We continue our Future Church series where Will and Caro listen back to a highlight excerpt from Future Church Conference and then debrief what it sparks for them as they think about their lives and faith communities.

This time, we listen to 10 minutes from Tanya Riches' talk, where she invites us into a wider and deeper understanding of the 'Imago Dei.' Is the Image of God exclusively reflected in humans? Or might we find it in the face of a cockatoo?

Tanya Riches directs the Masters of Transformational Development at Eastern University and is an all-round fantastic human. Her reflections spark Will and Caro's imagination and they discuss a range of ideas you might want to try out in your own life and/or faith community.

Listen to Tanya's full talk from Future Church (and all other keynote sessions) here: 
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCsFveo-xYmS3nYRJAMrVmew

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Will, Mitch and Caro get round the table and discuss some listener questions, like: Is it actually unethical to have kids given the state of the world? how do you respond to thought-stopping church clichés? And then Will shares the question on his mind: do you believe in aliens, and would it matter to your theology if they showed up tomorrow? 

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Previous Spiritual Misfits episodes mentioned:

• Blood, Wrath & Love: What Actually Happened on the Cross? (with Mitch Forbes) 
• A More Christlike God: Bradley Jersak on Faith After Deconstruction
• Future Church Series: Uncle Ray Minniecon and the Scarred Tree

The Documentary Will mentions:

UFOs: Investigating the Unknown — National Geographic documentary series on Disney+

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We're kicking off a new mini-series looking back at talks from Future Church Conference 2026 — after playing a short excerpt from the talk, Will and Caro unpack it together. 

First up: Uncle Ray Minniecon, a Kabi Kabi and Goreng Goreng elder of South East Queensland, with South Sea Islander heritage. Uncle Ray co-founded Scarred Tree Ministries in Glebe, Sydney, and has spent decades as a leading voice for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander justice, reconciliation, and self-determination within the Australian church.

The full version of Uncle Ray's talk (and all other Future Church keynotes) is now available at: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCsFveo-xYmS3nYRJAMrVmew

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Janet Kellogg Ray returns to Spiritual Misfits to talk about her new book, Fish with Feet: Human Evolution and the Image of God. We dig into why human evolution remains uniquely offensive even to people who accept evolution everywhere else, debunk the "if we came from monkeys, why are there still monkeys?" myth, and explore what it means to be evolved creatures, made in the Image of God.

Janet argues the real motivation behind most anti-evolution theology isn't evidence, it's a need to protect a prior doctrine (original sin, biblical inerrancy), and that starting with the evidence instead doesn't have to mean losing your faith, it might mean finding a more honest one.

Order the new book here: https://www.eerdmans.com/9780802885616/fish-with-feet/

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Matthew Vines has spent many years making the case that Christians can and should embrace same-sex marriage — his book God and the Gay Christian helped a generation of people reconcile their faith and sexuality. So when he recently distanced himself from queer theology, first in a conversation on the Uncommon Ground podcast and then in a New York Times piece titled "I'm Gay, Not Queer. It Matters," it set off a firestorm.

Karl Hand — pastor at Crave Church (Metropolitan Community Church), theologian, and longtime friend of the show — joins Will to sit inside the mess of it. This is a conversation that tries to hold two things at once: real, substantive pushback on where Matthew's argument goes wrong, and real gratitude for what his earlier work made possible. Along the way, Karl untangles what "queer" actually means across identity, activism, and theory, three things Karl argues Matthew's article quietly collapses into one.

A note before you press play: this conversation touches on trauma connected to church rejection, queerphobia, and sexual ethics. Take care of yourself, and feel entirely free to skip this one if it's not what you need right now.

The Matthew Vines NYT article:
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/06/30/opinion/queer-gay-rights.html

Books Karl references:

Butler, Judith (1990).  Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity. New York: Routledge.

Rubin, Gayle (1984). "Thinking Sex: Notes for a Radical Theory of the Politics of Sexuality." In Pleasure and Danger: Exploring Female Sexuality. Boston: Routledge.

Halperin, David M. (1995) Saint Foucault: Towards a gay hagiography. Oxford University Press.

Matthew Vines quoted Halperin without providing broader context. Here are those quotes in their original context:

“Queer is by definition whatever is at odds with the normal, the legitimate, the dominant. There is nothing in particular which it necessarily refers. It is an identity without an essence. "Queer," then, demarcates not a positivity but a positionality vis-a-vis the normative—a positionality that is not restricted to lesbians and gay men but is in fact available to anyone who is or who feels marginalized because of her or his sexual practices: it could include some married couples without children, for example, or even (who knows?) some married couples with children—with, perhaps, very naughty children.” p. 62

“Perhaps I should say that I don't intend this argument to be understood as advocating the adoption of the term "queer" in preference to the term "gay" or as providing partisan support for the politics of Queer Nation. First of all, it is not for me to suggest what words the members of sexual constituencies should use to designate or identify themselves. Second, the only thing that need be said about Queer Nation in this context is that it is significantly less queer, in the sense in which I am using the term, than, say, ACT UP, whose style of direct-action politics and activist glamor Queer Nation has attempted to replicate for the purpose of creating a movement of young lesbian and gay radicals defined by no other issue than that of sexual orientation.” p. 63

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Today is a replay of one of the most listened-to Spiritual Misfits episodes of all time — not because of a spike when it dropped, but because people just keep coming back to it. Every week, someone finds this conversation and sends it to a friend, or stumbles across it scrolling back through the feed.

Becca, Caro and Will discuss the question: for those of us who grew up in evangelical Christian households, how are we raising our kids today?

Even if that's not your exact story — not everyone grew up evangelical, not everyone has kids — there's something about reflecting on inheritance: what we keep, what we leave behind, and why it matters to think carefully about both.

This episode is three years old, which means we're all in slightly different places than we were then. We're planning to revisit this topic in an upcoming episode — and before we do, we'd love to hear from you. Got a question or a story about how parenting and faith has shifted for you over time? Email [email protected].

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When people ask Jessica Morthorpe what gives her hope, she gets a little wary. Sometimes it feels like they're really asking for permission to stop worrying — to feel better so they don't have to act. And that's why hope is complicated. Offered too cheaply, it becomes a sedative.

In this episode, Will and Caro speak with Jess — founder of the Five Leaf Eco Awards — about sitting honestly in that tension. How can we nurture hope that grows through participation, community and action?

Along the way the three explore why caring for creation was never a fringe issue, how a community garden can become a place that literally saves lives, sitting with climate grief without rushing past it, and the ancient gifts the church has been carrying all along — that might be exactly what an anxious and lonely world needs now.

Connect with more of Jessica's work at:
https://fiveleafecoawards.org/  https://climatepastoralcare.thinkific.com/

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Carolyn Meers guides us through a winter reflection on the healing power of slowing down. Where ever you find yourself when you hit 'play' this is a kind and gentle invitation to move differently through whatever activities this day may hold, drawing on an ancient prayer from St Aidan of Lindisfarne, alongside some poetry by Mary Oliver.

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Pearl is a queer pastor with a PhD in history. Rev Kev is a former missionary who now sometimes identifies as an atheist pastor. Together, they are forming a new church community in Maitland — with misfits front of mind. Will is joined by Pearl and Kev in Mitch Forbes' office, where the four of them have a conversation about queering the bible, exploring negative/apophatic theology and how these approaches might translate into the formation of a new church.

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Are apologists grifters? What happened to all the New Atheists? Can progressives Christians present a more compelling vision of faith that still has some backbone?

Mitch and Will get into a free-ranging pub theology conversation that somehow ends up exactly where it needs to — thinking about what it looks like to communicate a more beautiful, more honest vision of Christianity for the times we live in.

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