Context Matters

By Dr. Cyndi ParkerSociety & Culture Documentary Religion & Spirituality Christianity Education

Context Matters episodes

October 01 Burdens of Choice
In today's conversation, Dr. Felicia helps us understand how technology shapes not just what we do, but what we long for. In reality are our devices creating "burdens of choice" and are they training us to crave all that is possible instead of being present with other humans? What questions do we need to be mindful of when we determine how to use technology: What are we really living for? Where does our worth come from? What if freedom isn't about unlimited access to everything, but the freedom to be fully, messily ourselves and still be loved?And what does a Christian worldview have to contribute to the way we train our imaginations for what is good?
Find out more about Dr. Felicia Wu Song HERE
Find her book Restless Devices HERE and her previous book Virtual Communities HERE
Contact Cyndi Parker through Narrative of Place.
Learn more about me and sign up for upcoming tours of Israel/Palestine.
Join Cyndi Parker's Patreon Team!
32 min
September 24 Reimagining Freedom
Dr. Felicia Wu Song is a writer and speaker and cultural sociologist who studies the place of digital technologies in contemporary life. In this episode we trace American technological utopianism that optimistically believes every new invention will finally set us free. In reality, technology can lead to a psychological cocktail of pleasures, anxieties, and felt expectations that leave us feeling exhausted. What if we can learn to see the human finiteness as a gift, not a flaw? What if our need for rest, our limits, our embeddedness in time and place, aren't problems to be solved by the next app, but part of what makes us whole? What if the friction we're tempted to automate away is exactly where growth and creativity live?
Find out more about Dr. Felicia Wu Song HERE
Find her book Restless Devices HERE and her previous book Virtual Communities HERE
Contact Cyndi Parker through Narrative of Place.
Learn more about me and sign up for upcoming tours of Israel/Palestine.
Join Cyndi Parker's Patreon Team!
27 min
September 17 Thomas Aquinas and Modern Mental Health
In Part 2 of the conversation Dr. Warren Kinghorn continues his conversation with Cyndi, unpacking the ideas behind his book on mental health in dialogue with Thomas Aquinas. He challenges modern medicine's tendency to treat people as broken machines to be fixed or bundles of symptoms to be reduced and instead, offers Aquinas's image of the human as a wayfarer on a journey from God to God. This reframes care as accompaniment rather than repair, a shift Warren argues matters for clinicians, pastors, and everyday companions alike.
Read more about Dr. Kinghorn HERE
Read more about what is available through Duke's Theology, Medicine, and Culture HERE
Explore Dr. Kinghorn's book Wayfairing published with @eerdmans
Explore The Sanctuary Course - a free resource designed for small groups to explore mental health
Contact Cyndi Parker through Narrative of Place.
Learn more about me and sign up for upcoming tours of Israel/Palestine.
Join Cyndi Parker's Patreon Team!
34 min
September 10 Shalom and Mental Health
What does Peacemaking have to do with mental health? Dr. Warren Kinghorn is an excellent guide through the journey of discovery. Dr. Kinghorn challenges modern medicine's tendency to reduce people to "buckets of symptoms" or broken machines to be optimized. Instead he calls for a Christian vision of mental healthcare rooted in the belief that every person matters simply because they are made in the image of God -- not for their productivity and consumption which leads to increased levels of anxiety.
Read more about Dr. Kinghorn HERE
Read more about what is available through Duke's Theology, Medicine, and Culture HERE
Explore Dr. Kinghorn's book Wayfairing published with @eerdmans
Explore The Sanctuary Course - a free resource designed for small groups to explore mental health
Contact Cyndi Parker through Narrative of Place.
Learn more about me and sign up for upcoming tours of Israel/Palestine.
Join Cyndi Parker's Patreon Team!
31 min
September 10 Shalom and Mental Health
What does Peacemaking have to do with mental health? Dr. Warren Kinghorn is an excellent guide through the journey of discovery. Dr. Kinghorn challenges modern medicine's tendency to reduce people to "buckets of symptoms" or broken machines to be optimized. Instead he calls for a Christian vision of mental healthcare rooted in the belief that every person matters simply because they are made in the image of God -- not for their productivity and consumption which leads to increased levels of anxiety.
Read more about Dr. Kinghorn HERE
Read more about what is available through Duke's Theology, Medicine, and Culture HERE
Explore Dr. Kinghorn's book Wayfairing published with @eerdmans
Explore The Sanctuary Course - a free resource designed for small groups to explore mental health
Contact Cyndi Parker through Narrative of Place.
Learn more about me and sign up for upcoming tours of Israel/Palestine.
Join Cyndi Parker's Patreon Team!
29 min
September 03 Living out Hesed
In Part 2 of the conversation ]about her book Hesed, the Seed of the Biblical Story, Dr. Matheny walks through her own working definition of hesed, describing it as both something God does and a way of being that God's people are invited to embody. She and Cyndi unpack how two-thirds of the word's biblical uses point back to God's character, and how that opens up space for humanity, as image-bearers, to reflect that same quality back into the world.
Explore the book Hesed the Seed of the Biblical Story from @bakerpublishinggroup Here
Read more about Dr. Jennifer M. Matheny HERE
Contact Cyndi Parker through Narrative of Place.
Learn more about me and sign up for upcoming tours of Israel/Palestine.
Join Cyndi Parker's Patreon Team!
41 min
August 27 The Story of Hesed
Ever tried explaining a word that shows up 250+ times in the Bible... and still can't quite pin it down? That's exactly the puzzle Old Testament scholar Jenny Matheny sits down to unpack with Cyndi this episode. Using her own growing up context in Napa Valley and the French wine concept of terroir to help people explore the concept of the Hebrew term hesed. This word defies easy translations because it is so thick with meaning.
Explore the book Hesed the Seed of the Biblical Story from @bakerpublishinggroup Here
Read more about Dr. Jennifer M. Matheny HERE
Listen to Dr. Megan Roberts talk about a trauma informed reading of Isaiah: Part 1 and Part 2
Listen to Dr. Ericka Dunbar talk about reading Ruth as Horror: Part 1 and Part 2
Contact Cyndi Parker through Narrative of Place.
Learn more about me and sign up for upcoming tours of Israel/Palestine.
Join Cyndi Parker's Patreon Team!

30 min
March 19 Healing our Imagination
How does prayer fit into the formation and healing of our imagination? As we continue our conversation with Dr. Justin Bailey, he addresses prayer as reorienting our attention, priorities, and requests within Jesus' story. We also contrast cheap, clichéd hope with costly hope shaped by confession, suffering, and the Spirit’s reminder of the larger biblical story.
Find out more about Dr. Bailey and his book HERE
See his chapel talks that started the whole book project HERE (scroll to the bottom of the page)
Contact Dr. Bailey HERE
Contact Cyndi Parker through Narrative of Place.
Learn more about me and sign up for upcoming tours of Israel/Palestine.
Join Cyndi Parker's Patreon Team!
23 min
March 12 Undragoning our Imaginations
In our recent conversations about spiritual formation, the use of the imagination has come up several times. Why is the imagination so significant in spiritual formation? Don't we simply need to learn more data about the Bible? Out of early misgivings about the models of discipleship we often use in the church, Rev. Dr. Justin Bailey decided to focus his work on discipleship and the imagination. Today Justin joins us to talk about his newest book titled Disciplining the Diseased Imagination: Spiritual Formation and the Healing of Our Hearts.
Find out more about Dr. Bailey and his book HERE
See his chapel talks that started the whole book project HERE (scroll to the bottom of the page)
Contact Dr. Bailey HERE
Contact Cyndi Parker through Narrative of Place.
Learn more about me and sign up for upcoming tours of Israel/Palestine.
Join Cyndi Parker's Patreon Team!
28 min
March 05 No Discipleship without Justice
This is a re-edited broadcast of a conversation with Dr. Michael Rhodes from 2024. Is it possible that Western Christianity and modern American life is shaping us to become people who are NOT good at doing justice, and loving mercy, and showing kindness? We know of such concepts but do we embody such concepts in the world around us? This week kicks off a several week conversation with scholars about different aspects of discipleship. We start today with a fellow Old Testament scholar, Dr. Michael Rhodes. He is a professor in Old Testament at Carey Baptist College in Aukland, New Zealand. He is the author of Formative Feasting and Practicing the King's Economy.
We start with the impetus for his new book Just Discipleship, which you can find HERE.
What is biblical justice? Is it different from other forms of justice?
Contact Cyndi Parker through Narrative of Place.
Learn more about me and sign up for upcoming tours of Israel/Palestine.
Join Cyndi Parker's Patreon Team!
36 min

About Context Matters

From the publisher's feed

This podcast is for people who are curious about the ancient context that influenced the final shape of the Bible…AND ALSO…how our modern context influences the way we understand the Bible and God and…