Today we’re revisiting a conversation that Dr. Dan Allender had a few years ago with Dr. Chelle Stearns, Associate Professor of Theology at The Seattle School, exploring her ongoing work of developing a theology of abuse. She believes that as a theologian, an artist, and a witness of other artists, she is called—and we are called—to hold together immense sorrow and stunning beauty. Ultimately, Chelle invites us to wrestle with how we address trauma in view of the embodied life of Christ, and how this might change the way we tend to the stories of harm in our own lives and communities. 

Resources:

• Watch Dr. Chelle Stearns speak on ‘Lament and Hope Through a Trauma-Informed Theology’ at The Seattle School’s Seventh Annual Stanley Grenz Lecture
• Watch Rachael Clinton speak at the 2019 Theology & Trauma Conference 

Read “Let the Lament Come” by Heather Stringer