The Englewood Review of Books Podcast

Joel hosted a conversation with two first-time podcast guests all about 'CCM' or 'Contemporary Christian Music.' They explore various cultural aspects of 'CCM,' as well as the reality of profit-driven corporate influence. Larry Norman figures prominently in their discussion, and Joel reflects a bit on his experience as a 90s kid immersed in this industry.

Leah Payne is Associate Professor of American Religious History at Portland Seminary and a 2023–2024 Public Fellow at the Public Religion Research Institute (PRRI). She holds a Ph.D. from Vanderbilt University and her research explores the intersection of religion, politics, and popular culture. Payne is co-host of Rock That Doesn’t Roll, a Public Radio Exchange (PRX) podcast about Christian rock and its listeners and Weird Religion, a religion and pop culture podcast, as well as the author of the new book God Gave Rock & Roll to You: a History of Contemporary Christian Music (Oxford University Press, 2024).

Gregory Alan Thornbury, currently serves as Executive Director of Silver Art Projects at the World Trade Center. He has spent the past 25 years in higher education and arts nonprofits, as a professor, college dean, vice president, and president. Most recently, he served in senior leadership as Vice President at the New York Academy of Art in Tribeca, founded by Andy Warhol. In addition to being a curator, he is a scholar of art, philosophy, and religion, and his most recent book is "Why Should the Devil Have All the Good Music?: Larry Norman and the Perils of Christian Rock" (Convergent Books, 2018).

Books Mentioned in this Episode:

If you’d like to order any of the following books, we encourage you to do so from Hearts and Minds Books(An independent bookstore in Dallastown, PA, run by Byron and Beth Borger) 

• God Gave Rock and Roll to You: A History of Contemporary Christian Music by Leah Payne
• Why Should the Devil Have All the Good Music? Larry Norman and the Perils of Christian Rock by Gregory Alan Thornbury
• Evangelicals, Incorporated: Books and the Business of Religion in America by Daniel Vaca
• Diary of a Wimpy Kid by Jeff Kinney
• Missions Begin with Blood: Suffering and Salvation in the Borderlands of New Spain by Brandon Bayne
• From Bible Belt to Sunbelt: Plain-Folk Religion, Grassroots Politics and the Rise of Conservative Evangelicalism by Darren Dochuck
• The Heaven and Earth Grocery Story by James McBride
• Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin
• Encounters: Experiences with Nonhuman Intelligences by D. W. Pasulka
• Why We Can't Sleep by Darian Leader
• Modern Genre Theory: An Introduction for Biblical Studies by Andrew Judd
• You Like it Darker: Stories by Stephen King

The audio for this episode was recorded during a live event in collaboration with The Table and Gravity Commons, in which Matt Tebbe interviewed Jon DePue (co-author of 'Beyond Justification' with Douglas Campbell). The conversation focuses on the themes of this book, common interpretations of Paul's theology and ways to re-approach Paul with new lenses.

Books Mentioned in this Episode:

If you’d like to order any of the following books, we encourage you to do so from Hearts and Minds Books(An independent bookstore in Dallastown, PA, run by Byron and Beth Borger) 

• Beyond Justification: Liberating Paul's Gospel by Douglas Campbell and Jon DePue
• Four Views on the Apostle Paul ed. by Michael F. Bird
• The Deliverance of God: An Apocalyptic Rereading of Justification in Paul's Gospel by Douglas Campbell

Chris sat down at the recent CCDA conference with two first-time podcast guests, Stephanie Vander Lugt and Kimberlee Medicine Horn Jackson, each of whom hosted CCDA workshops. They discuss their work as it relates to the religious practices of indigenous people, the importance of attentiveness, and of course, what they are currently reading.

**This episode is sponsored by InterVarsity Press, publisher of 'Zion Learns to See.' When Zion joins her dad at work, she discovers that a day at the community center brings new and wonderful people into her life. Inspired by real events, this children’s book by Terence Lester and his daughter Zion, allows kids and adults to learn with Zion about people experiencing homelessness and see how she is moved to respond as she recognizes that all people matter to God. Zion Learns to See, a new IVP Kids book by Terence Lester and Zion Lester.

Books Mentioned in this Episode:

If you’d like to order any of the following books, we encourage you to do so from Hearts and Minds Books(An independent bookstore in Dallastown, PA, run by Byron and Beth Borger) 

• Slow Church: Cultivating Community in the Patient Way of Jesus by C. Christopher Smith and John Pattison
• Land of the Spotted Eagle by Luther Standing Bear
• Devotions: The Selected Poems of Mary Oliver
• Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge and the Teaching of Plants by Robin Wall Kimmerer
• The Christian Imagination: Theology and the Origins of Race by Willie James Jennings
• Consider the Birds: A Provocative Guide to Birds of the Bible by Debbie Blue
• Inciting Joy: Essays by Ross Gay
• The Book of (More) Delights: Essays, Book 2 by Ross Gay
• The Uncontrollability of the World by Hartmut Rosa
• An American Sunrise: Poems by Joy Harjo

Chris hosted a lively and interactive conversation between first-time guest David Fitch and returning guest Myles Werntz concerning the thesis of David's brand-new book from Brazos Press, the use of power in ministry and the institution of the church, whether power and conflict can be leveraged healthily in community, and of course what they are currently reading.

Books Mentioned in this Episode:

If you’d like to order any of the following books, we encourage you to do so from Hearts and Minds Books(An independent bookstore in Dallastown, PA, run by Byron and Beth Borger) 

• Reckoning with Power: Why the Church Fails When it's on the Wrong Side of Power by David Fitch
• From Isolation to Community: A Renewed Vision For Christian Life Together by Myles Werntz
• Sanctorum Communio: A Theological Study of the Sociology of the Church by Dietrich Bonhoeffer
• Life Together: The Classic Exploration of Faith in Community by Dietrich Bonhoeffer
• Myles' Substack
• Myles' Review of 'Reckoning with Power' for Christianity Today
• Pachinko by Min Jin Lee
• Shadow Work by Ivan Illich
• The Universal Christ: How a Forgotten Reality Can Change Everything We See, Hope For, and Believe by Richard Rohr
• God's Israel and the Israel of God: Paul and Supersessionism by Michael Bird and Scot McKnight
• Five Lies of Our Anti-Christian Age by Rosaria Butterfield
• Gender as Love: A Theological Account of Human Identity, Embodied Desire and Our Social Worlds by Fellipe do Vale

Jen sat down (live!) with two first-time podcast guests at the recent CCDA conference: E.K. Strawser and Lisa Rodriguez-Watson. They have an impassioned discussion about the importance of contextualizing discipleship work in the setting of the local congregation, as well as the importance of Western Christians listening to the global church.

Books Mentioned in this Episode:

If you’d like to order any of the following books, we encourage you to do so from Hearts and Minds Books(An independent bookstore in Dallastown, PA, run by Byron and Beth Borger) 

• Centering Discipleship: A Pathway for Multiplying Spectators into Mature Disciples by E.K. Strawser
• How to be an Anti-Racist by Ibram X. Kendi
• Rise: A Pop History of Asian America from the Nineties to Now by Jeff Yang, Phil Yu & Phillip Yang
• Prayer in the Night: For Those Who Work or Watch or Weep by Tish Harrison Warren
• When the Crawdads Sing by Delia Owens
• Demon Copperhead: A Novel by Barbara Kingsolver

Chris sat down with 3 co-authors and first-time podcast guests at the recent CCDA conference to discuss their work in the intersection of the topics of disability, inclusion, ministry leadership and the life of the church.

Books Mentioned in this Episode:

• Disabling Leadership: A Practical Theology for the Broken Body of Christ by Andrew Draper, Jody Michele & Andrea Mae
• A Disability History of the United States by Kim Nielsen
• How the Body of Christ Talks by C. Christopher Smith
• The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoyevsky
• Disability Visibility: First-Person Stories from the Twenty-First Century edited by Alice Wong

The podcast crew (Jen, Chris & Joel) is joined once again by Ashley Hales for our favorite topic: the books we enjoyed the most this year! ERB Contributors from 2023 also offer their suggestions throughout, so we cover a wide, wide range of titles. Enjoy this veritable feast of reading suggestions to keep you occupied until next year!

Books Mentioned in this Episode:

If you’d like to order any of the following books, we encourage you to do so from Hearts and Minds Books(An independent bookstore in Dallastown, PA, run by Byron and Beth Borger) 

• Remaking the World: How 1776 Created the Post-Christian West by Andrew Wilson
• Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver
• David Copperfield by Charles Dickens
• How to Stay Married: The Most Insane Love Story Ever Told by Harrison Scott Key
• Stolen Focus: Why You Can't Pay Attention - And How to Think Deeply Again by Johann Hari
• All My Knotted-Up Life: A Memoir by Beth Moore
• You Could Make this Place Beautiful: A Memoir by Maggie Smith
• The Kingdom, The Power and the Glory: American Evangelicalism in an Age of Extremism by Tim Alberta
• Disobedient Women: How a Small Group of Faithful Women Exposed Abuse, Brought Down Pastors, and Ignited an Evangelical Reckoning by Sarah Stankorb
• Foster by Claire Keegan
• These Walls are Starting to Glow (chapbook) by Karen Bjork Kubin
• Box Office Gospel: Poems by Marissa Glover
• The Church in an Age of Secular Mysticisms: Why Spiritualities Without God Fail to Transform Us by Andrew Root
• The Other Evangelicals: A Story of Liberal, Black, Progressive, Feminist and Gay Christians - And the Movement That Pushed Them Out by Isaac Sharp
• The Evangelical Imagination: How Stories, Images and Metaphors Created a Culture in Crisis by Karen Swallow Prior
• Loving Disagreement: Fighting for Community Through the Fruit of the Spirit by Matt Mikalatos and Kathy Khang
• Christian Poetry in America Since 1940: An Anthology edited by Micah Mattix and Sally Thomas
• Rivermouth: A Chronicle of Language, Faith and Migration by Alejandro Oliva
• Sanctuary and Subjectivity: Thinking Theologically about Whiteness and Sanctuary Movements by Michael Woolf
• The Rise and Fall of Dispensationalism by Daniel Hummel
• The Scandal of Leadership by J.R. Woodward
• Joel's Interview with JR Woodward
• Zero at the Bone: Fifty Entries Against Despair by Christian Wiman
• The Crosswicks Journals by Madeliene L'Engle
• The Sayings and Stories of the Desert Fathers and Mothers (2 Volume Set) translated by Tim Vivian
• Where God Happens: Discovering Christ in One Another by Rowan Williams
• Christianity and Critical Race Theory: A Faithful and Constructive Conversation by Robert Chao Romero and Jeff Liou
• Christ Among the Classes: The Rich, The Poor and the Mission of the Church by Al Tizon
• Overcoming Apathy: Gospel Hope for those Who Struggle to Care by Uche Anizor

Jen welcomes co-authors Matt Mikalatos (returning ERB podcast guest) and Kathy Khang (first-time podcast guest) for an honest and heartfelt discussion about the topic of their recent book: disagreement and Christian unity.

Books Mentioned in this Episode:

If you’d like to order any of the following books, we encourage you to do so from Hearts and Minds Books(An independent bookstore in Dallastown, PA, run by Byron and Beth Borger) 

• Loving Disagreement: Fighting For Community Through the Life of the Spirit by Kathy Khang & Matt Mikalatos
• Raise Your Voice: Why We Stay Silent and How to Speak Up by Kathy Khang
• More Than Serving Tea: Asian American Women on Expectations, Relationships, Leadership and Faith ed. by Nikki Toyama & Tracey Gee
• Journey to Love: What We Long For, How to Find it, and How to Pass it on by Matt Mikalatos
• The Sunlit Lands Trilogy by Matt Mikalatos
• Mystery and Manners: Occasional Prose by Flannery O'Connor
• On Repentance and Repair: Making Amends in an Unapologetic World by Rabbie Danya Ruttenberg
• The Gospel of J. Edgar Hoover: How the FBI Aided and Abetted the Rise of White Christian Nationalism by Lerone Martin
• East of Eden by John Steinbeck
• The Wolfe at the Door by Gene Wolfe
• Jesus and John Wayne by Kristin Kobes Du Mez
• Solo Planet (forthcoming) by Anna Broadway
• The Bone Shard War (trilogy) by Andrea Stewart

Chris sat down with two first-time ERB Podcast guests, Soong-Chan Rah and Mark Charles, at the recent CCDA conference to discuss their work related to colonialism, race, history and the church.

Books Mentioned in this Episode:

If you’d like to order any of the following books, we encourage you to do so from Hearts and Minds Books(An independent bookstore in Dallastown, PA, run by Byron and Beth Borger) 

• Unsettling Truths: The Ongoing, Dehumanizing Legacy of the Doctrine of Discovery by Mark Charles and Soong-Chan Rah
• Prophetic Lament: A Call for Justice in Troubled Times by Soong-Chan Rah
• The Next Evangelicalism: Freeing the Church from Western Cultural Captivity by Soong-Chan Rah
• The Evangelical Imagination: How Stories, Images and Metaphors Created a Culture in Crisis by Karen Swallow Prior
• Modern Social Imaginaries by Charles Taylor
• The Land is Not Empty: Following Jesus in Dismantling the Doctrine of Discovery by Sarah Augustine
• How to Hide an Empire: A History of the Greater United States by Daniel Immerwahr
• Die with Zero: Getting All You Can from Your Money and Your Life by Bill Perkins

Joel took over the host role for a vulnerable and thoughtful conversation on the topic of forgiveness with two first-time ERB guests. They discuss their personal narratives and experiences with forgiveness, the ways dominant cultural discussions of forgiveness can distort the concept, and what they are currently reading.

Books Mentioned in this Episode:

If you’d like to order any of the following books, we encourage you to do so from Hearts and Minds Books(An independent bookstore in Dallastown, PA, run by Byron and Beth Borger) 

• Forgiveness: An Alternative Account by Matthew Ichihashi Potts
• Cormac McCarthy and the Signs of Sacrament: Literature, Theology and the Moral of Stories by Matthew Ichihashi Potts
• The Seeker and the Monk: Everyday Conversations with Thomas Merton by Sophfronia Scott
• Wild, Beautiful and Free: A Novel by Sophfronia Scott
• Love's Long Line (21st Century Essays) by Sophfronia Scott
• The Seven Storey Mountain by Thomas Merton
• The Moral Imagination: The Art and Soul of Building Peace by John Paul Lederach
• The Wisdom Way of Knowing: Reclaiming an Ancient Tradition to Awaken the Heart by Cynthia Bourgealt
• Moral Failure: On the Impossible Demands of Morality by Lisa Tessman
• Thunderstone: A True Story of Losing One Home and Discovering Another by Nancy Campbell
• LaRose: A Novel by Louise Erdrich
• The Buried Giant by Kazuo Ishiguro
• Be Useful by Arnold Schwarzenegger
• Walk the Blue Fields: Stories by Claire Keegan
• Small Things Like These by Claire Keegan
• Foster by Claire Keegan
• If Beale Street Could Talk by James Baldwin
• The Unsettled: A Novel by Ayana Mathis
• The Twelve Tribes of Hattie by Ayana Mathis
• Those We Thought We Knew by David Joy