meant that they weren't necessarily saved in my house and my way because they hadn't fully bought into empire in the way I know Jenny muted herself.(19:31):They hadn't fully bought into empire. And I slowly watched those family members in California kind of give way to conservatism the things that beckoned it. And honestly, a lot of it was married to religion and to what is going on today and not standing up for justice, not standing up for civil rights. I watched the movement go over, and it feels like at the expense of the memory of my grandfather and my great-grandfather who despised religion in some ways, my grandfather did not like going to church because he thought people were fake. He didn't believe them, and he didn't see what church had to do with being saved anyway. And so I think about him a lot and I think, oh, I got to hold onto that a little bit in the face of empire. But yeah, my mind just went off on that rabbit trail.Starlette (20:38):Oh, it's quite all right. My grandfather had similar convictions. My grandmother took the children to church with her and he stayed back. And after a while, the children were to decide that they didn't want to go anymore. And I remember him saying, that's enough. That's enough. You've done enough. They've heard enough. Don't make them go. But I think he drew some of the same conclusions, and I hold those as well, but I didn't grow up in a household where politics was even discussed. Folks were rapture ready, as they say, because they were kingdom minded is what they say now. And so there was no discussion of what was going on on the ground. They were really out of touch with, I'm sending right now. They were out of touch with reality. I have on pants, I have on full makeup, I have on earrings. I'm not dressed modestly in any way, shape, fashion or form.(21:23):It was a very externalized, visible, able to be observed kind of spirituality. And so I enter the spaces back at home and it's like going into a different world. I had to step back a bit and oftentimes I just don't say anything. I just let the room have it because you can't, in my experience, you can't talk 'em out of it. They have this future orientation where they live with their feet off the ground because Jesus is just around the corner. He's right in that next cloud. He's coming, and so none of this matters. And so that affected their political participation and discussion. There was certainly very minor activism, so I wasn't prepared by family members to show up in the streets like I do now. I feel sincerely called. I feel like it's a work of the spirit that I know where to put my feet at all, but I certainly resonate with what you would call a rant that led you down to a rabbit hole because it led me to a story about my grandfather, so I thank you for that. They were both right by the way,Danielle (22:23):I think so he had it right. He would sit in the very back of church sometimes to please my grandmother and to please my family, and he didn't have a cell phone, but he would sit there and go to sleep. He would take a nap. And I have to think of that now as resistance. And as a kid I was like, why does he do that? But his body didn't want to take it in.Starlette (22:47):That's rest as resistance from the Nat Bishop, Trisha Hersey, rest as act of defiance, rest as reparations and taking back my time that you're stealing from me by having me sit in the service. I see that.Danielle (23:02):I mean, Jenny, it seems like Constantine, he knew what to do. He gets Christians on his side, they knew how to gather organically. He then gets this mass megaphone for whatever he wants, right?Jenny (23:21):Yeah. I think about Adrian Marie Brown talks a lot about fractals and how what happens on a smaller scale is going to be replicated on larger scales. And so even though there's some sense of disjoint with denominations, I think generally in the United States, there is some common threads of that manifest destiny that have still found its way into these places of congregating. And so you're having these training wheels really even within to break it down into the nuclear family that James Dobson wanted everyone to focus on was a very, very narrow white, patriarchal Christian family. And so if you rehearse this on these smaller scales, then you can rehearse it in your community, then you can rehearse it, and it just bubbles and bubbles and balloons out into what we're seeing happen, I think.Yeah, the nuclear family and then the youth movements, let us, give us your youth, give us your kids. Send us your kids and your youth to our camps.Jenny (24:46):Great. I grew up in Colorado and I was probably 10 or 11 when the Columbine shooting happened, and I remember that very viscerally. And the immediate conversation was not how do we protect kids in school? It was glorifying this one girl that maybe or maybe did not say yes when the shooters asked, do you still believe in God? And within a year her mom published a book about it. And that was the thing was let's use this to glorify martyrdom. And I think it is different. These were victims in school and I think any victim of the shooting is horrifying. And I think we're seeing a similar level of that martyrdom frenzy with Charlie Kirk right now. And what we're not talking about is how do we create a safer society? What we're talking about, I'm saying, but I dunno. What I'm hearing of the white Christian communities is how are we glorifying Charlie Kirk as a martyr and what power that wields when we have someone that we can call a martyr?Starlette (26:27):No, I just got triggered as soon as you said his name.(26:31):Just now. I think grieving a white supremacist is terrifying. Normalizing racist rhetoric is horrifying. And so I look online in disbelief. I unfollowed and blocked hundreds of people on social media based on their comments about what I didn't agree with. Everything he said, got a lot of that. I'm just not interested. I think they needed a martyr for the race war that they're amping for, and I would like to be delivered from the delusion that is white body supremacy. It is all exhausting. I don't want to be a part of the racial imagination that he represents. It is not a new narrative. We are not better for it. And he's not a better person because he's died. The great Biggie Smalls has a song that says you're nobody until somebody kills you. And I think it's appropriate. Most people did not know who he was. He was a podcaster. I'm also looking kind of cross-eyed at his wife because that's not, I served as a pastor for more than a decade. This is not an expression of grief. There's nothing like anything I've seen for someone who was assassinated, which I disagree with.(28:00):I've just not seen widows take the helm of organizations and given passion speeches and make veil threats to audiences days before the, as we would say in my community, before the body has cooled before there is a funeral that you'll go down and take pictures. That could be arguably photo ops. It's all very disturbing to me. This is a different measure of grief. I wrote about it. I don't know what, I've never heard of a sixth stage of grief that includes fighting. We're not fighting over anybody's dead body. We're not even supposed to do it with Jesus. And so I just find it all strange that before the man is buried, you've already concocted a story wherein opposing forces are at each other's throats. And it's all this intergalactic battle between good and bad and wrong, up and down, white and black. It's too much.(28:51):I think white body supremacy has gotten out of hand and it's incredibly theatrical. And for persons who have pulled back from who've decent whiteness, who've de racialize themselves, it's foolishness. Just nobody wants to be involved in this. It's a waste of time. White body supremacy and racism are wastes of time. Trying to prove that I'm a human being or you're looking right at is a waste of time. And people just want to do other things, which is why African-Americans have decided to go to sleep, to take a break. We're not getting ready to spin our wheels again, to defend our humanity, to march for rights that are innate, to demand a dignity that comes with being human. It's just asinine.(29:40):I think you would be giving more credence to the statements themselves by responding. And so I'd rather save my breath and do my makeup instead because trying to defend the fact that I'm a glorious human being made in the image of God is a waste of time. Look at me. My face is beat. It testifies for me. Who are you? Just tell me that I don't look good and that God didn't touch me. I'm with the finger of love as the people say, do you see this beat? Let me fall back. So you done got me started and I blame you. It's your fault for the question. So no, that's my response to things like that. African-American people have to insulate themselves with their senses of ness because he didn't have a kind word to say about African-American people, whether a African-American pilot who is racialized as black or an African-American woman calling us ignorance saying, we're incompetence. If there's no way we could have had these positions, when African-American women are the most agreed, we're the most educated, how dare you? And you think, I'm going to prove that I'm going to point to degrees. No, I'll just keep talking. It will make itself obvious and evident.(30:45):Is there a question in that? Just let's get out of that. It triggers me so bad. Like, oh, that he gets a holiday and it took, how many years did it take for Martin Luther King Junior to get a holiday? Oh, okay. So that's what I mean. The absurdity of it all. You're naming streets after him hasn't been dead a year. You have children coloring in sheets, doing reports on him. Hasn't been a few months yet. We couldn't do that for Martin Luther King. We couldn't do that for Rosa Parks. We couldn't do that for any other leader, this one in particular, and right now, find that to beI just think it just takes a whole lot of delusion and pride to keep puffing yourself up and saying, you're better than other people. Shut up, pipe down. Or to assume that everybody wants to look like you or wants to be racialized as white. No, I'm very cool in who I'm, I don't want to change as the people say in every lifetime, and they use these racialized terms, and so I'll use them and every lifetime I want to come back as black. I don't apologize for my existence. I love it here. I don't want to be racialized as white. I'm cool. That's the delusion for me that you think everyone wants to look like. You think I would trade.(32:13):You think I would trade for that, and it looks great on you. I love what it's doing for you. But as for me in my house, we believe in melanin and we keep it real cute over here. I just don't have time. I think African-Americans minoritized and otherwise, communities should invest their time in each other and in ourselves as opposed to wasting our breath, debating people. We can't debate white supremacists. Anyway, I think I've talked about that the arguments are not rooted in reason. It's rooted in your dehumanization and equating you with three fifths of a human being who's in charge of measurements, the demonizing of whiteness. It's deeply problematic for me because it puts them in a space of creator. How can you say how much of a human being that's someone? This stuff is absurd. And so I've refuse to waste my breath, waste my life arguing with somebody who doesn't have the power, the authority.(33:05):You don't have the eyesight to tell me if I'm human or not. This is stupid. We're going to do our work and part of our work is going to sleep. We're taking naps, we're taking breaks, we're putting our feet up. I'm going to take a nap after this conversation. We're giving ourselves a break. We're hitting the snooze button while staying woke. There's a play there. But I think it's important that people who are attacked by white body supremacy, not give it their energy. Don't feed into the madness. Don't feed into the machine because it'll eat you alive. And I didn't get dressed for that. I didn't get on this call. Look at how I look for that. So that's what that brings up. Okay. It brings up the violence of white body supremacy, the absurdity of supremacy at all. The delusion of the racial imagination, reading a 17th century creation onto a 21st century. It's just all absurd to me that anyone would continue to walk around and say, I'm better than you. I'm better than you. And I'll prove it by killing you, lynching you, raping your people, stealing your people, enslaving your people. Oh, aren't you great? That's pretty great,Jenny (34:30):I think. Yeah, I think it is. I had a therapist once tell me, it's like you've had the opposite of a psychotic break because when that is your world and that's all, it's so easy to justify and it makes sense. And then as soon as you step out of it, you're like, what the what? And then it makes it that much harder to understand. And this is my own, we talked about this last week, but processing what is my own path in this of liberation and how do I engage people who are still in that world, who are still related to me, who are, and in a way that isn't exhausting for I'm okay being exhausted if it's going to actually bear something, if it's just me spinning my wheels, I don't actually see value in that. And for me, what began to put cracks in that was people challenging my sense of superiority and my sense of knowing what they should do with their bodies. Because essentially, I think a lot of how I grew up was similar maybe and different from how you were sharing Danielle, where it was like always vote Republican because they're going to be against abortion and they're going to be against gay marriage. And those were the two in my world that were the things that I was supposed to vote for no matter what. And now just seeing how far that no matter what is willing to go is really terrifying.Danielle (36:25):Yeah, I agree. Jenny. I mean, again, I keep talking about him, but he's so important to me. The idea that my great grandfather to escape religious oppression would literally walk 1,950 miles and would leave an oppressive system just in an attempt to get away. That walk has to mean something to me today. You can't forget. All of my family has to remember that he did a walk like that. How many of us have walked that far? I mean, I haven't ever walked that far in just one instance to escape something. And he was poor because he couldn't even pay for his mom's burial at the Catholic church. So he said, let me get out of this. And then of course he landed with the Methodist and he was back in the fire again. But I come back to him, and that's what people will do to get out of religious oppression. They will give it an effort and when they can. And so I think it's important to remember those stories. I'm off on my tangent again now because it feels so important. It's a good one.Starlette (37:42):I think it's important to highlight the walking away from, to putting one foot in front of the other, praying with your feet(37:51):That it's its own. You answer your own prayer by getting away from it. It is to say that he was done with it, and if no one else was going to move, he was going to move himself that he didn't wait for the change in the institution. Let's just change directions and get away from it. And I hate to even imagine what he was faced with and that he had to make that decision. And what propelled him to walk that long with that kind of energy to keep momentum and to create that amount of distance. So for me, it's very telling. I ran away at 12. I had had it, so I get it. This is the last time you're going to hit me.Not going to beat me out of my sleep. I knew that at 12. This is no place for me. So I admire people who get up in the dead of night, get up without a warning, make it up in their mind and said, that's the last time, or This is not what I'm going to do. This is not the way that I want to be, and I'm leaving. I admire him. Sounds like a hero. I think we should have a holiday.Danielle (38:44):And then imagine telling that. Then you're going to tell me that people like my grandfather are just in it. This is where it leaves reality for me and leaves Christianity that he's just in it to steal someone's job. This man worked the lemon fields and then as a side job in his retired years, moved up to Sacramento, took in people off death row at Folsom Prison, took 'em to his home and nursed them until they passed. So this is the kind a person that will walk 1,950 miles. They'll do a lot of good in the world, and we're telling people that they can't come here. That's the kind of people that are walking here. That's the kind of people that are coming here. They're coming here to do whatever they can. And then they're nurturing families. They're actually living out in their families what supposed Christians are saying they want to be. Because people in these two parent households and these white families, they're actually raising the kind of people that will shoot Charlie Kirk. It's not people like my grandfather that walked almost 2000 miles to form a better life and take care of people out of prisons. Those aren't the people forming children that are, you'reStarlette (40:02):Going to email for that. The deacons will you in the parking lot for that one. You you're going to get a nasty tweet for that one. Somebody's going to jump off in the comments and straighten you out at,Danielle (40:17):I can't help it. It's true. That's the reality. Someone that will put their feet and their faith to that kind of practice is not traveling just so they can assault someone or rob someone. I mean, yes, there are people that have done that, but there's so much intentionality about moving so far. It does not carry the weight of, can you imagine? Let me walk 2000 miles to Rob my neighbor. That doesn't make any sense.Starlette (40:46):Sounds like it's own kind of pilgrimage.Jenny (40:59):I have so many thoughts, but I think whiteness has just done such a number on people. And I'm hearing each of you and I'm thinking, I don't know that I could tell one story from any of my grandparents. I think that that is part of whiteness. And it's not that I didn't know them, but it's that the ways in which Transgenerational family lines are passed down are executed for people in considered white bodies where it's like my grandmother, I guess I can't tell some stories, but she went to Polish school and in the States and was part of a Polish community. And then very quickly on polls were grafted into whiteness so that they could partake in the GI Bill. And so that Polish heritage was then lost. And that was not that long ago, but it was a severing that happened. And some of my ancestors from England, that severing happened a long time ago where it's like, we are not going to tell the stories of our ancestors because that would actually reveal that this whole white thing is made up. And we actually have so much more to us than that. And so I feel like the social privilege that has come from that, but also the visceral grief of how I would want to know those stories of my ancestors that aren't there. Because in part of the way that whiteness operates,Starlette (42:59):I'm glad you told that story. Diane de Prima, she tells about that, about her parents giving up their Italian ness, giving up their heritage and being Italian at home and being white in public. So not changing their name, shortening their name, losing their accent, or dropping the accent. I'm glad that you said that. I think that's important. But like you said though, if you tell those stories and it shakes up the power dynamic for whiteness, it's like, oh, but there are books how the Irish became White, the Making of Whiteness working for Whiteness, read all the books by David Broer on Whiteness Studies. But I'm glad that you told us. I think it's important, and I love that you named it as a severing. Why did you choose that word in particular?Jenny (43:55):I had the privilege a few years ago of going to Poland and doing an ancestry trip. And weeks before I went, an extended cousin in the States had gotten connected with our fifth cousin in Poland. We share the fifth grandparents. And this cousin of mine took us around to the church where my fifth great grandparents got married and these just very visceral places. And I had never felt the land that my ancestors know in my body. And there was something really, really powerful of that. And so I think of severing as I have been cut off from that lineage and that heritage because of whiteness. And I feel very, very grateful for the ways in which that is beginning to heal and beginning to mend. And we can tell truer stories of our ancestry and where we come from and the practices of our people. And I think it is important to acknowledge the cost and the privilege that has come from that severing in order to get a job that was not reserved for people that weren't white. My family decided, okay, well we'll just play the part. We will take on that role of whiteness because that will then give us that class privilege and that socioeconomic privilege that reveals how much of a construct whitenessStarlette (45:50):A racial contract is what Charles W. Mills calls it, that there's a deal made in a back room somewhere that you'll trade your sense of self for another. And so that it doesn't, it just unravels all the ways in which white supremacy, white body supremacy, pos itself, oh, that we're better. I think people don't say anything because it unravels those lies, those tongue twisters that persons have spun over the centuries, that it's really just an agreement that we've decided that we'll make ourselves the majority so that we can bully everybody else. And nobody wants to be called that. Nobody wants to be labeled greedy. I'm just trying to provide for my family, but at what expense? At who else's expense. But I like to live in this neighborhood and I don't want to be stopped by police. But you're willing to sacrifice other people. And I think that's why it becomes problematic and troublesome because persons have to look at themselves.(46:41):White body supremacy doesn't offer that reflection. If it did, persons would see how monstrous it is that under the belly of the beast, seeing the underside of that would be my community. We know what it costs for other people to feel really, really important because that's what whiteness demands. In order to look down your nose on somebody, you got to stand on somebody's back. Meanwhile, our communities are teaching each other to stand. We stand on the shoulders of giants. It's very communal. It's a shared identity and way of being. Whereas whiteness demands allegiance by way of violence, violent taking and grabbing it is quite the undoing. We have a lot of work to do. But I am proud of you for telling that story.Danielle (47:30):I wanted to read this quote by Gloria, I don't know if you know her. Do you know her? She writes, the struggle is inner Chicano, Indio, American Indian, Molo, Mexicano, immigrant, Latino, Anglo and power working class Anglo black, Asian. Our psyches resemble the border towns and are populated by the same people. The struggle has always been inner and has played out in outer terrains. Awareness of our situation must come before interchanges and which in turn come before changes in society. Nothing happens in the real world unless it first happens in the images in our heads.(48:16):So Jenny, when you're talking, you had some image in your head before you went to Poland, before it became reality. You had some, it didn't start with just knowing your cousin or whatever it happened before that. Or for me being confronted and having to confront things with my husband about ways we've been complicit or engaged in almost like the word comes gerrymandering our own future. That's kind of how it felt sometimes Luis and I and how to become aware of that and take away those scales off our own eyes and then just sit in the reality, oh no, we're really here and this is where we're really at. And so where are we going to go from here? And starlet, you've talked from your own position. That's just what comes to mind. It's something that happens inside. I mean, she talks about head, I think more in feelings in my chest. That's where it happens for me. But yeah, that's what comes to mind.Starlette (49:48):With. I feel like crying because of what we've done to our bodies and the bodies of other people. And we still can't see ourselves not as fully belonging to each other, not as beloved, not as holy.It's deeply saddening that for all the time that we have here together for all the time that we'll share with each other, we'll spend much of it not seeing each other at all.Danielle (50:57):My mind's going back to, I think I might've shared this right before you joined Starla, where it was like, I really believe the words of Jesus that says, what good is it for someone to gain the world and lose their soul? And that's what I hear. And what I feel is this soul loss. And I don't know how to convince other people. And I don't know if that's the point that their soul is worth it, but I think I've, not that I do it perfectly, but I think I've gotten to the place where I'm like, I believe my interiority is worth more than what it would be traded in for.(51:45):And I think that will be a lifelong journey of trying to figure out how to wrestle with a system. I will always be implicated in because I am talking to you on a device that was made from cobalt, from Congo and wearing clothes that were made in other countries. And there's no way I can make any decision other than to just off myself immediately. And I'm not saying I'm doing that, but I'm saying the part of the wrestle is that this is, everything is unresolved. And how do I, like what you said, Danielle, what did you say? Can you tune into this conversation?Jenny (52:45):Yeah. And how do I keep tapping in even when it means engaging my own implication in this violence? It's easier to be like, oh, those people over there that are doing those things. And it's like, wait, now how do I stay situated and how I'm continually perpetuating it as well, and how do I try to figure out how to untangle myself in that? And I think that will be always I,Danielle (53:29):He says, the US Mexican border as like an open wound where the third world grates against the first and bleeds. And before a scab forms it hemorrhages again, the lifeblood of two worlds. Two worlds merging to form a third country, a border culture. Borders are set up to define the places that are safe and unsafe to distinguish us from them. A border is a dividing line, a narrow strip along a steep edge. A borderland is a vague and undetermined place created by the emotional residue of an unnatural boundary is it is in a constant state of transition. They're prohibited and forbidden arts inhabitants. And I think that as a Latina that really describes and mixed with who my father is and that side that I feel like I live like the border in me, it feels like it grates against me. So I hear you, Jenny, and I feel very like all the resonance, and I hear you star led, and I feel a lot of resonance there too. But to deny either thing would make me less human because I am human with both of those parts of me.(54:45):But also to engage them brings a lot of grief for both parts of me. And how does that mix together? It does feel like it's in a constant state of transition. And that's partly why Latinos, I think particularly Latino men bought into this lie of power and played along. And now they're getting shown that no, that part of you that's European, that part never counted at all. And so there is no way to buy into that racialized system. There's no way to put a down payment in and come out on the other side as human. As soon as we buy into it, we're less human. Yeah. Oh, Jenny has to go in a minute. Me too. But starlet, you're welcome to join us any Thursday. Okay.Speaker 1 (55:51):Afternoon. Bye. Thank you. Bye bye.Kitsap County & Washington State Crisis and Mental Health ResourcesIf you or someone else is in immediate danger, please call 911.This resource list provides crisis and mental health contacts for Kitsap County and across Washington State.Kitsap County / Local ResourcesResourceContact InfoWhat They OfferSalish Regional Crisis Line / Kitsap Mental Health 24/7 Crisis Call LinePhone: 1‑888‑910‑0416Website: https://www.kitsapmentalhealth.org/crisis-24-7-services/24/7 emotional support for suicide or mental health crises; mobile crisis outreach; connection to services.KMHS Youth Mobile Crisis Outreach TeamEmergencies via Salish Crisis Line: 1‑888‑910‑0416Website: https://sync.salishbehavioralhealth.org/youth-mobile-crisis-outreach-team/Crisis outreach for minors and youth experiencing behavioral health emergencies.Kitsap Mental Health Services (KMHS)Main: 360‑373‑5031; Toll‑free: 888‑816‑0488; TDD: 360‑478‑2715Website: https://www.kitsapmentalhealth.org/crisis-24-7-services/Outpatient, inpatient, crisis triage, substance use treatment, stabilization, behavioral health services.Kitsap County Suicide Prevention / “Need Help Now”Call the Salish Regional Crisis Line at 1‑888‑910‑0416Website: https://www.kitsap.gov/hs/Pages/Suicide-Prevention-Website.aspx24/7/365 emotional support; connects people to resources; suicide prevention assistance.Crisis Clinic of the PeninsulasPhone: 360‑479‑3033 or 1‑800‑843‑4793Website: https://www.bainbridgewa.gov/607/Mental-Health-ResourcesLocal crisis intervention services, referrals, and emotional support.NAMI Kitsap CountyWebsite: https://namikitsap.org/Peer support groups, education, and resources for individuals and families affected by mental illness.Statewide & National Crisis ResourcesResourceContact InfoWhat They Offer988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline (WA‑988)Call or text 988; Website: https://wa988.org/Free, 24/7 support for suicidal thoughts, emotional distress, relationship problems, and substance concerns.Washington Recovery Help Line1‑866‑789‑1511Website: https://doh.wa.gov/you-and-your-family/injury-and-violence-prevention/suicide-prevention/hotline-text-and-chat-resourcesHelp for mental health, substance use, and problem gambling; 24/7 statewide support.WA Warm Line877‑500‑9276Website: https://www.crisisconnections.org/wa-warm-line/Peer-support line for emotional or mental health distress; support outside of crisis moments.Native & Strong Crisis LifelineDial 988 then press 4Website: https://doh.wa.gov/you-and-your-family/injury-and-violence-prevention/suicide-prevention/hotline-text-and-chat-resourcesCulturally relevant crisis counseling by Indigenous counselors.Additional Helpful Tools & Tips• Behavioral Health Services Access: Request assessments and access to outpatient, residential, or inpatient care through the Salish Behavioral Health Organization. Website: https://www.kitsap.gov/hs/Pages/SBHO-Get-Behaviroal-Health-Services.aspx• Deaf / Hard of Hearing: Use your preferred relay service (for example dial 711 then the appropriate number) to access crisis services.• Warning Signs & Risk Factors: If someone is talking about harming themselves, giving away possessions, expressing hopelessness, or showing extreme behavior changes, contact crisis resources immediately.Well, first I guess I would have to believe that there was or is an actual political dialogue taking place that I could potentially be a part of. And honestly, I'm not sure that I believe that. Well, first I guess I would have to believe that there was or is an actual political dialogue taking place that I could potentially be a part of. And honestly, I'm not sure that I believe that.

Bio: Jenny - Co-Host Podcast (er):I am Jenny! (She/Her) MACP, LMHCI am a Licensed Mental Health Counselor, Somatic Experiencing® Practitioner, Certified Yoga Teacher, and an Approved Supervisor in the state of Washington.I have spent over a decade researching the ways in which the body can heal from trauma through movement and connection. I have come to see that our bodies know what they need. By approaching our body with curiosity we can begin to listen to the innate wisdom our body has to teach us. And that is where the magic happens!I was raised within fundamentalist Christianity. I have been, and am still on my own journey of healing from religious trauma and religious sexual shame (as well as consistently engaging my entanglement with white saviorism). I am a white, straight, able-bodied, cis woman. I recognize the power and privilege this affords me socially, and I am committed to understanding my bias' and privilege in the work that I do. I am LGBTQIA+ affirming and actively engage critical race theory and consultation to see a better way forward that honors all bodies of various sizes, races, ability, religion, gender, and sexuality.I am immensely grateful for the teachers, healers, therapists, and friends (and of course my husband and dog!) for the healing I have been offered. I strive to pay it forward with my clients and students. Few things make me happier than seeing people live freely in their bodies from the inside out!Danielle (00:28):Welcome to the Arise Podcast, conversations based in what our reality is, faith, race, justice, gender in the church, therapy, all matter of things considered just exploring this topic of reality. Hey, I'm having this regular podcast co-host. Her name is Jenny McGrath. She's an M-A-C-P-L-M-H-C. She's dope. She's a licensed mental health counselor, a somatic experiencing practitioner, certified yoga teacher, and an approved supervisor in the state of Washington. She spent over a decade researching the ways in which the body can heal from trauma through movement and connection. And she's come to see that bodies are so important and she believes that by approaching the body with curiosity, we can begin to listen to the innate wisdom our body has to teach us. And that is where the magic happens. So I hope you're as thrilled as me to have such an amazing co-host join me. Yeah, we're going to talk about reality and therapy. We're just jumping in. Jenny and I are both writing books.Jenny, I think it's funny that we are good friends and we see each other when we're around each other, but then if not, we're always trading reels and often they're like parodies on real life. Funny things about real life that are happening, which I've been, the theme of my book is called Splitting, and I know you write about purity culture, and a part of that I think really has to do with what is our reality and how is it formed? And then that shapes what we do, how we act, how we behave in the world, how we relate to each other. So any thoughts on that? On Thursday, September 25th,Jenny (02:17):I mean, as you named that, I think 10 minutes before this started, I sent you a reel. There was a comedian singing Why She Doesn't Go to Therapy, and it says, all my friends that go to therapy are mean to me, and you don't have boundaries. You're just being an asshole. And it was good, but it was also existential. This was what seems to me a white woman. And I do think as a white woman who's a therapist, I feel existential a lot about the work I do in therapy and in healing spaces, and how we do this in a way that doesn't promote this hyper individualistic reality. And this idea that everything I see and everything I think is the way that it is, how do I stay open to more of a communal or collective way of knowing? And I think that that's a challenging thing. So that's something that comes to mind for me as you bring up Instagram reels.Danielle (03:26):Oh man, I have so many thoughts on that that I wasn't thinking before you said it, but I think they were all locked in a vault, been unleashed. No, seriously. You come from your own position in the world. Talk about your position and how did you come to that point of seeing more of a collective mindset or reality point of view?Jenny (03:47):I mean, honestly, I think a big part has been knowing you and working with you and knowing that I think we've had conversations over the years of both the privilege and the detriment that happens in a lot of white therapeutic spaces that say you just need detach from your family, from your community, from those who have harmed you. And I want to be very, very clear and very careful that obviously I do think that there are situations we need to extract ourselves from and remove ourselves from. And I think that can become disabling for bodies to, I've been having this thing play in my head lately where I'm like, are you healed? Or have you just cut off everyone that triggers you?Yeah, and I saw another, speaking of meme, it was like, I treat my trauma like Trump treats tariffs. I just implement boundaries arbitrarily, and they harm everyone.And so I think it's, there is a certain privilege that comes with being able to say, I'm just going to step away. I'm going to do my own thing. I'm going to do my healing journey. And I think there is a detriment to that and there's a loss. And I think we have co-evolved to be in community and to tell stories and to share reality and to hold reality in the tension of our space. I think about it as we each have a different lens. There's no objective reality, but if I can be open to your lens and you can be open to my lens, then we actually have two lenses, and then if we have five lenses or 10 lenses, we can have a much fuller picture of where we are rather than seeing the world through the really monochromatic white, patriarchal, Christian nationalist lens that we've been maybe conditioned, or at least I was conditioned to see the world through.Danielle (06:10):Yeah. Whoa. Yeah, I know we've talked about this so many times, and I think it just feels so present right now, especially as every moment it feels like every day. If you watch the news, if you don't take a break, I think you can be jarred at any moment or dissociated at any moment, or traumatized at any moment, or maybe feel a bit of joy too when someone says a smack down on your side of the issue. And I think that when we get in that mode of constantly being jarred and then we try to come into a healing space, it's like how do we determine then what is actually healing for us? What is actually good? What is actually wise? And I agree, I think if we're in a rhythm of being on our own, and I'm not criticizing, I mean, I get lonely and I'm part of a group, so I'm not speaking to loneliness particularly, but I'm speaking to the idea that no one else has input in your life, even the kind of input you may not agree with, but no one else is allowed to speak to you.(07:15):When I get in those spaces, it's not that I just feel lonely, I don't feel any hope. I don't feel any movement or any possibility because let's say that this ends tomorrow, that authoritarian regime magically ends. It's healed tomorrow. We're going to have to look at all of our people in our lives and face them and decide what we're going to do. I mean, that's what I think about a lot. At the end of the day, I might sit next to someone that hates me or that I perhaps might have rage and anger towards them. What are we going to do? So I don't know, when you talk about the different lenses, I'm not sure how that all mixes together. I don't have an answer, basically. Shoot.Jenny (08:05):But I also think that that's part of maybe how we hold reality is maybe it is more about presence and being with what is, rather than having an answer, I think I become more and more skeptical of anyone who says they have an answer for anything.Danielle (08:31):So I mean, there was this guy that recently passed away, and there was, on one hand I wanted to really talk about it, and on the other hand, I didn't want to talk about it because it took up so much space. And I feel that even as we start to talk about how do we form healing spaces in therapy with that, I think, what did you call it that, what kind of lens did you say? It was like a monochromatic lens. How do we talk about that without centering it?Jenny (09:08):I think one thing that comes to mind is holding it in context of all of the other deaths that have not taken up that space. And the social studies phrase, what are the conditions of possibility that have enabled this death to create church services happening that have taken over people's social media, people who have been silent about lots of different deaths in the last year or five years, all of a sudden can't help but become really vigilant about talking about this. I think for me, it helps to zoom back and go, how come? Why is this so prevalent? Why is this so loud? What is this illuminating or what is this unearthing about? What's already been here?So I grew up in very fundamentalist, white evangelical Christianity. And from the time I was eight, nine years old, I had in me messages instilled of martyrdom, whether that was a message that I should be a martyr, or whether that was a message that Christians were already being martyred, whether that was the war against Christmas with Starbucks cups or not having prayers happen at school. And these things where I grew up in this world where we were supposed to be prominent, we were supposed to be prevalent, we were supposed to be protected. And whenever there was any challenge to that from bodies that weren't white or straight or Christian or American, there became this very real frenzy around martyrdom. And I think on an interpersonal level and on a collective level, someone who plays the victim will always hold the most power in the relational dynamic. And so I think that this moment was a very useful moment to that psyche and that reality of seeing the world as a victim, as a martyr, as being persecuted, regardless of the fact that evangelical Christians are the strongest floating block in our nation. They have incredible privilege when it comes to a lot of education, marriage inequality, things like that, that are from the long lineage of Christian nationalism in our country.Danielle (12:15):So then how do you work with folks that are coming in with that lens, and what's the responsibility of our field? I know you and I can't answer that question necessarily, but we can just say from our own experience what that's like. Are you willing to share a little bit of that?What would I say? My client load is mixed and so do a lot of work, but just because it's mixed doesn't mean that I'm not currently undoing that process in myself as well. So I think just as much as therapy is about whoever comes into my office or shows up in the zoom room or even a group or a teaching we've been a part of, I think it's, well, I mean we say this co-created, but I actually mean it means I have to keep learning. I have to keep trying to be in my body. And what I mean by that is I was talking to my friend Phil yesterday, and he was like, Danielle, are you tracking your body sensations? And he's like, I just challenge you to do that today. And I was like, man, that that's a good reminder. So I think one way I try to come with clients is from the perspective of I don't know it all.(13:38):I only know what I'm feeling and sensing in this moment, and I have that to offer along with other things I've studied, of course. But just because the person sitting with me doesn't have a degree or the group and the people, doesn't mean they don't know just as much as me. It's just another form of maybe learning or knowing or presence and healing. And then we're figuring that out together. I see that as one way of undoing, undoing this. I know everything point of view, which I kind of felt like I had to have when I came out of grad school. Yeah,Jenny (14:14):Yeah, totally. Yeah, I feel similar and I think often think in quotes. And so one of my favorite quotes is by Simone Devo, and she says, without a doubt, it is always more comfortable to endure blind bondage than to work for one's liberation. And so I am consistently asking, where is my blind bondage? Who are the people in my life that will show me where my blind bondage is? Who are the people that will hold me accountable to my own liberation? And for me as a therapist, I work primarily with white folks who grew up in fundamental Christianity. And over 10 years of doing that work, I think that a primary part of my work is radical agency(15:13):Because I think that particularly white bodies maintain privilege by abdicating our agency and by being compliant with the systems that give us power and give us privilege. And so I think for me, my ethic is how do I help clients come into contact with their radical agency? And so a big part of that that I think is important is consent. And so if someone is coming to work with me, it's part of my disclosure form, it's part of my intake to say, I don't think our mental health concerns or our somatic concerns exist in a bubble. They are deeply impacted by the systems we move through. And so while we'll be engaging your individual body, we're also going to be engaging the collective structures. And I've had people say, no, I don't want to do that work. And I say, great, there are other lovely therapists that will work with you and be a better fit. That's just not the type of therapy I do. That's not within my scope of practice to only focus on the individual, because for me, that's unethical.Danielle (16:23):Oh, that's cool. I like that, Jenny. I think that a lot. I was consulting recently, and we're just talking about this current moment, and I'll just say from my point of view that even in my family, I noticed when something had gone on locally, we have some organizing that we do and we had some warnings go out. And I noticed even in my own family, the heightened anxiety, the alert, and one of the things we had to do was we took turns driving around just making sure everybody's safe and everybody was safe. And I came down and at the point where people began to lower anxiety, and we're talking about just regular business owners, regular people out there, we're not even talking about immigrants, quote migrants. We're just talking about people out there that don't want to encounter force. You could feel the anxiety just lower now that we went the parking lot's clear, no one's here, we're safe. This isn't happening, not today. I'm not saying it won't happen here in our area of the country, but it's not happening today. And I realized in consultation later about clients and stuff that things are going to, but the clinician I was consulting with just said to me, she said to me, just for your family, she's like, that anxiety is warranted. That's real. You're supposed to feel anxious. There's no way you can take that away for those people and you shouldn't.(18:02):And so just kind of learning, reminding myself, when you go to grad school, when you study therapy and psychology, there's pathological, there's diagnoses, all these things, but then there's some things like we just can't take away. They're part of the experience. They need to be there. They're part of the warning. And there's a reason why when you get out and do something practical for a community, the anxiety lowers. And I think that just gave me a lot of insight, not just for my client, but for my family and for myself. And there's some calm, not because I'm anxious, but because, oh, I'm not crazy. I'm not just making this up. And so I do think that speaks to how the system is creating trauma and it is powerless. What can we do against the big bad authorities? And we can do things, we can connect, we can be with people, but at some level, that baseline of anxiety is going to be there because it's warranted. That's how I think of it.What do we do? Well, we sat at home, we watched sports. We went to Best Buy, and this is not every, we had some privilege. We bought an extra controller to play Mario World or whatever it was. I don't remember, but I was like, I'm not playing on that little controller. They wanted me to hold. I was like, I need a real controller. I'm old. I need to be able to feel it in my hands. Just silly stuff. Just didn't put pressure on the kids to do homework. Not a pressure to clean the house, just to just exist. Just be, yeah. What about you? What do you do when you encounter either anxiety from trauma like that or the systemic pressure maybe to even conform to whiteness or privilege in that moment?Jenny (20:12):I typically need to move my body in some way, whether that's to take my dog on a very long walk or whether that's just to roll around on a dance floor or maybe do a yoga practice. I become aware of how my body is holding that, and I think about how emotions are just energy in motion. And so if we don't give them motion and expression, it becomes like a battery pack in our nervous system. And so I can feel that if I haven't been able to move and to express whatever my body needs to express, and often I don't even know cognitively what my body needs to express, but I've grown in trust that my body knows, and I say, I think the sillier we look the better it usually feels. I just saw this lovely post the other day, a movement person did where they, we talk a lot about brainwashing, but we don't talk a lot about body washing, and we are so conditioned to only move our body in certain ways. And because our body is not different than our brain, I think that the more free we feel in our actual physical body to our own ability, the more that can actually create a little bit more mobility in how we see reality and how we engage with it.Danielle (21:44):So take that back to the beginning where you started talking about how when you have clients come in, you're like, yo, we're going to address this systemically and collectively. What do you do with folks when they have that kind of energy and you guys are working through it and it's like, oh, it's like maybe that's collective energy. What do you do? Yeah,Jenny (22:02):Yeah. I ask my clients probably annoying amount of times each session, what do you notice right now? And then I follow their body. So if their body says like, oh, I feel a lot of tension in my gut instead of alleviating that, I go, okay, great. Can you actually exaggerate that tension a little bit and see what happens? See if that tension wants to come out in a snarl or a growl, or maybe you want to curl up in a ball and I just follow whatever the impulses of their body are. Or if they say like, oh, I feel a lot in my shoulders. I'm like, great. Do you want to go push against a wall or push against the floor or punch a pillow and let your body actually get some movement into those spaces that you're sensing?Well, as I said, I'm very skeptical about individual work, even though I do it, I don't think is all that. I think it is both necessary and not that helpful for the collective(23:21):Because it is individual. And so I actually do think we need collective spaces of moving and expressing and being in our bodies. I think our ancestors knew this for before Christian supremacy and then white supremacy and then capitalistic supremacy eradicated how we've evolved to move in our and collectively. That being said, I do think that the more we become aware of how our body is constrained and how we've been socialized, especially I think for anybody, but for me, I'll speak to white bodies, we aren't always conscious. We take for granted whiteness and how it affects our bodies. So the first time I'm asking a white person, especially maybe a white woman to look pissed, that's going to be probably really scary because socially we are not actually allowed to be pissed. We're allowed to be dams, souls, and we're allowed to freak out, but we're not actually allowed to be strong and be powerful and be angry. And so I do believe that in that work of individual liberation and freedom, it actually helps us resist those roles and those performances of white womanhood that then perpetuate collective harm.Danielle (24:49):I can see how that shift would really impact the way one person both connects with their neighbor or a different person, even same race or same culture, and would impact not only how they relate and connect to that person, but also just how they might love.Jenny (25:10):Yeah, because I think it is dangerous. It is disproportionately dangerous to oppressed bodies when white women aren't holding our own anger because I think that there is a deferral to the police, to governing bodies to different authorities when a white woman is actually pissed, rather than saying like, Hey, you did this and it pissed me off, let's work it out here. Oftentimes that ends up actually getting policed to authorities that then disproportionately harm oppressed bodies. And so I think it is essential for white women to grow our capacity to bear. No, I actually am pissed and I can acknowledge that and engage that and be with it in myself.I do. I do actually. So I have been working on a book for the last six years in which I'm looking at the socialization of young white women in purity culture and this political moment of Invisible children, which was this documentary style film that manipulated an entire generation of young white women to get involved in missions or development. And so as part of my research, I interviewed many white women who grew up in purity culture and became missionaries. And there were some that maybe still had good relations with organizations such as invisible children and felt threatened or maybe pissed that I was inquiring into this. And so instead of engaging and talking about the emotions that were coming up, they went straight to interrogating my IRB and then went straight to is this research ethical? Even though I could tell they were really just angry and upset about what I was interrogating, and I would've much rather we could have that conversation than this quick sense of I'm going to go to the structures while I can maintain feeling like this demure pleasantness of white womanhood, even though I could feel the energy. And that's an example for me, and I have white privilege, and so there was still threat there, but it was not probably to the same degree that it could be if I didn't hold that same power and privilege that I do.Scared. I felt really scared and I had done everything ethically. I had hired my own IRB to oversee my research. I did their protocol and still I felt the wielding of power and the sense of I can move the system to act against you if I don't like what you're doing. And so it was really, really scary. And then I had to move my anxiety and my body and I had to shake because what I do often when I get scared and I had to let my body discharge that adrenaline and that cortisol, and then I was able to back to myself and respond and say, it sounds like you have some concerns, and being interviewed is totally optional so you don't have to do it. And then I never heard back from 'em, and so it was just helpful for me to get to move that through. Even in part of that process,Danielle (29:27):Jenny, is that energy still in you now or is it gong?Jenny (29:30):Oh yeah, totally. I can feel my body vibrating and even there's that fear of like, oh shit, what's going to happen if I talk about this? I can feel the silencingThe demand to be small and not to expose it because then I'm open to fill in the blank. And so I can feel the sense of how power wants to keep us from speaking truth to power and to those that wield it.Danielle (30:02):Man, I want to swear so bad, motherfucker. I'm not surprised. But I do think I continue to allow myself to be shocked. And I think the thing is, I know this can happen. I know it will happen. I think both you and I are writing on topics that are very interrogate this moment in a very particular way that's threatening. And so although I'm not surprised, I am allowing myself to continually be shocked, not I want to re-traumatize myself, but I don't want to lose the feeling of there might be somebody good out there, this might be well received. And also I want to maintain that feeling of like, man, I really love my friend. I believe in her. And I think allowing myself to kind of hold all those things kind of just allows me to wake up for the moment versus just numbing out to it. Man,So vicious. It's so vicious because you aren't taking their money, you aren't literally hurting them physically. You're not taking their power, and yet there's this full force. You've dedicated your life to this thing and they could take you out.Jenny (31:19):Yeah, and I think it's primarily because I am questioning white women's innocence and I think based on how race and gender work, a white woman's privilege and power comes from this presumed purity and innocence. And so if we start to disrupt that and go, actually, I'm human and I've done some shit and I've, I've caused harm and I will cause harm, and that's actually a really important part of me working out my humanity. Then I'm stepping out of the bounds of being protected under white patriarchy.Danielle (32:06):I feel like I learned, I feel like so much resonance with that. I've had many similar experiences, but one stands out where right after the election I talked with a friend of mine on the phone, and I don't remember if she is a white colleague from same grad school and said something like, oh, it's just a bummer. And we didn't really talk about it. And I was like, that's all you could say. I thought about that. And later I sent a really kind text saying, Hey, that really hurt my feelings. I don't know. It doesn't make sense why we haven't talked about it more. And then I didn't hear back. It just went silent. This is someone I'd known for seven years.(32:45):Then later I called and I was like, Hey, what's up? And they're like, I can't believe you would write that to me If I ever engage you again, I want to start here. Some other random place. I was just sat back and I was like, I'm not giving this any more energy at that time. I said that to myself and it was just like the complete collapse when I said, you hurt my feelings, the complete collapse. When I said, I don't understand this, can we talk about it? And then I went through this period this summer of just having this feeling. I don't want to be at odds with people. So I left this person a voicemail saying, Hey man, can we talk? I haven't heard back from them, but I feel like I did my part. But I'm just struck it even in down from the big view, like the 30,000 foot view or how that person wants to reign the system on you to even interpersonally, if I don't like what you said, I'm just going to remove my presence,Jenny (33:51):Which I think again, is so much of the epidemic of whiteness. And I think it then produces such a fragility that's like I don't actually know how to bear open conflict and disruption because I'm not practiced at it, and I just will escape every time someone calls me to accountability or says something I don't like. And we can't stay in that place of tension.Yeah. Well, I think one is that I feel those tendencies so much in my own body, and I do think that we have capacity to metabolize them. And so I literally might say something like, great, could you let your body get up and run around the room or run in place? Or maybe you stay seated but you let your legs and your arms kick. And they think that if we even just let ourselves express I want to fight, or if I want to flee or I want to get away from this and we let our body do what we need to do, we can then come back to ourselves and have fuller access to our capacity. And again, sometimes I do think there are relationships or communities or things that we do need to step away from. And sometimes if we've only ever learned to say yes, we might go through a process where we swing to the other side and we just cut everyone out and then we get to learn how to have discernment and how to enter into relationships thoughtfully and how to know who are those people we will be investing in probably for a long time.(35:43):And so it's not denying that those impulses are there, but it's letting our bodies metabolize them and work through them. And it makes me think of res, menkin talks about dirty pain versus clean pain, and I think dirty pain is just like, this hurts. I'm going to avoid it. And just disconnect and dissociate clean pain is like this hurts and I'm going to press into it and I'm going to see what it can teach me and how I can grow into a stronger, more mature person through this process.Danielle (36:16):Man, that sounds like some good work you could do with somebody. I think the thing about therapy, coming back to what you said at the beginning is I think we want a quick answer. We want, we want to go to a retreat, we want to show up at the gym. In my case, I go to the gym often. We want to go somewhere, we want to feel like we did it, we accomplished it. And often at the gym, I can hear my coaches are saying just little steps. Every week and above doing lots of weight, it's showing up as much as you can, being consistent. And I kind of hear that in a little bit of what you're saying. It's not like getting to the end right away. It's tracking your body and the sensations and showing up for yourself even in that way.Jenny (37:08):And I think even like that, I love that analogy. I often say relationships are like muscles. They're only as strong as the ruptures that they can handle. And stronger muscles have had more and more and more and more ruptures. We build muscle through tearing and rebuilding. And I think that that's the same with relationship too. But if we've never torn, then we're so afraid of what's going to happen. If there is a rupture,Danielle:I don't know that we're going to heal that, but someone recently said the system is collapsing. It really is. It's coming down on itself. And I think really it's going to come down to the work that you talked about at the beginning, however people are choosing to see it. But one way you talked about it was that monochromatic lens and adding a lens, adding a lens. And I do think the challenge for all of us, even to form something new, whether that means new government, I don't know what it means, but just even a new way of being together set the government aside. It means really forming, adding lenses to ourselves. Jenny, I hope you're coming back to talk to me again.It's okay. Where can they find your stuff? Tell me.Jenny (38:42):Yeah, so I'm on Instagram at indwell movement, and then my website is indwell movement.com. So find me at either of those places, email me, reach out, send a message, would love to connect.Danielle (38:59):Okay, cool. Well, that's a wrap on this episode. If you can share, download, subscribe, tune into what we're talking about. But more important, have a conversation with a friend, a colleague, a neighbor, challenge your therapist, challenge your family. Don't forget to keep talking. And at the end of the show notes are resources, just some resources. They aren't the end all, be all of resources, but I'm putting 'em in there because I want you to know it's important to do resourcing for ourselves. As always, thank you for joining us, and at the end of the podcast are notes and resources, and I encourage you to stay connected to those who are loving in your path and in your community. Stay tuned.  Crisis Resources:Kitsap County & Washington State Crisis and Mental Health ResourcesIf you or someone else is in immediate danger, please call 911.This resource list provides crisis and mental health contacts for Kitsap County and across Washington State.Kitsap County / Local ResourcesResource Contact Info What They OfferSalish Regional Crisis Line / Kitsap Mental Health 24/7 Crisis Call Line Phone: 1‑888‑910‑0416Website: https://www.kitsapmentalhealth.org/crisis-24-7-services/ 24/7 emotional support for suicide or mental health crises; mobile crisis outreach; connection to services.KMHS Youth Mobile Crisis Outreach Team Emergencies via Salish Crisis Line: 1‑888‑910‑0416Website: https://sync.salishbehavioralhealth.org/youth-mobile-crisis-outreach-team/ Crisis outreach for minors and youth experiencing behavioral health emergencies.Kitsap Mental Health Services (KMHS) Main: 360‑373‑5031; Toll‑free: 888‑816‑0488; TDD: 360‑478‑2715Website: https://www.kitsapmentalhealth.org/crisis-24-7-services/ Outpatient, inpatient, crisis triage, substance use treatment, stabilization, behavioral health services.Kitsap County Suicide Prevention / “Need Help Now” Call the Salish Regional Crisis Line at 1‑888‑910‑0416Website: https://www.kitsap.gov/hs/Pages/Suicide-Prevention-Website.aspx 24/7/365 emotional support; connects people to resources; suicide prevention assistance.Crisis Clinic of the Peninsulas Phone: 360‑479‑3033 or 1‑800‑843‑4793Website: https://www.bainbridgewa.gov/607/Mental-Health-Resources Local crisis intervention services, referrals, and emotional support.NAMI Kitsap County Website: https://namikitsap.org/ Peer support groups, education, and resources for individuals and families affected by mental illness.Statewide & National Crisis ResourcesResource Contact Info What They Offer988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline (WA‑988) Call or text 988; Website: https://wa988.org/ Free, 24/7 support for suicidal thoughts, emotional distress, relationship problems, and substance concerns.Washington Recovery Help Line 1‑866‑789‑1511Website: https://doh.wa.gov/you-and-your-family/injury-and-violence-prevention/suicide-prevention/hotline-text-and-chat-resources Help for mental health, substance use, and problem gambling; 24/7 statewide support.WA Warm Line 877‑500‑9276Website: https://www.crisisconnections.org/wa-warm-line/ Peer-support line for emotional or mental health distress; support outside of crisis moments.Native & Strong Crisis Lifeline Dial 988 then press 4Website: https://doh.wa.gov/you-and-your-family/injury-and-violence-prevention/suicide-prevention/hotline-text-and-chat-resources Culturally relevant crisis counseling by Indigenous counselors.Additional Helpful Tools & Tips• Behavioral Health Services Access: Request assessments and access to outpatient, residential, or inpatient care through the Salish Behavioral Health Organization. Website: https://www.kitsap.gov/hs/Pages/SBHO-Get-Behaviroal-Health-Services.aspx• Deaf / Hard of Hearing: Use your preferred relay service (for example dial 711 then the appropriate number) to access crisis services.• Warning Signs & Risk Factors: If someone is talking about harming themselves, giving away possessions, expressing hopelessness, or showing extreme behavior changes, contact crisis resources immediately.Well, first I guess I would have to believe that there was or is an actual political dialogue taking place that I could potentially be a part of. And honestly, I'm not sure that I believe that. Well, first I guess I would have to believe that there was or is an actual political dialogue taking place that I could potentially be a part of. And honestly, I'm not sure that I believe that.

Listen to Rev. Dr. Das Sydney being interviewed by Rev. Dr. Andrew Stirling. Das Sydney is a pastor, theologian, and global church leader whose life brought him from India to Africa and then eventually to Canada. He served as the Lead Pastor at Highland Baptist Church in Kitchener for close to 20 years, and has led churches with a heart for preaching, justice, and community care. In this episode, Das reflects on his broad experience within the Church, as a professor at various colleges and as the past President of the Canadian Council of Churches. He believes that the Church is more than just an institution and that it represents the hands and feet of Jesus.Read the transcript: biblesociety.ca/transcript-scripture-untangled-s10-ep13---Canadian Bible Society: biblesociety.caHelp people hear God speak: biblesociety.ca/donateConnect with us on Instagram: @canadianbiblesocietyWhether you're well-versed in Scripture or just starting out on your journey, The Bible Course offers a superb overview of the world's best-selling book. Watch the first session and learn more at biblecourse.ca. ---Das Sydney was born in India and moved to Africa with his parents at a very young age. He lived in Ethiopia and Ghana for a total of 14 years before immigrating to Canada in 1969. This rich and varied background has given him a profound appreciation and sensitivity towards people, cultures, and differing expressions of faith around the world.He has served in the parish contexts in both Ontario and Nova Scotia where his ministry has maintained the importance of preaching as a key element of worship. He has also emphasized the dynamic union of the message of Jesus with the practical care of people. It has led to a compassion towards those in need, advocacy for the marginalized and offering care where there is spiritual need. He has served as the Lead Pastor of Highland Baptist Church in Kitchener for almost 19 years. On his recent retirement from Highland, he was given the honorific title, Minister Emeritus. He has helped churches engage in long term planning and helped them find their calling or mission, in service and witness. While the Lead Pastor at the historic Wolfville Baptist Church in Nova Scotia, the church attained the highest membership since records were kept. He spear-headed the Out of the Cold program at a Toronto Church, helped organize a variety of helping ministries for refugees and new Canadians, and has been involved with significant reconciliation efforts with our First Nations neighbours. He is currently the immediate Past President of the Canadian Council of Churches, a Past President of the Canadian Baptists of Ontario and Quebec, and was the chair of the writing team that produced This We Believe, an important document that outlines various emphases in faith and practice among Canadian Baptists. He serves on the Leadership Commission of the Baptist World Alliance and is on the Board of Indwell – which offers supportive housing for the marginalized. He is also the Moderator of the South Central Association of Baptist Churches. Das has graduate degrees from the University of Toronto, McMaster University, and a doctorate from Northern Seminary in Chicago. He has taught Practical Theology as an adjunct at Acadia Divinity College (Wolfville, NS), McMaster Divinity College (Hamilton, ON), and Communication at Emmanuel Bible College (Kitchener, ON).

Today we will discuss the the Holy Spirit, who He is and who He is not and what role he plays in our life.

Today we will discuss the the Holy Spirit, who He is and who He is not and what role he plays in our life.

In the beautiful compilation, Discernment: Reading the Signs of Daily Life, Henri Nouwen invites us to learn to listen deeply to the voice of the Spirit. Encouraging us to encounter this voice through books, nature, people and events, Nouwen reminds us that God is ever present. In this episode of Henri's bookshelf, we speak with Sam Cooper, a pastor who has accompanied a local community of faith for 31 years and counting. Through stories of listening and obeying, Sam and Wendy celebrate a long journey of discernment that has led a community to learn to participate with God in making things right. Meadowvale Community Church: https://www.meadowvalecrc.org/ Indwell - builder of affordable housing: https://indwell.ca/ ___________ Book Discussed: Discernment: Reading the Signs of Daily Life https://amzn.to/2NBrriT (US) https://amzn.to/2Oczt1T (CAD) Spiritual Direction https://amzn.to/389dTEI (US) https://amzn.to/2Zf9gGA (CAD) Spiritual Formation https://amzn.to/2YCNETY (US) https://amzn.to/2COPVTM (CAD) The Wounded Healer https://amzn.to/2AGOrKz (US) https://amzn.to/3hdDkcr (CAD) ___________ SUPPORT THIS PODCAST: henrinouwen.org/donate/ * SIGN UP FOR FREE DAILY E-MEDITATIONS: henrinouwen.org/meditation/ * MORE FREE RESOURCES: henrinouwen.org/ * FOLLOW US ON SOCIAL MEDIA: INSTAGRAM: www.instagram.com/henrinouwensociety/ TWITTER: twitter.com/nouwensociety FACEBOOK: www.facebook.com/nouwensociety/ PINTEREST: www.pinterest.ca/henrinouwen/

In this PODCAST, a most timely and timeless message, courtesy of an apostle named Paul. Enjoy!!! Thank you for listening, and for sharing this message!!! Please remember that depending upon your web browser and connection speed, it may take up to 60 seconds for this podcast to begin to play. God bless you richly as you listen.

John 14, Romans 8

To tackle homelessness, this charity turned to social finance to fund the development of more affordable housing The post This Community Bond is Fighting Homelessness: Ryan Collins-Swartz of Tapestry & Nick van der Velde of Indwell appeared first on SEE Change Magazine.

Indwell- 50 years of building and providing affordable housing that transforms lives” – “This week on the pod we are joined by Indwell CEO Jeff Neven to talk about the inspiring and incredible work Indwell continues to lead in the affordable housing space. We touch on the history of Indwell, what makes Indwell unique in the space, some of the projects they've done, the partnerships they've made, what they are working on now, and what has to happen in the future in order to create the affordable housing our country desperately needs Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The Hamilton Today Podcast with Scott Thompson: A large encampment at Hamilton city hall has lost its primary organizer. Former President Donald Trump is urging his supporters to buy a "God Bless the USA" Bible for $59.99 as he faces mounting legal bills amid his third presidential run. Hamilton mayor Andrea Horwath has used her strong mayor powers to veto a decision to reject the construction of 67 affordable housing units on top of a parking area in downtown Stoney Creek that residents and businesses argue is critical for the local economy. Indwell, a 50-year old, Hamilton-based charity and housing developer is launching four new projects that will create 140 units of supportive and affordable housing in Hamilton. Massive barges carrying cranes are on their way to Baltimore to begin work to remove the wreckage of the Francis Scott Key Bridge that is blocking a major shipping route. Most premiers and the federal Conservatives want the Liberals to cancel Monday's scheduled increase of the carbon price by $15 per tonne, adding 3.3 cents to a litre of gasoline and 2.9 cents to a cubic metre of natural gas. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has announced new measures he says will help protect Canadian renters and help them break into the housing market ahead of the 2024 budget. The federal budget is scheduled to be released on April 16th, but we seem to be seeing announcements trickling out ahead of schedule - yesterday we heard about new measures to help renters looking to break into the housing market, and today we've heard about $1 billion in federal loans to expand child care spaces. Guests: Lisa Polewski, reporter with 900 CHML Brian J. Karem, journalist and author, White House correspondent for Playboy and political analyst for CNN Jeff Beattie, Councillor, Ward 10 (Lower Stoney Creek, Fruitland & Winona) Nickolaas van der Velde, Financial Manager, Indwell Larissa Fenn, VP of Corporate Affairs, Hamilton-Oshawa Port Authority Ross McKitrick, Senior Fellow with the Fraser Institute Stewart Klazinga, ACORN Hamilton Elissa Freeman, PR and Pop Culture Expert Host – Scott Thompson Content Producer – Lisa Polewski Technical Producer – Tom McKay Podcast Producer – Ben Straughan News Anchor – Dave Woodard & Jen McQueen Want to keep up with what happened in Hamilton Today? Subscribe to the podcast! https://megaphone.link/CORU8835115919

Block 1 - From Canadian inflation numbers to the latest decision on interest rates by the U.S. central bank and a takeover of a promising Canadian drug company, we recap the top stories of the week. Plus, we check in with Pedro Antunes, chief economist with the Conference Board of Canada, for his insights on when Canadian lending rates might finally start heading lower. Block 2 - It's harder than ever to buy a home in Canada, which is a big reason why Canada's home ownership rate is falling. We'll take a look at Canada's housing market By The Numbers and speak with some experts who are finding some innovative solutions to the problem. Alex Kjorven, Chief Product Officer of Ourboro, explains the company's business model of becoming equity partners with prospective buyers by helping out with the down payment. Next, we talk to with Nikolaas Van Der Velde, Finance Manager at Indwell, who are selling community bonds to investors looking to help spur the construction of affordable housing. Block 3 - Climate scientists say we are already missing key targets for emissions, and a new book explores their thoughts about what comes next. Amanda Lang speaks to author and historian, Gwynne Dyer. And in this week's edition of The Takeaway, Amanda says complex problems like climate change require humanity to resist our innate urge for immediate gratification, and suggests that perhaps we need to get smarter about the ways that we are dumb. 

Stuart Briscoe Just before His crucifixion, Jesus told His disciples that they would soon realize that I am in the Father, and you are in me, and I am in you (John 14:20). As modern disciples, we must embrace the mystery of the mutual indwelling of which He spoke. To support this ministry financially, visit: https://www.oneplace.com/donate/508/29

Stuart Briscoe Just before His crucifixion, Jesus told His disciples that they would soon realize that I am in the Father, and you are in me, and I am in you (John 14:20). As modern disciples, we must embrace the mystery of the mutual indwelling of which He spoke. To support this ministry financially, visit: https://www.oneplace.com/donate/508/29

Stuart Briscoe Just before His crucifixion, Jesus told His disciples that they would soon realize that I am in the Father, and you are in me, and I am in you (John 14:20). As modern disciples, we must embrace the mystery of the mutual indwelling of which He spoke. To support this ministry financially, visit: https://www.oneplace.com/donate/508/29

Stuart Briscoe Just before His crucifixion, Jesus told His disciples that they would soon realize that I am in the Father, and you are in me, and I am in you (John 14:20). As modern disciples, we must embrace the mystery of the mutual indwelling of which He spoke. To support this ministry financially, visit: https://www.oneplace.com/donate/508/29

Solid Rock Family Church Podcast

There are 2 Stages of receiving the Holy Spirit: (1) When we receive Christ, we are baptised into Him, born again, and receive the Spirit of God WITHIN, for our own personal blessing, holiness and life with God. (2) There is a subsequent experience of the Spirit after salvation, called the Baptism in the Spirit, when we receive the Spirit UPON, for the purpose of empowering us to witness to Christ and for ministry. The PROMISE of the SPIRIT is also called the BLESSING of ABRAHAM (Galatians 3:14), which is a 2-fold BLESSING (Genesis 12:2). Jesus is the prime example of this 2-stage Blessing of the Spirit: (1) He had the Spirit WITHIN from birth, and by the indwelling Spirit, He lived a perfect holy life to God as a man, but (2) He was not empowered for supernatural ministry until He received the Spirit UPON, at His Baptism. The BAPTISM in the SPIRIT is when we are clothed with POWER, by receiving the SPIRIT UPON, enabling us to witness and fulfil our ministry. Jesus' Baptism in the Spirit is the BLUEPRINT for ours (John 1:33). He already had the Spirit WITHIN from birth, but still needed to receive the Spirit UPON, to clothe Him with power for ministry. Likewise, we have the Spirit WITHIN, from our New Birth, but still need to receive the Spirit UPON, to clothe and anoint us with power to fulfil the Great Commission. He confirmed when God's SPIRIT came UPON Him, He was ANOINTED with God's POWER to minister (Luke 4:17-21). He described His Baptism in the Spirit as the Spirit coming UPON and ANOINTING Him to preach, heal and set the captives free. He also said that once the Spirit came upon Him, He rested and remained on Him, and so God's power was present on Him to heal them. Isaiah prophesied about the Messiah (Anointed One) in 11:1-3, 42:1, 61:1-3. In the Old Testament, nobody was BORN AGAIN or had the SPIRIT WITHIN, as this was only made available in the New Covenant. Although certain prophets, priests and kings were anointed with the SPIRIT UPON, this was not necessarily permanent, nor for all believers. But in the New Covenant, the SPIRIT UPON is available to all believers (John 7:38-39, Acts 2:16-18), and is permanent. Jesus described these 2 ministries of the Spirit WITHIN and UPON in His TEACHING. (1) He described the SPIRIT WITHIN us, as an everlasting FOUNTAIN of living water (John 4:10-14). (2) Later in John 7:37-39, He described the SPIRIT flowing out of us as RIVERS of living water, making us channels of blessing to others (v38). In Luke 11:9-13, He taught God will give His born again children more of the Holy Spirit if they ask Him (it's not automatic). In the Gospels, He primarily prepared His disciples to receive the New Birth and the Spirit WITHIN. He taught about the New Birth of our spirit by the Spirit in John 3:3-9,16. Then in John 14:16-17, He introduced the Spirit as another Helper like Himself. This means He is like Jesus, (1) a PERSON, not a force, and (2) GOD. He is a Divine Person, given to us. He also said in the New Birth the Spirit will INDWELL us forever: “He will be WITHIN YOU.” So He taught in the New Covenant the Spirit will indwell all believers forever. He explained the connection between the NEW BIRTH and the SPIRIT WITHIN in Mark 2:22. First, God must make our wineskin (spirit) new, and then He can put the NEW WINE of His SPIRIT WITHIN us. Old wineskins were renewed by rubbing them with oil. Likewise in the New Birth, our old spirits were made new and holy by the application of the OIL of the SPIRIT, making them able to receive the NEW WINE of the SPIRIT WITHIN. Then after they received His Spirit within on the day of His resurrection, during the 40 days He prepared them to receive the SPIRIT UPON, which they did at Pentecost (Acts 2). On the morning Jesus rose from the dead, He ascended to Heaven, before returning to earth and appearing to His disciples for the next 40 days, before His final Ascension (John 20:16-17). The 4 Purposes for His first Ascension: (1) To fulfil the Feast of First Fruits on the day of His resurrection (1Corinthians 15:20-23). The First Fruits of the harvest must be offered up and waved before God, to be accepted by God on behalf of the whole harvest (Leviticus 23:10-11). Therefore, He had to ascend to Heaven and appear before God to offer Himself as the First Fruits, to be accepted on our behalf. (2) To present His Blood in Heaven (Hebrews 9:12). Thus, it was not appropriate for Mary to touch Him before He made these holy offerings to God. But after He came back from Heaven, He allowed other women and His disciples to touch Him (Matthew 28:9, Luke 24:39, John 20:27). (3) To receive all authority in Heaven and on earth (Matthew 28:18, Philippians 2:9-11, Daniel 7:13-14). (4) To receive the Holy Spirit on our behalf, in order to pour Him out (Acts 2:33). He must have received the Spirit from the Father on the resurrection morning, as already that evening, He imparted the Spirit to His disciples (John 20:22).

There are 2 Stages of receiving the Holy Spirit: (1) When we receive Christ, we are baptised into Him, born again, and receive the Spirit of God WITHIN, for our own personal blessing, holiness and life with God. (2) There is a subsequent experience of the Spirit after salvation, called the Baptism in the Spirit, when we receive the Spirit UPON, for the purpose of empowering us to witness to Christ and for ministry. The PROMISE of the SPIRIT is also called the BLESSING of ABRAHAM (Galatians 3:14), which is a 2-fold BLESSING (Genesis 12:2). Jesus is the prime example of this 2-stage Blessing of the Spirit: (1) He had the Spirit WITHIN from birth, and by the indwelling Spirit, He lived a perfect holy life to God as a man, but (2) He was not empowered for supernatural ministry until He received the Spirit UPON, at His Baptism. The BAPTISM in the SPIRIT is when we are clothed with POWER, by receiving the SPIRIT UPON, enabling us to witness and fulfil our ministry. Jesus' Baptism in the Spirit is the BLUEPRINT for ours (John 1:33). He already had the Spirit WITHIN from birth, but still needed to receive the Spirit UPON, to clothe Him with power for ministry. Likewise, we have the Spirit WITHIN, from our New Birth, but still need to receive the Spirit UPON, to clothe and anoint us with power to fulfil the Great Commission. He confirmed when God's SPIRIT came UPON Him, He was ANOINTED with God's POWER to minister (Luke 4:17-21). He described His Baptism in the Spirit as the Spirit coming UPON and ANOINTING Him to preach, heal and set the captives free. He also said that once the Spirit came upon Him, He rested and remained on Him, and so God's power was present on Him to heal them. Isaiah prophesied about the Messiah (Anointed One) in 11:1-3, 42:1, 61:1-3. In the Old Testament, nobody was BORN AGAIN or had the SPIRIT WITHIN, as this was only made available in the New Covenant. Although certain prophets, priests and kings were anointed with the SPIRIT UPON, this was not necessarily permanent, nor for all believers. But in the New Covenant, the SPIRIT UPON is available to all believers (John 7:38-39, Acts 2:16-18), and is permanent. Jesus described these 2 ministries of the Spirit WITHIN and UPON in His TEACHING. (1) He described the SPIRIT WITHIN us, as an everlasting FOUNTAIN of living water (John 4:10-14). (2) Later in John 7:37-39, He described the SPIRIT flowing out of us as RIVERS of living water, making us channels of blessing to others (v38). In Luke 11:9-13, He taught God will give His born again children more of the Holy Spirit if they ask Him (it's not automatic). In the Gospels, He primarily prepared His disciples to receive the New Birth and the Spirit WITHIN. He taught about the New Birth of our spirit by the Spirit in John 3:3-9,16. Then in John 14:16-17, He introduced the Spirit as another Helper like Himself. This means He is like Jesus, (1) a PERSON, not a force, and (2) GOD. He is a Divine Person, given to us. He also said in the New Birth the Spirit will INDWELL us forever: “He will be WITHIN YOU.” So He taught in the New Covenant the Spirit will indwell all believers forever. He explained the connection between the NEW BIRTH and the SPIRIT WITHIN in Mark 2:22. First, God must make our wineskin (spirit) new, and then He can put the NEW WINE of His SPIRIT WITHIN us. Old wineskins were renewed by rubbing them with oil. Likewise in the New Birth, our old spirits were made new and holy by the application of the OIL of the SPIRIT, making them able to receive the NEW WINE of the SPIRIT WITHIN. Then after they received His Spirit within on the day of His resurrection, during the 40 days He prepared them to receive the SPIRIT UPON, which they did at Pentecost (Acts 2). On the morning Jesus rose from the dead, He ascended to Heaven, before returning to earth and appearing to His disciples for the next 40 days, before His final Ascension (John 20:16-17). The 4 Purposes for His first Ascension: (1) To fulfil the Feast of First Fruits on the day of His resurrection (1Corinthians 15:20-23). The First Fruits of the harvest must be offered up and waved before God, to be accepted by God on behalf of the whole harvest (Leviticus 23:10-11). Therefore, He had to ascend to Heaven and appear before God to offer Himself as the First Fruits, to be accepted on our behalf. (2) To present His Blood in Heaven (Hebrews 9:12). Thus, it was not appropriate for Mary to touch Him before He made these holy offerings to God. But after He came back from Heaven, He allowed other women and His disciples to touch Him (Matthew 28:9, Luke 24:39, John 20:27). (3) To receive all authority in Heaven and on earth (Matthew 28:18, Philippians 2:9-11, Daniel 7:13-14). (4) To receive the Holy Spirit on our behalf, in order to pour Him out (Acts 2:33). He must have received the Spirit from the Father on the resurrection morning, as already that evening, He imparted the Spirit to His disciples (John 20:22).

This episode shares with the listeners the purpose, power and love of God for His creation: The race of mankind. " For God So Loved the World that He gave us His only begotten Son, that whosever believeth in Him shall not perish but have everlasting life." For He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, (through dying to pay the penalty for mankind brought upon mankind Through the sin of Adam. ) That we could become the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus.( Through the spirit of Jesus Christ living in us that restores God' Spiritual and Holy image in the race of mankind.) " And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind that ye may prove what is that good, acceptable and perfect will of God. John chapter 3 verse 16; 2nd Corinthians Chapter 5 verse 21; Romans Chapter 12 verse 1 King James Version Bible. " --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/juanita212/message

Welcome back to episode 4 of After Socrates! Please join our patreon to support our work! https://www.patreon.com/johnvervaeke -- You are invited to join me live, online, at the next Circling & Dialogos Workshop where we discuss & practice the tools involved in both Philosophical Fellowship & Dialectic into Dialogos. You can find more information, and register, here:   https://circlinginstitute.com/circling-dialogos/ -- Thinkers Referenced: Phillip S. Cary Taylor Barratt Peter Limberg Guy Sengstock Pierre Hadot L. A. Paul Agnes Callard Christopher Moore Lev Vygotsky Michael Polanyi Maurice Merleau-Ponty Sara Ahbel-Rappe William James -- Time Codes: 9:54 The Horizontal Dimension of Dialectic 10:46 The Vertical Dimension of Dialectic 13:08 Philia 15:14 Sophia 21:20 Aspiration 22:20 Relational Self 24:39 Internalization and Indweilling 29:21 Self as aspirational 33:45 Socratic ignorance, Platonic knowledge 38:59 Back to Aporia - Self Knowing 44:01 No-thingness 48:04 Socrates and Suhrawardi 49:00 Illumination 52:59 Indwell to internalize, internalize to indwell 55:34 Anagogic Loop 57:24 God, Logos, light 58:26 Three books that are networked together 1:00:55 Kirkland, Alethea, Socratic Questioning 1:16:26 Practices --- After Socrates is a series about how to create the theory, the practice, and the ecology of practices such that we can live and grow and develop through a Socratic way of life. The core argument is; the combination of the theoretical framework and the pedagogical program of practices can properly conduct us into the Socratic way of life. We believe that the Socratic way of life is what is most needed today because it is the one that can most help us cultivate wisdom in a way that is simultaneously respectful to spiritual tradition and to current scientific work.

In this Faith Friday episode of the Mowing in the Dark podcast I dive into 1 John chapter 5. As we wrap up the book of 1 John I feel the over arching theme of the book is to remind believers of the gospel of Jesus Christ.    Thanks for listening. Please give the podcast a 5 star rating and review in Apple Podcasts.   I would love to hear your feedback. Send me an email with your feedback at lansinglawnservice@gmail.com Podcast Website: https://www.mowinginthedarkpodcast.com/ https://anchor.fm/mowinginthelight   12 Month Contract Template Editable Download https://www.mowinginthedarkpodcast.com/product-page/12-month-contract-for-lawn-snow-combined-100-editable   Follow your host Aaron Sutter on… Instagram @lansinglawnservice Youtube: www.youtube.com/lansinglawnservicellc and check out my business website: www.lansinglawnservice.com   Want to be on our Sticker Wall? Send your stickers to: Lansing Lawn Service LLC P.O. Box 454 Potterville, MI 48876   Check out My Favorite Lawn Care Gear: Werner, AC78, Quickclick Stabilizer, Aluminum https://amzn.to/2OTOfMf Wonder Grip WG318L Liquid-Proof Double-Coated/Dipped Natural Latex Rubber Work Gloves 13-Gauge Seamless Nylon, Large, Large https://amzn.to/2Ytjml6 Hodenn Zero Turn Lawn Mower Hitch - Fits Ariens & Gravely ZT-X: https://amzn.to/3jJmEua ECHO Black Diamond Trimmer Line: https://amzn.to/2GBEL7d   #lawncare #landscaping #mowinginthedark #lawnservice #lawncarebusiness #lawncarepodcast #greenindustry #mowing #lawnmowing #landscapingpodcast #lawnpodcast #greenindustrypodcast #fullertonunfiltered #greengrindpodcast

Join me as I interview guest Michelle Lewis on her time in Hollywood, how demonic ties can still affect Christians today, our authority as believers and so much more. Michelle Lewis, founder of Visibility Vixen and The Color Cure, is a color psychology analyst who works with business owners to grow their audiences and impact. Author of Color Secrets, her passion is teaching everyone the universal language of color. A passionate Biblically-based songwriter, her favorite books are Exodus and Job. Next year, she will be releasing her music as well as her newest book detailing the colors used in Scripture. You can find Michelle at the following: Visibility Vixen The Color Cure Color Secrets Book Faith Fury Instagram The prayer that was discussed in today's episode: Credit is to Arthur Anderson of My Prayer Warrior® Strategic Warfare Prayer Lord Jesus Christ, in accordance with Your will and through the permission of intercessory prayer, I pray for you to keep me and my family surrounded with a hedge of Your Angelic protection today 360 degrees in all dimensions. Deactivate any plots, plans, and schemes satan and his kingdom have planned for us and give us a path of safe escape. Make us invisible to the enemy so he cannot see, hear or participate in anything we are doing. Indwell us today with the supernatural knowledge and wisdom of the Holy Spirit to guide us in what you would have us do for the Kingdom of Jesus Christ today. Lord Jesus Christ, in accordance with Your will and through the permission of intercessory prayer, I pray for those people you want to come into Your Kingdom who do not yet know you. I ask that You send however many of Your Angelic Host necessary to create a path of salvation for each of these people. Lord Jesus Christ, in accordance with Your will and through the permission of intercessory prayer, I pray for all the followers of Jesus Christ who are being persecuted in Your Name. I hereby give You and Your Angels any permission they need via human intercessory prayer to move in by and through any person, place, thing, or dimension, in whatever numbers necessary, to bring deliverance to and accomplish Your will for those who are being oppressed in Your Name. Lord Jesus Christ, in accordance with Your will and through the permission of intercessory prayer, I pray for the salvation for everyone in a leadership position in our country and throughout the world. In accordance with Matthew 18:18, I ask that you bind with your Angelic army any satanic forces coming in, by and through any of these leaders that seek to influence and control them and cast them out. And I ask that You lose the Angels of Jesus Christ to give these leaders protection and wisdom in the administration of their offices. Lord Jesus Christ, in accordance with Your will and through imprecatory prayer, I pray against satan, every fallen angel, demon, and all satanic spirits in his kingdom. I ask that You send however many of Your Angelic Hosts needed to enforce Your will upon satan and his forces in the spiritual and physical realms. To find the rest of this prayer please visit https://www.myprayerwarrior.com _____ To join The Rooted Truth Collective and next Bible Study click here: https://www.jennymire.com/thecollective

Join me as I interview guest Michelle Lewis on her time in Hollywood, how demonic ties can still affect Christians today, our authority as believers and so much more. Michelle Lewis, founder of Visibility Vixen and The Color Cure, is a color psychology analyst who works with business owners to grow their audiences and impact. Author of Color Secrets, her passion is teaching everyone the universal language of color. A passionate Biblically-based songwriter, her favorite books are Exodus and Job. Next year, she will be releasing her music as well as her newest book detailing the colors used in Scripture. You can find Michelle at the following: Visibility Vixen The Color Cure Color Secrets Book Faith Fury Instagram The prayer that was discussed in today's episode: Credit is to Arthur Anderson of My Prayer Warrior® Strategic Warfare Prayer Lord Jesus Christ, in accordance with Your will and through the permission of intercessory prayer, I pray for you to keep me and my family surrounded with a hedge of Your Angelic protection today 360 degrees in all dimensions. Deactivate any plots, plans, and schemes satan and his kingdom have planned for us and give us a path of safe escape. Make us invisible to the enemy so he cannot see, hear or participate in anything we are doing. Indwell us today with the supernatural knowledge and wisdom of the Holy Spirit to guide us in what you would have us do for the Kingdom of Jesus Christ today. Lord Jesus Christ, in accordance with Your will and through the permission of intercessory prayer, I pray for those people you want to come into Your Kingdom who do not yet know you. I ask that You send however many of Your Angelic Host necessary to create a path of salvation for each of these people. Lord Jesus Christ, in accordance with Your will and through the permission of intercessory prayer, I pray for all the followers of Jesus Christ who are being persecuted in Your Name. I hereby give You and Your Angels any permission they need via human intercessory prayer to move in by and through any person, place, thing, or dimension, in whatever numbers necessary, to bring deliverance to and accomplish Your will for those who are being oppressed in Your Name. Lord Jesus Christ, in accordance with Your will and through the permission of intercessory prayer, I pray for the salvation for everyone in a leadership position in our country and throughout the world. In accordance with Matthew 18:18, I ask that you bind with your Angelic army any satanic forces coming in, by and through any of these leaders that seek to influence and control them and cast them out. And I ask that You lose the Angels of Jesus Christ to give these leaders protection and wisdom in the administration of their offices. Lord Jesus Christ, in accordance with Your will and through imprecatory prayer, I pray against satan, every fallen angel, demon, and all satanic spirits in his kingdom. I ask that You send however many of Your Angelic Hosts needed to enforce Your will upon satan and his forces in the spiritual and physical realms. To find the rest of this prayer please visit https://www.myprayerwarrior.com _____ To join The Rooted Truth Collective and next Bible Study click here: https://www.jennymire.com/thecollective

In this episode, Sara Joy and Eric talk with Pastor Dwayne Cline about James North Baptist Church and their journey towards providing affordable housing in their neighborhood in the north end Hamilton, Ontario. With a vision for incarnational ministry, James North has been serving their neighborhood for over 130 years. As one of the most economically depressed neighborhoods in the city, they have faithfully provided care and resources for many of those struggling to make ends meet. As the neighborhood tide began to change with new development and rising property prices in more recent years, the church recognized a growing need to provide affordable housing options for the long-time local residents. Their solution was to build affordable housing into their church property plans.The church had already drawn plans and paid over $700K in costs for designing their new church building when they hit the pause button to rethink their property. In prayerful consideration, they decided to go back to the drawing board and design a new building that would also accommodate 45 units of affordable housing. The total project cost was $22 million with half of those costs related to the housing and half related to the church. They used a mix of government funds and a church capital campaign to cover the development expenses. Additionally, they worked in close collaboration with Indwell, a faith-based affordable housing developer, to guide the project to successful completion. Indwell also provides the property management and supportive services necessary for the property. The level of grit and collaboration required of the church has been great, but their relationships with the city officials and local neighborhood players opened doors for a successful project. Eric and Sara Joy also speak with two field guides who provide more insight into the affordable housing context and resources that exist to guide churches in participating and advocating in this arena. Jill Shook, founder of Making Housing and Community Happen, explains classifications of affordable housing and talks about how churches can advocate for policy changes that allow for more affordable housing production in their communities while also considering opportunities for churches to play a direct role in providing it themselves. Patrick Duggan, Executive Director of the United Church of Christ Church Building and Loan Fund, gives some practical steps for churches to assess whether affordable housing makes sense in light of their location and their mission. He also shares about ways churches can mitigate risks by partnering with organizations like his to guide the development process.Episode ContributorsDwayne Cline is the Lead Pastor of James North Baptist Church in Hamilton, Ontario. Dr. Jill Shook is the Founding Director of Making Housing and Community Happen, working with churches to bring about housing justice in the United States. She is author of Making Housing Happen: Faith Based Affordable Housing Models. She has developed and taught Housing Justice and Community Organizing in the Azusa Pacific University MA Social Work Department. Today she does a variety of workshops, including One-Day Housing Justice Workshops around the US. Rev. Dr. Patrick Duggan is the Executive Director of the United Church of Christ Church Building and Loan Fund. He is responsible for advancing the mission and growing the capacity, reach and social impact of CB&LF products and services. Patrick has more than 30 years of experience in bi-vocational ministry, serving the local church while working in the public sector, including education, government, nonprofit organizations and economic and community development.Access more Show Notes with pictures and resources related to this episode. Sign up for the free online Community Forum on August 23, 2022 to discuss this episode with Eric, Sara Joy, and Chris and other podcast listeners. Register today!More information about this podcast and helpful church and urbanism resources can be found on The Embedded Church website.Related ResourcesJames North Baptist ChurchGrowing to Serve: The Story of James North - videoIndwell - a Christian charity that creates affordable housing communities Making Housing and Community Happen - a faith-based nonprofit that equips congregations, community leaders, and neighbors with practical tools needed to transform their communities to end homelessness, and to stabilize the cost of housingUnited Church of Christ Church Building & Loan Fund - an institution that transforms communities by helping the Church live into God's economy, helping congregations plan, raise, finance, and build transformative projectsCNU - Members Christian Caucus: Churches + Affordable Housing Case StudiesMinistries of Mercy by Tim KellerChristianity's Surprise by C. Kavin RoweMaking Housing Happen: Faith Based Affordable Housing Models by Jill ShookKey Terms- Affordable Housing- Displacement- Entitlements- Gentrification- Inclusionary Zoning- Tax Credits- ZoningShow CreditsHosted and Produced by Eric O. Jacobsen and Sara Joy ProppeEdited by Adam Higgins | Odd Dad Out Voice ProductionsTheme Music by Jacob ShafferArtwork by Lance Kagey | Rotator Creative

This week we embarrass each other with some GUILTY PLEASURES, and this time, anything goes!TIMESTAMPS| 4:08 | Leedle Leedle Lee| 17:45 | Time Travel Kool Aid| 30:00 | Hot Tub| 42:30 | Affirmation| 58:15 |  Try Everything| 1:13:20 |  Uninvited GuestsJOIN OUR DISCORD!Hit us up! -- Instagram // Email: bangeralertpodcast@gmail.comLogo and Art by Mitch WeirCONTENT ADVISORY: Explicit language, mature lyrical themesThe Banger Alert Podcast is Joe Tantalo and Mitch Weir

Craig Bowler

Troy Gambrell

Craig Bowler

Craig Bowler

Student Youth

Craig Bowler

Craig Bowler

Today I'm having a conversation with Leah Logan and Mark Willcock from Indwell. Indwell is a faith-based non-profit that partners with churches and communities to create affordable housing that supports people seeking health, wellness and belonging. They've got a fantastic backstory, and if you're a church that wants to help support those without sustainable living or a church looking to move out of its building, then this episode is for you! Website: www.churchhelper.ca Elders Facebook Group - https://www.facebook.com/groups/988366488593038 Get Help Today: www.churchhelper.ca Downloadable Transcript: www.churchhelper.com/podcast Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Church-Helper-349931712870683 . . . . . . . . . . #churchhelper #churchconsulting #churchconsultant #churchgrowth #attendancegrowth #growingattendance #churchleader #elders #eldertraining #sessiontraining #sessionleadership #sessions #churchleader #churchleadertraining #ministry #ministrytraining #churchstrategy #churchcommunication #teambuilding #churchteams #mikewasyluk #northamericanchurch #canadianchurch #churchleadertraining #churchleaderpodcast #churchpodcast #churchcoach #leadpastor #pastortraining #pastorcoaching #ministercoaching #leadminister #ministertraining #sessionmembers #trainyourelders #churchwebsite #churchsocialmedia #onlineengagement #churchnewsletter #onlineengagement #eldertraining #sessionmember #elderboard #churchelder #churchboard #clerkofsession #disciples #churchbuilding

His purpose was to create in himself one new humanity out of the two, thus making peace, and in one body to reconcile both of them to God through the cross, by which he put to death their hostility. (Ephesians 2:15b-16) And I pray that you, being rooted and established in love, may have power, together with all the Lord's holy people, to grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ, and to know this love that surpasses knowledge—that you may be filled to the measure of all the fullness of God. (Ephesians 3:17b-19) Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace. (Ephesians 4:3)   Our devotion yesterday mentioned the letter of Ephesians, grace, and the gift of already being a part of God's people.  A gift we have only to receive and live congruently out of to find ourselves in touch with God's blessing.  Well: I feel like I have been living in this gift and these texts this past week, and even though it might mean a slightly longer devotion today, I would love to share the story with you so that you too can be encouraged. Wednesday afternoon, a group of Calvin Seminary students gathered in Hamilton to see what “CRC ministry” looks like here.  I was able to serve as one of the organizers and tour guides for their time.  And, rather than show them around a church building to see the Sanctuary, Fellowship Hall, and GEMS closet, we took them on a tour of TrueCity to see the gift that it is to be a part of the reconciled family of God. We started at 541 where they got their food, bought their buttons, and listened in to a young Anglican in roughly the same spot in the ordination track as they are.  “What keeps a place like 541 running?” it was asked.  “It couldn't happen without the support, community, and patronage of folks and churches in the TrueCity network” came the reply.  This place wouldn't be here without the churches working together for the good of the city. Next we came to New Hope Bikes, a ministry that has expanded and generated a deep and broad community and hub of activity.  Tammy greeted us there, talked about how this ministry grew from the prayerful presence of the church and Asset Based Community Development principles incubated at Diaconal Ministries Canada.  “Is there a TrueCity thread running through this place?”  “Most of our board members, supporters, and funding partners are people from the TrueCity network” was the reply. Then we visited Indwell at the Perkins Centre where New Hope meets.  Again, CRC incubation (by Immanuelites especially early on) of a ministry that's now deeply supported, staffed, and integrated in Hamilton within the TrueCity Network. An example of which is the three or four TrueCity churches that have Indwell projects integrated into their buildings or will soon. Then we visited GOHOP, the new monastic prayer movement in Hamilton where not a few of our Young Adults and Redeemer Students have done internships or taken shifts with the prayer teams and where I myself get spiritual direction.  They were the ones who began praying for the churches and pastors in Hamilton a few years before TrueCity sprang up, and they have been the prayerful anchor for the movement ever since.  Never does a TrueCity Conference happen without the churches coming together in GOHOP facilitated 24/7 prayer stretching for a week or two after. I had to leave before Katie shared about Open Homes Hamilton and all the newcomer support that happens here, also through places like the Micah House, but that too is a TrueCity network story through and through.  A thing that may never have existed if the churches weren't together for the good of the city. The hostility between our churches and denominations has been put to death in the cross of Christ here in Hamilton as we live together in this one new humanity of the church.  And together with all these TrueCity saints, I have begun to grasp a little more fully how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ.  I think by the end of our tour, our visiting seminarians did too.   When the church lives in the “unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace” that was forged between us through the cross of Christ—a whole city can be transformed.  Structurally, physically, relationally.  It's happened, friends.  It is happening.  And whether you knew it or not: you're already a part of it!  In these ways and so many more.  

On today's episode, ~ing Producer Ben Wideman sits down with author and marriage and family therapist, Hatty J. Lee. Hatty recently created and co-launched a kickstarter campaign for a project called Indwell. We'll be talking with her about the intersection of faith and therapy, the importance of creating access points, and why she and her team created Indwell. We are grateful for the continued support of Everence, a faith-based financial services organization who believe it's possible to incorporate your faith and values with your decisions about money. To take a closer look at the difference it makes when your financial services company is rooted in something more than making a profit visit Everence.com. Securities offered through ProEquities Inc., member FINRA/SIPC. ~ing Podcast is a production of MennoMedia, a nonprofit Publisher that creates thoughtful, Anabaptist resources to enrich faith in a complex world. To find out more, visit us online at MennoMedia.org --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/ing-pod/message

Kyle Worley is joined by Dr. James Hamilton to discuss the role of the Holy Spirit in the Old Testament. Specifically answering the question, did the Holy Spirit indwell Abraham?Questions Covered in This Episode:Did the Holy Spirit indwell Abraham?One of the roles of the Holy Spirit in the New Testament is keeping God’s people. How were the people of the Old Testament kept if not for the power of the Holy Spirit?Is the Spirit more localized in the Old Testament?Guest Bio:Dr. James Hamilton is professor of Biblical Theology at the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. The author of several books including but not limited to; What is Biblical Theology: A Guide to the Bible’s Story, Symbolism, and Patterns, The Bible’s Big Story: Salvation History for Kids, and God’s Indwelling Presence: The Ministry of the Holy Spirit in the Old and New Testaments. He also currently serves as the preaching pastor at Kenwood Baptist Church. Resources Mentioned in This Episode:Genesis 8:21, 6, 15, 17, 18, 22, 12:1-3, Exodus, John 4, Psalm 84“What is Biblical Theology?” by James H. Hamilton “God’s Indwelling Presence” by James H. Hamilton Amazon affiliate links are used where appropriate. As an Amazon Associate we earn from qualifying purchases, thank you for supporting Knowing Faith.Sponsors:To learn more about the Southern Seminary PhD mentioned in this podcast, please click this link.Follow Us:Twitter | Instagram | Facebook | WebsiteSupport Knowing Faith and Become a Patron:patreon.com/knowingfaith

In this episode of What London Can Be, Diane Silva speaks with Sylvia Harris, Project Developer at Indwell, and Greg Playford, member of LCF's Board of Directors and Housing Action Committee, about the Vision SoHo Alliance and the new mixed-use, affordable housing development proposed for the Old Victoria Hospital Lands in South London.

  – 12/16/20 Bible Class  – Teacher: Justin P. Sivley

Caz's co-host is world renowned Davidic-style worship instructor, and author Vivien Hibbert. Her book entitled "Prohetic Worship" is known for breaking old worship paradyms and setting both worship leaders and congregations free.  See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Since we cannot come to saving faith apart from the Spirit of God, how do we account for believers prior to Pentecost? Today, Sinclair Ferguson compares how Old Testament believers related to the Holy Spirit with our experience today. Submit a biblical or theological question of your own by calling 1-800-607-9386 or by emailing an audio recording of your question to askligoniervm@ligonier.org. You can also receive real-time answers through our online chat service at https://ask.Ligonier.org/. Read the transcript: https://ask.ligonier.org/podcast-episodes/did-the-holy-spirit-indwell-old-testament-believers/ A donor-supported outreach of Ligonier Ministries. Donate: https://ask.ligonier.org/podcast/donate/

In today’s episode we break down all your confusion around affordable housing. One of the barriers to us understanding what affordable housing is, is that there is no universal definition of the concept. We’ve invited Greg Tedesco from the City of Hamilton and Jeff Neven from Indwell to our CityLAB class to discuss what affordable housing looks like in practice. The two also give students some tips on how they can get more involved with these issues and help build networks with people who are in need of this kind of housing. To learn more about affordable housing in Canada, the affordability crisis, and organizations that are working to fight for affordability, check out these links below: https://indwell.ca/ http://housingresearchcollaborative.scarp.ubc.ca/our-response-to-the-covid-19-pandemic/?fbclid=IwAR1UtOiAXJMdXwBc-wnrZ-YQHk9aUmKpBDuSi8np1QutTh_Oq8SRMR2EFjs http://www.pushthefilm.com/ https://www.hamilton.ca/social-services/housing Make sure to stay connected with Claire and CityCAST by following us on social media: Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/citylabsir Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/citylabsir Stay tuned for more episodes!

This week we interview Cameron McBride from Methwitch! We ask him what his process is like and how he got into this type of music. Indwell out now on all platforms! --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/strawberrydeathmachine/support

“Walk in the Spirit-Indwell” by Pastor Tim Wilcox.