Practicing Gospel Podcast

This episode is part of one of my ongoing series I call “Christian Music Not Played On Christian Radio.” The purpose of the series is heighten awareness that although traditional Christian music may no longer be the dominant music style experienced in Christian Churches in the United States, the composition of new music in the traditional forms of hymns and anthems is thriving. In this...

Peacebuilding, social justice, and bridge building all overlap and interweave. My guest for this episode exemplifies the desire and quest for all three of these. The Rabbi Dr. Joseph A. Edelheit has been a long-time activist in interfaith dialogue. He is Emeritus Professor of Religious and Jewish Studies at St. Cloud State University (St. Cloud, Minnesota) where he initiated and facilitated the tr...

There are folks who approach faith creatively. They use their gifted intelligence and artistry to explore the Mystery, the Divine, the Sacred, God. In doing so, they often have profound encounters. When they are gracious to share with us their experiences and learnings they provide us with resources for our own journeys that enable us to understand and experience the Holy more deeply and fully. Th...

My guest for this episode is David LaMotte. David is an internationally know musician, speaker, writer, and peacebuilder. The best access to all that David has done and is doing–his twelve cds, his three books, the store, videos of his speaking engagements and performances, his calendar and touring information, and the means of contacting his–is his website: https://www.davidlamotte.co...

When folks think about ethics common thoughts relate either to decisions about daily behaviors or to university philosophy or theology departments developing and discussion the merits of various ethical theories. There are organizations where the daily activity so regularly bears on ethical situations that they employ ethicists to help the organization navigate decisions that must be made regardin...

In this episode, Dr. John Pierce explains the Jesus Worldview Initiative and offers it as an alternative to the ‘Biblical worldview’ as defined by Conservative evangelicals. In doing so, John is enabling those participants in the Jesus Worldview Initiative to provide a counter-voice to a position that is compatible with the growth of Christian nationalism, and to provide another means...

The election of Donald Trump was surprising, but, once people began to explain why they voted the way the did, it became understandable. What hasn’t been understandable, however, is the subsequent devotion to him by white evangelicals. His past and continuing lifestyle is so at odds with the things white evangelicals have publicly professed to value. This devotion seems different from the ty...

One of the most important lessons I have learned from Meta Commerse is the importance of white people telling their own race story. A significant part of the problem with our ability as white people to fulfill that task is due to the truth that because we are so conditioned by our white-dominated culture, we both don’t tend to think about ourselves as having a race story and don’t know...

Mohandas (know by the honorific, ‘Mahatma,’ meaning ‘great-souled’) Gandhi is one of humanity’s great figures in making the world better. His lifestyle and teachings of nonviolence and his leadership in non-violent resistance has brought great change, especially in India. Many have followed Gandhi’s methods–The Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. in the U...

My guest for this episode is novelist Jeanine Joyner. If you have been listening to podcast, you may remember Jeanine from my interview with the folks of Foundling House in episode 33. Christians who are artists understand the relationship between their art and their faith in different ways and perceive the purpose of their art in different ways. Exploring this relationship between a particular Ch...

This episode is the second in a two-part interview on decolonizing worship. My guests are again Becca Whitla , Marcell Silva Steuernagel , and Brian Hehn . In the first episode we talked about the importance of decolonizing worship as beginning steps for Christians and churches to repent of the Church’s complicity in creating, promoting, and perpetuating colonial imperialism and white male s...

Among the great evils of human history has been colonial imperialism and the rise of white male supremacy. The terrible legacy of these two interwoven realities still continues. Tragically and shamefully for the Church and Christianity, is that in a twisted and perverted logic that was and is a contradiction to the Gospel, the Church has played and continues to play a fundamental role in the creat...

This episode is my second interview with The Rev. Dr. Mae Elise Cannon . As I say in my spoken introduction, Dr. Cannon is a peacebuilder, advocate, author, and speaker. She is an ordained minister in the Evangelical Covenant Church. She has two doctorates and multiple degrees in areas as diverse as history, bioethics, business, ministry. Currently she is Executive director of Churches for Middle...

Regardless of where a church is on the theological and political spectrum, all churches have always been interested in and concerned about youth. There are many reasons for this that exist at the same time and with varying degrees of intensity. As volunteer organizations, churches know that their survival depends on the continual and prolonged inclusion of new people. Churches also know that the a...

My guest for this episode is Dr. Thomas Bandy . Tom was part of a panel discussion on Alternative Lectionaries in PGE 21 of this podcast. At the time, Tom noted that his consideration of the usefulness of lectionaries had been modified since he published his on alternative lectionary in  Introducing The Uncommon Lectionary: Opening The Bible to Seekers and Disciples . His coming to understand the...

I love interviewing artists and having conversations about the arts not just because I love the arts but know, despite opinions by some to the contrary, that the arts are vehicles of truth and provide the means of insights and understanding about reality, ethics, faith, worldview, beauty, the quest for meaning, and all manner of other important issues and questions. The arts have been and are an i...

One might think that an interview with a couple of editors of a music publishing company might be an episode targeted only to a select audience, but, to the contrary, decisions made by such publishers can be worthy of national news. In my interview with the deans of three theological schools, when I asked what is going on in theological education presently, Dr. Karen Massey described the situation...

Dr. Michael L. Budde is Professor of Catholic Studies and Political Science at DePaul University, where he also serves as Senior Research Scholar in the Center for World Catholicism and Intercultural Theology (CWCIT). His research explores the intersections of ecclesiology, political economy, and culture. Much of his contemporary research flows from the work of DePaul’s Center for World Catholicis...

With the significant decline in the numbers of people calling themselves ‘Christian,’ and the closing of thousands of churches each year in the United States, a lot of us who are Christians across the theological spectrum are asking the questions, “What is God doing? How and where is God moving, especially in God’s church?” In Amos 3:7-8, the prophet Amos declares, &#...

For those of you who have been listening to this podcast from its beginning, you know Donna Marie Todd as a storyteller. She was one of the first people who graciously and generously gave her time and talent to allow me to interview her or him. Donna Marie introduced us to the wonderful art of Biblical Storytelling, and that art has been an ongoing series for me as I continue to interview Biblical...

What does it mean to be a Christian peacebuilder and peacemaker? In addition to the capacity and willingness to listen to others with caring, compassion, and respect, it also involves Christians asking themselves questions about what God wants of us and how we understand our relationship to others who are not Christian. These questions extend to further questions about the practices throughout Chr...

This episode is Part 2 of a conversation with Dean Emilie Townes of Vanderbilt Divinity School , Dean Kelly Brown Douglas of the Episcopal Divinity School at Union Theological Seminary , and Associate Dean Karen Massey at Mercer University McAfee School of Theology on the state of theological education. Throughout the conversation, we have been using Willie James Jennings’s book,  After Whit...

All Christians should be interested in what is going on in institutions that train people for Christian ministry because what happens in those institutions–how people are trained and what they are taught–finds it way, for good or not, into churches. Back in the late 1970s and early 1980s there was such dissatisfaction with theological education that the stirrings of an extensive and ex...

In this episode, I have invited back as my guest Dr. C. Michael Hawn . Michael is University Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Church Music and Adjunct Professor and Director of the Doctor of Pastoral Music Program in the Perkins School of Theology at Southern Methodist University in Dallas, TX and was one of my professors during my church music training at The Southern Baptist Theological Semin...

This episode will be the first in a new series on democracy. In the United States, democracy is the way our cities, counties, states, and nation is governed. In many faith groups democracy is the way the faith community is governed. Democracy has provided such a vision for change both in our nation and around the world, we have a hard time imagining anyone raising questions about it or its value....