RePlacing Church: Local Spirituality, Innovative Community & Social Change with Ben Katt

AnaYelsi Velasco-Sanchez is an IndoLatinx mujerista working to create and agitate her way through the latin diaspora. She is a writer and speaker, visual artist, and faith-based community organizer. She blogs at Patheos Progressive Christian and shares other resources at browneyedamazon.com. Born in Venezuela, she came to the United States at a young age where she was adopted and given the name Ashley. When she was 15, she stood before a judge and declared, “I want my name back.” This reclamation of her name and identity has marked her work in the areas of decolonization in the church and beyond, intersectionality, and LGBT inclusion ever since. In this episode, AnaYelsi joins me to discuss:

Identity and name reclamation

Being displaced and living as part of a cultural diaspora

Language and intentional use of terms like "Latinx"

Finding refuge and healing in community

Why decolonization must go beyond the personal level and address unjust systems

The power of art to capture and speak to complex issues

Get your free RePlacing Church Resource List, a guide to being and becoming the church in the neighborhood.

Subscribe, rate, and review the RePlacing Church Podcast on iTunes, or listen on Stitcher, Google Play, or Podbean.

Support RePlacing Church on Patreon. I need your support to offset production costs so that I can continue to offer quality content and insightful interviews that will help you grow in your faith and practice. Visit www.patreon.com/benkatt, become a RePlacing Church Patron for as little as a $1/month and receive access to bonus podcast episodes, additional blog posts and more exclusive content! More information here.

Sign up for RePlacing Church updates at www.replacingchurch.org. Like on Facebook, Follow on Instagram.

Episode Song Credits: "Another Wrong to Right" by Mercir. "Feels Like Home" by Immersive Music. "Full Humanity" by Cymatix. Used with Permission.

Production Assistance by Nate Tubbs.

Dr. Mark Mulder is professor of sociology, adjunct professor of congregational and ministry studies, and director of the urban studies minor and at Calvin College in Grand Rapids, Michigan. He teaches classes on church and society, diversity and inequality, and urban sociology. Mark is the author of Congregations, Neighborhoods, Places, Shades of White Flight: Evangelical Congregations and Urban Departure, and co-author of Latino Protestants in America: Diverse and Growing. His research centers on the intersection of cities and congregations. In this episode of RePlacing Church, Mark joins me to discuss:

The shift in church culture and theology towards place

Historic and present-day barriers that perpetuate systemic inequity

Why churches should take inventory of their assets and explore how they can be utilized for their neighborhood

The "halo effect" of church impact on communities

The importance of ethnography, being attuned to your context, and a posture of humility

Historical example of white flight on Chicago's South side

Church adaptation in the tide of changing demographics

Get your free RePlacing Church Resource List, a guide to being and becoming the church in the neighborhood.

Subscribe, rate, and review the RePlacing Church Podcast on iTunes, or listen on Stitcher, Google Play, or Podbean.

Support RePlacing Church on Patreon. I need your support to offset production costs so that I can continue to offer quality content and insightful interviews that will help you grow in your faith and practice. Visit www.patreon.com/benkatt, become a RePlacing Church Patron for as little as a $1/month and receive access to bonus podcast episodes, additional blog posts and more exclusive content! More information here.

Sign up for RePlacing Church updates at www.replacingchurch.org. Like on Facebook, Follow on Instagram.

Episode Song Credits: "Another Wrong to Right" by Mercir. "Feels Like Home" by Immersive Music. "Full Humanity" by Cymatix. Used with Permission.

Production Assistance by Nate Tubbs.

Kathy Khang is the author of the forthcoming book, Raise Your Voice: Why We Stay Silent and How to Speak Up. She is a speaker, journalist, and activist with expertise in the issues of gender, ethnicity, justice and leadership development. She has worked in campus ministry for more than twenty years. She is a columnist for Sojourners magazine, a writer for Faith & Leadership, and a coauthor of More Than Serving Tea: Asian American Women on Expectations, Relationships, Leadership and Faith. In this episode of RePlacing Church, she joins me to discuss:

The importance of 'learning to use your voice'

Recognizing your privilege, even as an outsider

How we can be aware of and turn down the imposter syndrome

Lessons learned from speaking too soon

How raising your voice can articulate hope for others

Why good leaders see the potential in other people's voices as much as their own

Get your free RePlacing Church Resource List, a guide to being and becoming the church in the neighborhood.

Subscribe, rate, and review the RePlacing Church Podcast on iTunes, or listen on Stitcher, Google Play, or Podbean.

Support RePlacing Church on Patreon. I need your support to offset production costs so that I can continue to offer quality content and insightful interviews that will help you grow in your faith and practice. Visit www.patreon.com/benkatt, become a RePlacing Church Patron for as little as a $1/month and receive access to bonus podcast episodes, additional blog posts and more exclusive content! More information here.

Sign up for RePlacing Church updates at www.replacingchurch.org. Like on Facebook, Follow on Instagram.

Episode Song Credits: "Another Wrong to Right" by Mercir. "Feels Like Home" by Immersive Music. "Full Humanity" by Cymatix. Used with Permission.

Production Assistance by Nate Tubbs.

DeAnza Spaulding is the Lead Disrupter for Table Turning, a Holy Week movement initiated by her neighborhood church, Valley & Mountain, that is “grounded in the radical tradition of Jesus, who turned tables to interrupt the oppression of people disregarded by society.” The daughter of a Filipina mother and Norwegian father, DeAnza is committed to the liberation and empowerment of marginalized people in her work as a therapist focused on trauma, as a doctoral candidate and researcher focused on survivors of domestic violence, and as a former pastor who led her church in the development of an day drop-in center for unhoused women and men. She blogs about her life and work at Created For More. In this episode of RePlacing Church, she joins me to discuss:

The Table Turning movement and how your community can join in

Why the church often ignores the story of Jesus turning tables in the temple

How her biracial, bicultural background has prepared her for this moment in our society

Why we need to make space to liberate and empower the voices of women

How communities can move beyond their denial about domestic violence

The many manifestations of domestic abuse

Why we need to move from “victim” to “survivor” language when we talk about domestic violence

Organize a Table Turning event in your community

 

Get your free RePlacing Church Resource List, a guide to being and becoming the church in the neighborhood.

Subscribe, rate, and review the RePlacing Church Podcast on iTunes, or listen on Stitcher, Google Play, or Podbean.

Support RePlacing Church on Patreon. I need your support to offset production costs so that I can continue to offer quality content and insightful interviews that will help you grow in your faith and practice. Visit www.patreon.com/benkatt, become a RePlacing Church Patron for as little as a $1/month and receive access to bonus podcast episodes, additional blog posts and more exclusive content! More information here.

Sign up for RePlacing Church updates at www.replacingchurch.org. Like on Facebook, Follow on Instagram.

Episode Song Credits: "Another Wrong to Right" by Mercir. "Feels Like Home" by Immersive Music. "Full Humanity" by Cymatix. Used with Permission.

Production Assistance by Nate Tubbs.

Brian McLaren is a well-known author, speaker, activist and public theologian who has been advocating for “a new kind of Christianity” that is just and generous for over twenty years since he wrote The Church On the Other Side while serving as pastor of Cedar Ridge Community Church. Since then, he has written numerous books including A New Kind of Christian, A Generous Orthodoxy and Why Did Jesus, Moses, the Buddha, and Mohammed Cross the Road?. His most recent work, The Great Spiritual Migration: How the World’s Largest Religion Is Seeking a Better Way to Be Christian explores the spiritual, theological and missional conversions that the church needs to undergo in order to be true to the way of Jesus and make a generative impact on the world. Brian is an Auburn Senior Fellow and a leader in the Convergence Network, and collaborates with the Center for Progressive Renewal, the Wild Goose Festival and the Fair Food Program’s Faith Working Group. In this episode of RePlacing Church, he joins me to discuss:

What he saw twenty years ago that launched him into writing to the church

How a mafia metaphor can help white people engage their whiteness

How to pray for your enemies

The important idea that Protestants missed in Luther’s 95 theses

Why the church should be a “school of love”

One key aspect of the next Reformation

*Check out the Prayer for Enemies that Brian mentions here.

Get your free RePlacing Church Resource List, a guide to being and becoming the church in the neighborhood.

Subscribe, rate, and review the RePlacing Church Podcast on iTunes, or listen on Stitcher, Google Play, or Podbean.

Support RePlacing Church on Patreon. I need your support to offset production costs so that I can continue to offer quality content and insightful interviews that will help you grow in your faith and practice. Visit www.patreon.com/benkatt, become a RePlacing Church Patron for as little as a $1/month and receive access to bonus podcast episodes, additional blog posts and more exclusive content! More information here.

Sign up for RePlacing Church updates at www.replacingchurch.org. Like on Facebook, Follow on Instagram.

Episode Song Credits: "Another Wrong to Right" by Mercir. "Feels Like Home" by Immersive Music. "Full Humanity" by Cymatix. Used with Permission.

Production Assistance by Nate Tubbs.

Sandhya Jha is the founder and director of the Oakland Peace Center, a collective of people and organizations committed to creating access, equity and dignity for all in Oakland and the Bay area. She is the author of Room at the Table, Pre-Post-Racial America: Spiritual Stories from the Front Lines and, most recently, Transforming Communities: How People Like You are Healing Their Neighborhoods. She has previously created and hosted the “Hope from the Hood: the Peaceful City Podcast” Sandhya Jha is a faith-rooted organizer, anti-racism/anti-oppression trainer, an ordained minister in the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) who is passionate about effecting change in urban policy and fostering interfaith relationships and collaboration. In this episode of RePlacing Church, she joins me to discuss:

Why complex issues need multifaceted solutions

Ministry leadership and the priesthood of all believers

Non-traditional and bivocational ways of ministry

The importance of self-care through beloved community

Why we should focus on what we are building and not just what we are dismantling

The myth of independence and the essential nature of community

Get your free RePlacing Church Resource List, a guide to being and becoming the church in the neighborhood.

Subscribe, rate, and review the RePlacing Church Podcast on iTunes, or listen on Stitcher, Google Play, or Podbean.

Support RePlacing Church on Patreon. I need your support to offset production costs so that I can continue to offer quality content and insightful interviews that will help you grow in your faith and practice. Visit www.patreon.com/benkatt, become a RePlacing Church Patron for as little as a $1/month and receive access to bonus podcast episodes, additional blog posts and more exclusive content! More information here.

Sign up for RePlacing Church updates at www.replacingchurch.org. Like on Facebook, Follow on Instagram.

Episode Song Credits: "Another Wrong to Right" by Mercir. "Feels Like Home" by Immersive Music. "Full Humanity" by Cymatix. Used with Permission.

Production Assistance by Nate Tubbs.

What is Sabbath? Why is it so important for our society right now? How can we put it into practice this year and beyond? Some reflections on sabbath practice, featuring the Ice Bowl, Walter Brueggemann’s Sabbath As Resistance, pour over coffee, the pomodoro technique and much more in this episode of RePlacing Church.

Get your free RePlacing Church Resource List, a guide to being and becoming the church in the neighborhood.

Subscribe, rate, and review the RePlacing Church Podcast on iTunes, or listen on Stitcher, Google Play, or Podbean.

Support RePlacing Church on Patreon. I need your support to offset production costs so that I can continue to offer quality content and insightful interviews that will help you grow in your faith and practice. Visit www.patreon.com/benkatt, become a RePlacing Church Patron for as little as a $1/month and receive access to bonus podcast episodes, additional blog posts and more exclusive content! More information here.

Sign up for RePlacing Church updates at www.replacingchurch.org. Like on Facebook, Follow on Instagram.

Production Assistance by Nate Tubbs.

Jon Huckins is the Co-Founding Director of The Global Immersion Project, a peacemaking training organization that helps individuals and communities move towards conflict and become everyday peacemakers. He is the co-author of Mending the Divides: Creative Love in a Conflicted World and Thin Places: Six Postures for Creating and Practicing Missional Community, and writes for numerous publications including USAToday, Red Letter Christians, Sojourners, and Relevant. Jon lives in San Diego with his wife and four children where he pastors an intentional faith community. In this episode of RePlacing Church he joins me to talk about:

The need for developing a holistic view of peace

Peacemaking in the spheres of interpersonal relationships, local injustice and international conflict

How our theology should fuel rather than restrict our pursuit of peacemaking and renewal

Stories of confronting violence with a posture of non-violence

Why we need wisdom to know when to leverage our privilege for others, and when to lay down our privilege for others

Get your free RePlacing Church Resource List, a guide to being and becoming the church in the neighborhood.

Subscribe, rate, and review the RePlacing Church Podcast on iTunes, or listen on Stitcher, Google Play, or Podbean.

Support RePlacing Church on Patreon. I need your support to offset production costs so that I can continue to offer quality content and insightful interviews that will help you grow in your faith and practice. Visit www.patreon.com/benkatt, become a RePlacing Church Patron for as little as a $1/month and receive access to bonus podcast episodes, additional blog posts and more exclusive content! More information here.

Sign up for RePlacing Church updates at www.replacingchurch.org. Like on Facebook, Follow on Instagram.

Episode Song Credits: "Another Wrong to Right" by Mercir. "Feels Like Home" by Immersive Music. "Full Humanity" by Cymatix. Used with Permission.

Production Assistance by Nate Tubbs.

Dr. Preston Pouteaux is the author of The Bees of Rainbow Falls: Finding Faith, Imagination, and Delight in Your Neighbourhood. He is a beekeeper, writer, published watercolour portrait artist and neighbourhood enthusiast. Preston is a syndicated columnist with 13 Ways. Since 2015, his column “Into the Neighbourhood” has been printed over one million times in weekly newspapers. He is a pastor at Lake Ridge Community Church, serves nationally with Forge Canada Missional Training Network, and teaches community engagement, spiritual formation, and biblical geography at colleges across the country. Preston lives and gardens in Chestermere, Alberta, with his wife Kelly, their daughters Scotia and Ivy, and a few thousand honeybees. In this episode of RePlacing Church he joins me to talk about:

How exposure to beauty can inspire neighborhood imagination

Metaphors that can reshape dialogue among community members

How bees (or people) can function as 'keystone species' that cause everything around them to flourish

Intentional practices that can take advantage of seasons - even winter

How the church can awaken communities and inspire awe in local everyday places

Why we are called to be 'keepers' of our neighborhoods

Get your free RePlacing Church Resource List, a guide to being and becoming the church in the neighborhood.

Subscribe, rate, and review the RePlacing Church Podcast on iTunes, or listen on Stitcher, Google Play, or Podbean.

Support RePlacing Church on Patreon. I need your support to offset production costs so that I can continue to offer quality content and insightful interviews that will help you grow in your faith and practice. Visit www.patreon.com/benkatt, become a RePlacing Church Patron for as little as a $1/month and receive access to bonus podcast episodes, additional blog posts and more exclusive content! More information here.

Sign up for RePlacing Church updates at www.replacingchurch.org. Like on Facebook, Follow on Instagram.

Episode Song Credits: "Another Wrong to Right" by Mercir. "Feels Like Home" by Immersive Music. "Full Humanity" by Cymatix. Used with Permission.

Production Assistance by Nate Tubbs.

The Reverend Dr. Soong-Chan Rah is the author of Prophetic Lament: A Call for Justice in Troubled Times, The Next Evangelicalism: Freeing the Church from Western Cultural Captivity, Many Colors: Cultural Intelligence for a Changing Church, and Return to Justice: Six Movements That Reignited Our Contemporary Evangelical Conscience. A former church planter and Senior Pastor of Cambridge Community Fellowship Church, a multi-ethnic church living out the values of racial reconciliation and social justice in Cambridge, Massachusetts, Dr. Rah is now the Milton B. Engebretson Professor of Church Growth and Evangelism at North Park Theological Seminary in Chicago, IL. He currently serves on the board of World Vision and Evangelicals 4 Justice, and previously served with Sojourners and the Christian Community Development Association. In this episode of RePlacing Church, he joins me to discuss:

How the Church is returning to justice

How church planting is often linked to cultural ideas of triumphalism and exceptionalism

Why lament needs to be an essential response to suffering in our world

Why 'thoughts and prayers' are insufficient for leading us to communal response to tragedy

How to move beyond the white, Western, dominant narrative of the Church

How to practice lament in your local church

Get your free RePlacing Church Resource List, a guide to being and becoming the church in the neighborhood.

Subscribe, rate, and review the RePlacing Church Podcast on iTunes, or listen on Stitcher, Google Play, or Podbean.

Support RePlacing Church on Patreon. I need your support to offset production costs so that I can continue to offer quality content and insightful interviews that will help you grow in your faith and practice. Visit www.patreon.com/benkatt, become a RePlacing Church Patron for as little as a $1/month and receive access to bonus podcast episodes, additional blog posts and more exclusive content! More information here.

Sign up for RePlacing Church updates at www.replacingchurch.org. Like on Facebook, Follow on Instagram.

Episode Song Credits: "Another Wrong to Right" by Mercir. "Feels Like Home" by Immersive Music. "Full Humanity" by Cymatix. Used with Permission.

Production Assistance by Nate Tubbs.