The Smell of Freedom and the Best Things You'll Read All Week

by Sebastian Faust and Ben Howard

Reads of the Week

1) I Know a Boy by Shannan Martin

"There are so many sides to every story and we may never know for sure what happened in those moments where time stood still and a new line of mangled history was inked. It's too hard to wade through, the water too murky, and we don't want to be wrong. So we turn and walk away, back to our tidy corners and our predominantly white churches where things make sense and everyone believes the same version of the story."

2) He Was a Miracle by Laura Turner

"He's there, walking, so alive, so completely, painfully alive. He's right there, a living, breathing human person! His diaphragm is contracting! His lungs are taking in oxygen and nitrogen! Air moved from his trachea to his bronchi, then bronchioles, then alveoli! He was a walking ninth-grade science class, right there in front of us, a fucking miracle on two feet!
It was over in about fifteen seconds. The cops came, of course. They are white. He, as you know, was black."

3) The Cross and the Molotov Cocktail by Christena Cleveland

"Can you see the suffering Christ in the oppressed, even the ones who aren't responding perfectly to society's oppression? Christ doesn't just suffer for the innocent, the ones who don't have the energy to fight back, or the ones who perfectly respond to injustice. He suffers for the ones who suffer now and sin in their suffering."

4) The Eccentric Economy of Love by Richard Beck

"The church is denying its own need, weakness and vulnerability. Thus, the church comes to see itself as a hero, riding in on a white horse to save others. Since we don't need anything from the people we are helping, there is no reciprocity, no economy, no relationship, no giving and sharing back and forth.
We show up, do our good deeds and then pack up and leave. Why? Because we don't need anything from those people. They need us. We don't need them.
But we do need them. And we need each other."

5) For Now, Young Black Males Matter...Until the Cameras Go Off by Romal Tune

"If they go inside now, they know that they will cease to matter. America will go right back to not caring about what happens to them. In their minds, they have to stay outside, they will do whatever it takes to keep the cameras rolling. It's almost as if they are saying please don't go away, please stay, because the moment you leave or turn the channel, no one will care anymore."

Honorable Mention

When Them Becomes Us: On Emmanuel by Abby Norman

Sermon on Grace, Dogs, and Sass-Mouthed Women by Nadia Bolz Weber

What to Wear When You're Lost by Shannan Martin

Tweets of the Week (via Lane Severson)

"According to Led Zeppelin, people in wheelchairs aren't getting into heaven." - @daemonic3

"I held a grape up to a cup of wine before eating it, so it could see how fully my species has subjugated its kind" - @lanyardigan

"i put my pants on like everyone else - surrounded by cops in the middle of a wendy's screaming furiously about my rights" - @rahtzee

On Pop Theology Week in Review 

Ferguson and the Suffering God by Kyle Baughman

"Theology is, for me, a Trojan Horse. I allowed it through the gates and trusted much too quickly, when suddenly its peaceful presence turned savage; the doors fell open and it revealed its nature."


Song of the Week

For Michael Brown, Ferguson, and all the rest... "Final Straw" by R.E.M.

If hatred makes a play on me tomorrow

And forgiveness takes a backseat to revenge

There's a hurt down deep that has not been corrected

There's a voice in me that says you will not win.

Now I don't believe, and I never did,

That two wrongs make a right

But if the world be filled with the likes of you

Then I'm putting up a fight.

So I raise my voice up higher

And I look you in the eye,

And I offer love with one condition:

With conviction, tell me why.

You can follow On Pop Theology on Twitter @OnPopTheology or like us on Facebook at www.facebook.com/OnPopTheology. If you'd like to help us pay the bills, you can donate via the button on the right of the screen.

Contact us at onpoptheology [at] gmail.com.  

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Useful Signs and the Best Things You'll Read All Week

by Ben Howard and Sebastian Faust

Reads of the Week

1) The Cost of Repentance by Zack Hunt

"Our actions have consequences. And while we may no longer face eternal consequences for our sin because of Jesus, the earthly consequences are very real and aren’t going anywhere. Which is why forgiveness divorced from accountability is so dangerous."

2) Cripple by Shannan Martin

"We worry sometimes that we'll seem too churchy, too weird, and all Jesus ever did was be weird and ridiculous and shocking and bold. We tell ourselves the world wants us to be more like them, and caught in the exact-right light, it's true. But the harder truth is, the world wants us to love them with the heart-ruined love of the only thing that ever made us alive."

3) Letting Go of God by Heath Bradley

"Throughout the Christian tradition there has always been a constructive tension between saying things about God, and at the same time acknowledging that all our words fall short of the divine reality. It is to our detriment when this paradoxical polarity gets out of balance."

4) Farewell, StrongBlackWoman by Christena Cleveland

"Meanwhile, the StrongBlackWoman identity, which at first glance seems like a positive identity, has wreaked havoc on black women’s emotional, physical, spiritual and relational health. In an attempt to escape one set of racist/sexist stereotypes, black women have run smack dab into another stereotype, one that is also maintained by societal racism and sexism."

5) Sermon on Lembas Bread, the Feeding of the 5,000 and Why I Hated Pastoral Care Classes by Nadia Bolz-Weber

"Perhaps Jesus’ injunction against sending the crowd away wasn’t because he was about to magically multiply a couple loaves into thousands, (although, again, that is a totally valid reading of the text). Maybe he didn’t want the disciples to send the people away because Jesus knew that those people had what the disciples lacked."

Honorable Mention

Search Term Friday: Judas Suicide by Richard Beck

Holy Relics: A Focus on the Family Movie Review by Martyn Wendell Jones

The Book That Changed Amy's Life by Amy Peterson

Not Our Problem: Why Collectively Ignoring Mark Driscoll Isn't an Option by Richard Clark

Tweets of the Week

"When He Goes Limp You Have To Stop Punching, Charlie Brown" - @briangarr

"Good thing most planes have TVs. Nothings worse than having to look out the window at Earths sacred majesty from the point of view of angels" - @pharmasean

"I raised my kid as a philistine. "How about less Schopenhauer & more QVC Shopping Hour?" I'd scold—but German idealism already corrupted him" - @BigRedDreck

On Pop Theology Week in Review

Harry, Severus, & David: The Danger of a Single Narrative by Laura Brekke

"Recently, I had an epic weekend of re-watching all the Harry Potter films (okay, it was more than a weekend, because: sleep)."

Song of the Week

"Let Your Heart Hold Fast" by Fort Atlantic

Peace,
Ben

You can follow On Pop Theology on Twitter @OnPopTheology or like us on Facebook at www.facebook.com/OnPopTheology. If you'd like to help us pay the bills, you can donate via the button on the right of the screen.

Contact us at onpoptheology [at] gmail.com.  

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Cops Buying Mother's Day Cards and the Best Things You'll Read All Week

by Ben Howard and Sebastian Faust

Reads of the Week

1) On Faithfulness (A Brain Dump) by Rachel Held Evans

"And so I stood, vulnerable once again, in that most infuriating and miraculous contradiction of the Christian life: that the Church wounds and the Church heals. I’m still not sure what to do with that."

2) Jesus On the Under-Arc by Shannan Martin

"I'm not good at making sense of the world I'm in. I've tried. And in this harder, ordinary state of living, hope is found when we cobble together a few broken pieces and shape them into something whole and new. We re-frame our expectations for the zillionth time and wonder all over again why we ever thought black and white were real. Almost all we ever see is gray."

3) In Prison With Ann Voskamp by Richard Beck

"Steve and I start talking about what eucharisteo looks like in a maximum security prison. About where an inmate might find "one thousand gifts" in his day to day life. And we talk about how that practice of thankfulness, gratitude and grace has been spiritually transformative for Steve. And while Steve and I were talking about how Ann Voskamp is changing his life I began to grow uneasy in my heart. For I had misjudged Ann Voskamp."

4) Confessions of a Religious Asshole by Micah Murray

"They say the Bible is like a mirror, and when I catch a glimpse of myself in its scattered fragments I realize I’m just the same as the people I’m so quick to denouce. I speak out against shame, but I shame those who disagree with me. I speak out against borders and walls, but I’m quick to turn “us” against “them” when “them” make me angry. I speak of love, but only when it’s easy."

5) If We Are The Body, I Might Be The Thumb by Sarah Joslyn

"I like grown-ups. I like the ones with gritty pasts and messy, grace-laden presents and dream-filled, wild futures. I like the ones who are broken and disheveled, like me. Who aren’t afraid of real talk and swear words."

Honorable Mention

Holy Relics: A Plan of Salvation Bead Bracelet by Martyn Jones

For Your Own Good by Gretchen White

In Which a Homeschooler Tries to Write Contemporary YA by Hannah Ettinger

Tweets of the Week

"Happy B-day Kierkegaard. You lived a bitter life and died alone. Now anyone who quotes you loses all their friends too." - @_lxnx

"George RR Martin's hat versus Pharrel's." - @TheAlanNoble

"How am I supposed to explain Michael Sam to my kids? I don't want them confused by his two first names lifestyle." - @EmmaWilson511

On Pop Theology Week in Review

No Honest Song Besides These Blues by Hannah Paasch

"1961. New York City. The scene opens on an ill-lit, smoky bar, crowded with mesmerized listeners huddled around cafe tables and bottles of beer."

The Problem of Evil: Devils, Aliens, and Doctor Who by Laura Brekke

"Cultures across human history have struggled with the problem of evil."

Song of the Week

"Sleep" by Little India

Peace,
Ben

You can follow On Pop Theology on Twitter @OnPopTheology or like us on Facebook at www.facebook.com/OnPopTheology. If you'd like to help us pay the bills, you can donate via the button on the right of the screen.

Contact us at onpoptheology [at] gmail.com. 
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The Dangers of Hammocks and the Best Things You'll Read All Week

by Ben Howard and Sebastian Faust

Reads of the Week

1) "God Is Done With You": Pensacola Christian College and Sexual Violence by Samantha Field

"That is what these extremely strict morality codes do at these colleges. They actively prevent the administration from seeing a victim’s situation clearly. Because the administration is more committed to enforcing the honor code than they are to helping victims, they are incapable of giving a victim the protection he or she needs to come forward about their assault."

2) Footsteps in the Student Center by Katherine Willis Pershey

"What I did do was this: I sat in a room with a pastor of deep integrity who took the scriptures seriously enough not to take them literally. I admitted to being full of doubt and distrust without the person to whom I was speaking turning into the Salvation Police. I realized that Christianity didn’t have to be about accepting a bunch of propositions about God, but that it could be a journey."

3) The Solution to American Poverty by Shannan Martin

"If our hope dangles on a spindly thread of political best practices, it's time to shear it off. If we find ourselves caught up in the puppet-string politics where society's easiest targets dance on demand, a jazzy chorus line to our real concerns, let's remember God's kingdom is theirs and the responsibility to right their wrongs was handed straight to us."

4) The Fuller Integration Lectures: Part 4, Kenosis as Pouring Out and Vomiting by Richard Beck

"Specifically, what is being emptied is the hero system--the ways we have internalized social and cultural standards of significance versus insignificance, success versus failure, worthiness versus unworthiness, light versus darkness, pure versus defiled, whole versus damaged. The "emptying" of kenosis is becoming indifferent to, dying to, this hero system."

5) Jonesing by D.L. Mayfield

"This was my drug of choice for many years, my heroin, my whiskey. Saving the world, helping all the people, spreading the gospel both in word and deed. The picture on my shelf is a reminder of the dangers of my drug, of how self-serving and isolating it is, how it causes beautiful young refugees to become props in the story of me, how it becomes the only identifier of any value. Like the addict misses their fix, I look longingly at the picture. When I am jonesing hard to take up my old savior complexes and crosses, I look and remember that the world was never mine to save anyways. It was too big of a burden, and I was nearly crushed in the process."

Honorable Mention


Understanding My "Call" by Benjamin Moberg

Triumph of What? by Maria Gwyn McDowell

Brief Moments When I Did Not Hate The Bible by Heather Caliri

Tweets of the Week

"I've never been dumped but I have poured my cereal & later realized there was no milk so I pretty much know what you're going through." - @jbyas

"You're never really taking a selfie when you walk with Christ :)" - @ashfein

"I do not understand the concept of robots. I am a bear." - @a_single_bear

On Pop Theology Week in Review

OPT Podcast: Episode 52 - The Swan Children w/ Hannah Ettinger and Connor Park

"This week on the show Ben talks to Hannah Ettinger and Connor Park about the new magazine and online art gallery The Swan Children."

I Need You To Kill Me by Justin McRoberts

"Nothing curbs the appetite of my fierce personal preferences or consumerist instincts like falling in love with someone else."

Which Christian Celebrity Are You? by Rebekah Mays

"Lately, Buzzfeed has been taking up way too much of our time with all those darned quizzes, when we should be meditating on more lasting things during this period of Lent."

If God Had a Name by Sebastian Faust

"In the land where I am from we worshipped the nameless God."

The Eternal Darkness of Parks and Recreation by Charity Erickson

"My last On Pop Theology piece explored the newest addition to the McConaissance oeuvre, the seriously serious HBO show True Detective, and its struggle to say anything really meaningful about…anything."

Song of the Week

"Girls Chase Boys" by Ingrid Michaelson

Peace,
Ben

You can follow On Pop Theology on Twitter @OnPopTheology or like us on Facebook at www.facebook.com/OnPopTheology. If you'd like to help us pay the bills, you can donate via the button on the right of the screen.

Contact us at onpoptheology [at] gmail.com.  

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A Helpful Bookstore Display and the Best Things You'll Read All Week

by Ben Howard and Sebastian Faust

Reads of the Week

1) The Theology of Johnny Cash: Part 8, A Whirlwind in the Thorn Tree by Richard Beck

"The biblical imagination, like the God it is trying to describe, is like that whirlwind in a thorn tree. The biblical imagination cannot be codified or systematized. The biblical imagination is going to be wild and untamed."

2) Walking the Second Mile: Jesus, Discrimination, and 'Religious Freedom' by Rachel Held Evans

"And yet despite enjoying majority status, significant privilege, and unchallenged religious freedom in this country, we evangelical Christians have become known as a group of people who cry 'persecution!' upon being wished 'Happy Holidays' by a store clerk."

3) When Life Gets Quiet and I Can't Deal by Shannan Martin

"Getting here was the easy part. Letting roots fall down into the earth is a lazy girl's labor. Growing them out takes muscle and grit and quite possibly more time than I'd like to share.  I don't know if Relative Inactivity was ever logged on God's calendar, or if I'm dealing with my familiar refusal to do the hard work."

4) I Don't Have My Shit Together by Micah Murray

"I don’t want to be a Christian writer, if it means writing from the heart and then hitting backspace until it feels safe again. I don’t want to be a Christian writer, if it means pretending that faith is something other than what it is – brutal, clumsy, fragile, ugly. I don’t want to be a Christian writer if it means that we need to act like we have all our shit together. Because the truth is, we don’t."

5) What If Jesus Had Been More Like The Arizona House of Representatives? by Zack Hunt

"Remember that leper Jesus embraced and healed? No more miracle service for him. Lepers in the Bible get leprosy because they sinned or their parents sinned. So they must be avoided at all costs, for their own good and the good of the community. The woman caught in adultery would have died, pummeled to death under a pile of stones. She was a sinner and undeserving of any advocacy service Jesus could provide her."

Honorable Mention

The Consoled, the Insiders by D.L. Mayfield

To All of Us on the Fringe by Andrea Levendusky

On Growing Up in Bill Gothard's Homeschool Cult by Micah Murray

Tweets of the Week

"I got 'A doctor in Portugal named Angela Valença' in Buzzfeed's Which One Of Earth's 7+ Billion People Are You Quiz" - @celebrityhottub

"Just typed JESUS and my phone auto-corrected to TELL ARIZONA I DON'T HATE GAY PEOPLE." - @denisleary

"Should I tell the barefoot kid in the Lipscomb Starbucks that he's a sellout, or should I just let the world tell him slowly and painfully?" - @Jesse_Baker

On Pop Theology Week in Review

On Pop Theology Podcast: Episode 51 - Exodus w/ Terence Fretheim

"This week on the show Sebastian continues our journey through the Bible with the book of Exodus."

Grace Is Waiting by Lyndsey Graves

"On a retreat this weekend, my mind wandered the way it can amidst the sudden freedom of escaping the city: I don’t have any idea what time it is, and it doesn’t even matter."

The Ethics of Information by Dominick Dodgson

"Currently, there are tens of thousands of human rights violations taking place throughout the world."

Song of the Week

"Game Shows Touch Our Lives" by The Mountain Goats

Peace,
Ben and Sebastian

You can follow On Pop Theology on Twitter @OnPopTheology or like us on Facebook at www.facebook.com/OnPopTheology. If you'd like to help us pay the bills, you can donate via the button on the right of the screen.

Contact us at onpoptheology [at] gmail.com.  

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by Ben Howard

Reads of the Week

1) Sinners in the Hands by Sonia Smith

"Three days later they returned. As they drove through town, they came across four teenagers in a pickup truck. Andy started to ask them where to find the church, but before he could finish his sentence, one of them cut him off. 'You’re looking for the cult,' he said."

2) Don't Put Down the Camera by Carol Howard Merritt

"But I have to admit, my long defense also comes with a pang of guilt and another revelation of my ever-present insecurities. I’ve never started some amazing non-profit (something I thought I was called to before I began at Western Presbyterian). I often hear my activist friends saying, 'Shut up and do something.' And I always feel like I’m not doing enough. I’m not going deep enough. I’m not… enough."

3) Privilege and the Pill by Rachel Held Evans

"As we discuss contraception, Christians especially must be committed to telling the truth and getting our facts straight, or else we risk losing credibility in the conversation and leading the faithful astray."

4) More Than A Feeling: The Cup That Faith and Marriage Share by Shannan Martin

"Worship, like love, is a certain steadiness. It's staying consistent and present when the days are too long and the nights are lonely. It's all the little things, the small obediences and unacknowledged tasks. Worship is the salt-tracks of grief and quiet reflection. Love is toes touching under the covers when words have been scare or raw."

5) When Having an Opinion is a Weary Endeavor by Nate Pyle

"Writing becomes exhausting when you are constantly expending emotional and mental energy to disregard personal attacks. And that’s what they are, personal attacks. The blogosphere – and society in general – has become a place where the exchange of ideas has been replaced by the attacking the holder of ideas. Ideas are not put under scrutiny, the person is."

Honorable Mention

Justice Broken: How A Poor Theology Of The Cross Created America's Broken Justice System by Benjamin Corey

Boycotting for Sport: Why The Olympics Must Go On by Matthew Towles

Here's to the Children by Micah Murray

Tweets of the Week

"Weird. I wrote 'croissant' but it autocorrected to 'the terror of human life is that we are stalked by Death which may strike at any time.'" - @tejucole

"What if Daft Punk was actually Scott Stapp and Chad Kroeger?" - @ethanluck

"yeah lorde is younger than me and has two grammys but I'm sitting on the floor eating pizza rolls so who is the real winner here" - @aguywithnolife

On Pop Theology Week in Review

Take Your Son, Your Only Son: The Binding of Isaac and the Unbinding of God

"God said to Abraham, 'If you will, take your son.' And Abraham answered, 'I have two sons.'"

Les Revenants and the Christian Imagination

"The French show Les Revenants (translated as “The Returned”) appeared on the Sundance Channel at the end of 2013 to much acclaim."

On Pop Theology Podcast: Episode 48 - On Being Muslim in America w/ Amir Arain

"This week Ben talked to Dr. Amir Arain, the President of the Islamic Center of Nashville, about his Muslim faith, and in particular the experience of Muslims in the American South."

A Series of Outright Lies About the Eucharist

"So with the fundamental ethos of the internet in mind, we bring you A Series of Outright Lies About the Eucharist."

Song of the Week

"Ghost" by Chelsea Lankes



Peace,
Ben

You can follow On Pop Theology on Twitter @OnPopTheology or like us on Facebook at www.facebook.com/OnPopTheology. If you'd like to help us pay the bills, you can donate via the button on the right of the screen.

Contact us at onpoptheology [at] gmail.com.  

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