The Distillery

What happens when ordinary friendships become something deeper, something more sacred, something—dare we say—holy? On this episode, Victoria Atkinson White shares from her new book Holy Friendships: Nurturing Relationships that Sustain Pastors and Leaders. Explore the nature of “holy friendships”: how they’re formed, their benefits, and how they might be a key for sustaining those who lead.

Guest: Victoria Atkinson White | Host: Shari Oosting

Questions of how the Bible should be read by modern Christians have never been more important than they are today. What does it mean to read the Bible through a sociohistorical lens? Can identifying the politics of its ancient Judean writers help us navigate the twenty-first century? On this episode of The Distillery, Jonathan Lee Walton discusses his book A Lens of Love: Reading the Bible in Its World for Our World. Join us as we explore the dangers of biblical literalism, unpack alternative approaches to hard-to-interpret texts, and discover how the Bible can lead us to a new moral imagination. 

Guest: Jonathan Lee Walton | Host: Shari Oosting

In an age of secularization, church planters face new, unexpected obstacles. Could the key to solving their problems be found in ministries started by marginalized communities? In this episode, Reverend Dr. Alexia Salvatierra and Reverend Brandon Wrencher discuss their new book Buried Seeds, an exploration of base ecclesial communities in the Global South and the hush harbors founded in secret by enslaved Africans throughout the American Antebellum South. Together, they might provide a blueprint for a new era of church engagement.

Guests: Alexia Salvatierra and Brandon Wrencher | Host: Shari Oosting

What does it look like for Christians to live in a pluralistic society? What can be learned from neighbors who practice different religious traditions? 

In this episode, Barbara Brown Taylor shares from her book “Holy Envy: Finding God in the Faith of Others”. We discuss her journey from pew to pulpit to professors’ desk, and the lessons she learned from teaching Religion 101 to American college students. Listen as she shares the profound insights about what it means to love our religiously different neighbor as ourselves and how to engage with and learn from religious traditions that are not our own. Taylor is an Episcopal priest, academic, and New York Times best selling author.

Guest: Barbara Brown Taylor | Host: Shari Oosting

In the wake of the Jesus Movement’s emergence from the underground, designated worship spaces like churches began to be seen as sacred spaces in and of themselves. How did this happen? According to Mary K. Farag, it was the result of centuries of debate between ancient Roman jurists, Catholic bishops, artists, and theologians. Farag is Assistant Professor of Early Christian Studies at Princeton Theological Seminary, and her research focuses on Christian liturgical practices in late antiquity and their role in the wider Greco-Roman, Byzantine, and Islamic worlds. In this episode Farag shares from her book “What Makes a Church Sacred?: Legal and Ritual Perspectives from Late Antiquity.”  

Guest: Mary Farag | Host: Shari Oosting

White evangelical support for Trump was not surprising, according to Kristin Kobes Du Mez, professor of history and gender studies at Calvin University. In this episode, we talk about her book, Jesus and John Wayne: How White Evangelicals Corrupted a Faith and Fractured a Nation, which explores how a popular Hollywood movie star helped to shape a cult of masculinity that put several presidents, including Trump, in the White House.

With institutional distrust seemingly at all-time highs, nearly 40% of Generation Z claims no religious affiliation. It’s a startling revelation, one magnified by studies announcing Gen Z as both the most diverse and most lonely generation on record. In this week’s episode, we sit down with Dr. Josh Packard, the Executive Director of the Springtide Research Institute, to discuss his work exploring the faith, spirituality, and churchgoing habits of Generation Z. Listen to this frank conversation about how faith leaders should and should not engage these religious seekers in a COVID-shaped world. 

In this episode of The Distillery, we talk with the Rev. Dr. Jamie Eaddy Chism, the director of program development for the International End of Life Doula Association and 2015 Fellow of the Black Theology and Leadership Institute at Princeton Theological Seminary, about her work as a certified trauma professional and death counselor. In this conversation, she shares how she journeys with those dealing with death, grief, and learning to live with loss. 

The Rev. Jamie Eaddy Chism, DMin., CT, CTP, the CEO of Thoughtful Transitions, is an ordained minister, death doula, educator and serves as the Director of Program Development at the International End of Life Doula Association. Deeply committed to challenging the societal norms that make death a forbidden topic for so many people, Dr. Eaddy Chism helps cultivate sacred spaces for exploring our mortality. Her work with loss does not center solely on the end of life. Instead, she helps people navigate all kinds of loss, including losing a relationship, identity, normalcy, dreams, hope, etc. Providing trauma-informed care and dismantling a system that disregards black life, silences black grief, ignores black death, and shames the Black griever is her life's passion. Dr. Eaddy Chism earned a Doctor of Ministry degree with an emphasis in Transformative Leadership and Prophetic Preaching from the Colgate Rochester Crozer Divinity School and a Master of Divinity degree from the Samuel DeWitt Proctor School of Theology at Virginia Union University. She is a clinically trained chaplain, a certified trauma professional, and holds certification in Thanatology (death, dying and bereavement), from the Association of Death Education and Counseling (ADEC). She believes in therapy, that ALL Black Lives Matter and that a conversation with a good friend can save your life. She enjoys art, reading, traveling, 90's hip-hop and R&B, poetry, and pink lipstick.

For centuries, the mentally ill have been misunderstood and ostracized within religious communities. What would it mean to seriously transform how we view, discuss and treat those struggling with mental illness as Christians? In this episode, co-host Shari Oosting sits down with John Swinton, professor of practical theology and pastoral care at the University of Aberdeen Scotland to examine these questions, and discuss his new book, Finding Jesus in the Storm: The Spiritual Lives of Christians with Mental Health Challenges.

John Swinton is a Professor in Practical Theology and Pastoral Care and Chair in Divinity and Religious Studies at the University of Aberdeen. For more than a decade he worked as a registered mental health nurse. He also worked for a number of years as a hospital and community mental health Chaplain alongside people with severe mental health challenges who were moving from the hospital into the community. In 2004, he founded the University of Aberdeen’s Centre for Spirituality, Health and Disability. He has published widely within the area of mental health, dementia, disability theology, spirituality and healthcare, qualitative research and pastoral care. He is the author of a number of monographs including Becoming Friends of Time: Disability, Timefullness and Gentle Discipleship (Baylor Press 2017), Dementia: Living in the Memories of God (Eerdmans 2012), and Finding Jesus in the Storm: The Spiritual Lives of People with Mental Health Challenges. (Eerdmans 2020) . 

In this episode, Rev. Mark Elsdon talks to us about his book, “We Aren’t Broke: Uncovering Hidden Resources for Mission and Ministry," which explores how faith-based organizations can use investment assets and property for mission impact and financial resiliency. Listen as Elsdon challenges the idea of a scarcity mindset, arguing that the Church is wealthier now more than ever before, and shares transformative ways churches can invest funds to do good in the world.

Mark Elsdon lives and works at the intersection of money and meaning as an entrepreneur, pastor, consultant, and speaker. He is the author of the book, We Aren't Broke: Uncovering Hidden Resources for Mission and Ministry. Mark is co-founder of RootedGood, which seeks to create more good in the world through social innovation; executive director at Pres House on the University of Wisconsin's Madison campus; and owner of Elsdon Strategic Consulting. Mark is president of the board of directors of Working Capital for Community Needs (WCCN) an impact investing fund that provides micro-finance for the working poor in Latin America.  

Mark has a BA in Psychology from UC Berkeley, a Master of Divinity from Princeton Theological Seminary, and an MBA from the University of Wisconsin School of Business. Mark is an ordained minister in the Presbyterian Church, USA, and lives in Madison, Wisconsin with his spouse and two daughters. He is an avid cyclist and considers it a good year when he rides more miles on his bike than he drives in his car.