Found in Translation

Jenna DeWitt (she/her) is a writer, editor, and resource curator working primarily in queer Christian spaces, and centering aromanticism & asexuality. You can find her work at www.invisiblecakesociety.com and on Threads as @jennadewitt.

Episode Highlights

• Paul is doing pastoral triage, not writing a universal marriage doctrine;
• Marriage is about mutuality, not male entitlement;
• Economic vulnerability is a key ingredient to the chapter.
• Paul reads more clearly as ace and possibly aro.
• Making an idol of family and marriage is nothing new.

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Read LIT online: litbible.net/1corinthians-7

LIT Bible apps: Download for iPhone/iPad, and on Android

Liberating Scripture Collective: www.liberatingscripture.org

Support LIT & FIT: liberatingscripture.org/support/

Our guest for 1 Corinthians 3 & 4 is Anthony Parrott. Anthony is the co-pastor at the Table Church in Washington, DC, an affirming, multiracial community committed to following Jesus without the baggage of white Christian nationalism. Anthony writes at parrott.ink about the Bible, books, and what it means to be human, with a bias toward love and liberation. He's also doing his own translation work in the Christian and Hebrew scriptures, with commitments that rhymes nicely with the LIT Bible.

• Follow Anthony on Threads

Episode Highlights

• Why porneia means sexual exploitation, not generic "sexual sin"
• How vague translations of "sexual immorality" can actually enable exploitation
• Paul's anger and consequence fall solely on the exploiter, never on the exploited party
• Reframing sarx as a self-preservation drive out of balance, rather than "the flesh is evil"
• "Handed over to the adversary" as redemptive discipline aimed at restoration, not eternal punishment
• Judging behavior without judging a person's worth — and why real community safety still requires firm boundaries and consequences
• What the lexicons actually say about malakoi and arsenokoitai

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Read LIT online: litbible.net/1corinthians-5 and litbible.net/1corinthians-6

LIT Bible apps: Download for iPhone/iPad, and on Android

Liberating Scripture Collective: www.liberatingscripture.org

Support LIT & FIT: liberatingscripture.org/support/

Our guest for 1 Corinthians 3 & 4 is Dr. Drew Hart, Associate Professor of Theology at Messiah University, director of Messiah's Thriving Together: Congregations for Racial Justice program, and co-host with Jared McKenna of the amazing Inverse podcast. Dr. Hart is the author of Trouble I've Seen: Changing the Way the Church Views Racism, Who Will Be a Witness: Igniting Activism for God's Justice, Love, and Deliverance, and most recently, Making It Plain Why We Need Anabaptism in the Black Church.

• Follow Dr. Hart on Threads

Episode Highlights

• Why Black Church & Anabaptism have more in common than you might think
• How rivalry, status, and self-preservation distort church life
• Paul's insistence that the church is built on Jesus, not favoritism, flex, or hierarchy
• God’s wisdom is cruciform and surprising
• How the light of Christ exposes the “successful” way of ego & empire as foolishness
• Why marginalized communities often see more clearly
• The church should measure itself by liberation, healing, and communal flourishing
• True spiritual authority comes from the scandal of Jesus, not from prestige

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Read LIT online: litbible.net/1corinthians-3

LIT Bible apps: Download for iPhone/iPad, and on Android

Liberating Scripture Collective: www.liberatingscripture.org

Support LIT & FIT: liberatingscripture.org/support/

Welcome to Season 9, where we'll be exploring Paul's expansive pastoral concerns and pleas to the Jesus huddle in Corinth. The letter has its share of landmines, which we can't wait to explore with you in the months ahead.

Our guest for 1 Corinthians 1 & 2 is Dr. Miguel A. De La Torre, one of the most influential liberation ethicists and theologians alive today. He is the author of 50 books, including Doing Christian Ethics from the Margins, Decolonizing Christianity: Becoming Badass Believers, and Embracing Hopelessness. Dr. De La Torre is Professor of Social Ethics and Latinx Studies at Iliff School of Theology in Denver, Colorado.

Episode Highlights

• 1 Corinthians 1–2 flips the all of the power structure's ideas of wisdom
• The cross challenges our ego and empire ideas of power or status
• What the world rejects comes to reveal divine power.
• A “spiritual” way of knowing that is different from elite knowledge
• Why the oppressed can read reality with unusual clarity
• Scripture must be read in community, not by gatekeepers alone
• Questions about God matter at least as much as answers about God
• Faithfulness of a translation is measured by whether it leads to life

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Read LIT online: litbible.net/1corinthians-1

LIT Bible apps: Download for iPhone/iPad, and on Android

Liberating Scripture Collective: www.liberatingscripture.org

Support LIT & FIT: liberatingscripture.org/support/

Now you can read, highlight, and annotate the Liberation & Inclusion Translation from your iPhone or Android.

• Download on iPhone and iPad
• Download on Android

It's a Bible app that we actually want to use. They're free, no ads, and no tracking. Your LIT Bible updates as Brandon adds chapters and books to litbible.net, and each week's lectionary readings are available in its own tab.

In this episode Brandon and Brandon talk about the work behind this app, and what to poke around for once you've got it on your device.

A special thank you to all of our beta testers who helped make each app shine. Your enthusiasm for the LIT and for quality apps was invaluable.

One more thing: Brandon Rhodes paused editing this show for a few months to focus on these apps, so expect our next season, 1 Corinthians, to debut later this summer.

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Found in Translation is a production of the Liberating Scripture Collective.

Episode Highlights

• Perseverance amidst systemic injustice and economic exploitation;
• Importance of communal care and addressing chronic illness with dignity;
• Wealth as a chronic illness in spiritual and social realms;
• Church discipline and communal accountability for the wealthy;
• False security of hoarding wealth and exploitative systems.
• Allegiance to people and justice over economic stability.
• Reimagining economic security rooted in community care.
• Jesus' ethic—breaking powers that exploit and marginalize.
• Loving kindness, womb love, and compassionate care.

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Read LIT online: litbible.net/james-5

Liberating Scripture Collective: www.liberatingscripture.org

More about the LIT Bible: litbible.net/translation-commitments

Support LIT & FIT: donorbox.org/found-in-translation-1

Episode Highlights

• The "desire for pleasures" James condemns isn't about sex — it's about golden toilets, rent-gouging, and union-busting.
• Your 401(k) might be morally complicated.
• "The world" James warns against isn't a vague spiritual fog — it's redlining, ICE raids, and every system where one human decides they matter more than another.
• Public prayer was never meant to be a private hotline to God — it's how a community surfaces each other's needs and volunteers to meet them.
• There's a reason the jet-ski buyer doesn't ask permission from the congregation first.
• "If you support ICE, you are an enemy of God. That's according to James."
• Judging someone's worth as a human is forbidden. Judging whether their actions cause harm is not only allowed — it's required.
• "If God wills it" is not a verbal get-out-of-jail-free card you can staple to a business plan.
• James asks you to let other people's suffering actually land on you — and the hosts connect that to people laughing about Alligator Alcatraz.

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Read LIT online: litbible.net/james-4

More about the LIT Bible: litbible.net/translation-commitments

Support LIT & FIT: donorbox.org/found-in-translation-1

We had an absolute blast recording this episode at the Queer Christian Fellowship Conference in Portland, Oregon. Rather than talk about the clobber passages used against queer folk, we wanted to explore how the LIT Bible opens up new insights into moral courage and resisting scapegoating in Hebrews 6.

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Follow the slide deck: https://tinyurl.com/NoMoreSacrifice

Read LIT online: https://litbible.net/hebrews-6

More about the LIT Bible: https://www.litbible.net/translation-commitments

Support LIT & FIT: https://donorbox.org/found-in-translation-1

Episode Highlights

• Dehumanizing words vs taboo words;
• What kind of speech disqualifies someone from church leadership;
• "you piece of 💩" vs "look at that 💩"
• Competitive self-promotion in tension with maturity;
• Open-mindedness, not certainty, as a mark of Christian maturity;
• The role of power and hierarchy in how we speak.

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Read LIT online: https://litbible.net/james-3

More about the LIT Bible: https://www.litbible.net/translation-commitments

Support LIT & FIT: https://donorbox.org/found-in-translation-1

Episode Highlights

• The importance of avoiding the word faith in translation;
• What James probably meant by faith;
• Comparing what James and Paul each meant by works;
• Classism and power's role in James' exhortations about modesty;
• The importance of solidarity with the poor in shaping our faithfulness.

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Read LIT online: https://litbible.net/james-2

More about the LIT Bible: https://www.litbible.net/translation-commitments

Support LIT & FIT: https://donorbox.org/found-in-translation-1