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With America heading into a 250th anniversary, we sit with an uncomfortable question Christians tend to dodge until it’s unavoidable: is patriotism a sin? With Malcolm on sabbatical, Slim goes solo and names why this topic feels so spiritually charged right now.

We start with the emotional pull of national pride, the summer nostalgia, the stories we tell ourselves about home and belonging. Then we turn and face the hard collisions: what do we do with a country we love when its history and violence? From there, we unpack why patriotism is uniquely tempting for Christians, because it borrows the language of religion: sacred symbols, rituals, songs, and pledges that can quietly train our hearts toward ultimate loyalty.

Next, we dig into a biblical view of patriotism and nationalism through the New Testament lens: citizenship in heaven, life as exiles, Jesus’ refusal to advance his kingdom through coercion, and the enemy love ethic of the Sermon on the Mount. We also take Romans 13 seriously, offering a more nuanced reading alongside insights from John Howard Yoder and themes echoed in Greg Boyd’s The Myth of a Christian Nation. Finally, we trace the historic shift after Constantine and ask the question that won’t go away: did the church convert the empire, or did the empire convert the church?

Before all that we look at 2 different denominational conversations happening right now.  1 in the SBC banning women Pastors and 1 in the PCUSA and Polyamory or Monogamy in the clergy. 

The Artificial Line and a point where we agree with Trump. 

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Malcolm Foley - on twitter @MalcolmBFoley
Slim Thompson on twitter @wacoslim

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Pastors w/ guns. Screens robbing our attention. Families losing income, homes, and loved ones through detention and deportation. If any of that makes your stomach drop, you’re not alone.  We need Sanctuary as christians!  We need Shalom.  We need Jesus. 

Today we sit down with Dianne Garcia, a Mennonite pastor in San Antonio who founded Iglesia Cristiana Roca De Refugio. Diane also leads a nonprofit Nuevos Vecinos serving hundreds of immigrant families. She walks us through what “mass deportation” actually looks like: work authorization stripped, exploitation at work, higher filing fees, loss of benefits, and relentless financial stress, and most devastating... family separation, with parents detained, deported, and children left behind trying to survive a system designed to create suffering.

Along the way, we wrestle with Christian nationalism, gun culture, just war theory, modern drone warfare, and explore one article's plea to reduce the screens in church.

Dianne's 90 Day March

Mejores Juntos

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For more information, you can follow us at
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Malcolm Foley - on twitter @MalcolmBFoley
Slim Thompson on twitter @wacoslim

For more information on the church,
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Today, we continue: "Theologians in SUV's Coming Back from the Airport". 

Listen in on an unfiltered conversation with Sho Baraka about creativity, Christian hip hop, and the hidden forces shaping the modern church. We start light and personal, talking Atlanta culture and the “many hats” Sho wears as a writer, cultural critic, speaker, and artist. From there, he walks us through his origin story: poetry, West Coast influences, freestyling, and the slow work of developing a voice that doesn’t sound like anyone else.

Then we zoom out to the music industry and the attention economy. Sho challenges the pressure to overproduce and to live inside the algorithm, and he names why promotion can feel less like honest communication and more like manipulation. If you’ve ever wondered why so much music feels rushed or hollow, you’ll hear a clear diagnosis and a better vision for making art with patience, maturity, and depth.

The conversation gets even sharper as we talk about the Western church, “relevance,” and the danger of being tethered to empire. Sho argues that what masquerades as church can become Christendom, Christianity shaped to please power. He also reflects on justice work, the temptation to let anger become condemnation, and the hard but hopeful path back through confession, repentance, and real community. If you care about faithfulness, public theology, racial solidarity, and the integrity of Christian witness, this one will stay with you. 

Sho came to Waco on he and Malcolm's "Good Culture In An Empire" Tour.  If you missed it here, reach out and see if they're coming to your city.  They have dates in Denver and Atlanta already lined up.  

Check all things Sho Baraka out at www.shobaraka.com/

His Book: He Saw That it Was Good

Latest Album: Spotify: Midnight of a Good Culture / Apple: Midnight of a Good Culture

The Bootmaker's Ballad (Music video) 

If this conversation helps you, follow the show, share it with a friend, and leave a review. Your support helps more people find thoughtful, grounded faith in a loud, fearful world.

For more information, you can follow us at
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Theology in Pieces on Instagram - @theologyinpieces

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Malcolm Foley - on twitter @MalcolmBFoley
Slim Thompson on twitter @wacoslim

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“Christ Is King” is everywhere right now and that’s exactly why we needed to slow down and ask what we’re actually confessing. We’re recording during Holy Week, and we feel the tension: the Resurrection is the center of Christian faith, but the name of Jesus keeps getting pulled into arguments about power, violence, and national identity. So we put the slogan on the table and ask whether it’s being used as comfort, as a threat, or as a shortcut to baptize the politics of empire. 

We discuss imprecatory psalms, the difference between the oppressed crying out for justice and an empire asking God to bless its weapons.  Also, are there  prayers that God ignores?  Does God listen to the prayers of the wicked? The Pope recently warned that God doesn't listen to those who wage war. 

We also take a look at our Mail Bag and there is one consistent theme.... $ Hope you enjoy!  Keep writing in!  

Sho Baraka & Malcolm's Good Culture in an Empire Event - April 17th! Get your tix. 

Resources discussed

Power Over vs. Power Under in Two-Kingdoms by Greg Boyd

The Myth of a Christian Nation: How the Quest for Political Power Is Destroying the Church by Greg Boyd

Pete Hegseth's Prayer

Terrible tweets:

"the worst of the worst"

Robert Morris released

If this conversation helps you, follow the show, share it with a friend, and leave a review. Your support helps more people find thoughtful, grounded faith in a loud, fearful world.

For more information, you can follow us at
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Theology in Pieces on Instagram - @theologyinpieces

Email us by emailing [email protected]

Malcolm Foley - on twitter @MalcolmBFoley
Slim Thompson on twitter @wacoslim

For more information on the church,
check us out at www.mosaicwaco.org or on instagram.  

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“Christian socialism” can sound like a contradiction if you’ve been taught that Christianity and capitalism belong together. We slow the whole thing down and ask a better question: what does the gospel actually announce, and what kind of economic life should that announcement produce? Along the way, we respond to a debate clip that tries to shrink the gospel into “Jesus’ finished work” while treating justice as merely an implication. We argue that the good news is bigger, more public, and more demanding than that, without turning works into a way to earn salvation.

Then we get honest about how systems shape souls. Capitalism is not just private property and Starbucks choices. It’s a moral formation built around profit motive, endless growth, and “voluntary exchange” that often isn’t voluntary when it involves housing, healthcare, wages, and survival. We connect modern wealth to empire history, including the doctrine of discovery and the long chain of dispossession that set the table for today’s inequality. If the top owns staggering wealth while the poor are crushed, the question isn’t only “did you personally exploit?” but “what does it mean to retain excess while your neighbor suffers?”

We also define socialism in plain language, talk about why so many “failed socialism” examples ignore U.S. intervention, and bring the conversation back to Scripture: Jubilee, debt forgiveness, gleaning, Acts 2, and Acts 4. Our bottom line is not blind faith in the state but a call for the church to offer a real economic witness in the shadow of empire, so there are no needy among us.

Books, Articles, and Notes:

John Perkins Stood Almost Alone - (Russell Moore) The civil rights leader treated love of God and love for others as inseparable.

Tax the Rich: How Lies, Loopholes, and Lobbyists Make the Rich even Richer

It's Basically Just Immoral to Be Rich

Malcolm's Debate

Thaddeus Williams RECAP of the debate.

The Case for Christian Socialism

Christianity and Capitalism are Incompatible

Institute for Christian Socialism

If this conversation helps you, follow the show, share it with a friend, and leave a review. Your support helps more people find thoughtful, grounded faith in a loud, fearful world.

For more information, you can follow us at
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Theology in Pieces on Instagram - @theologyinpieces

Email us by emailing [email protected]

Malcolm Foley - on twitter @MalcolmBFoley
Slim Thompson on twitter @wacoslim

For more information on the church,
check us out at www.mosaicwaco.org or on instagram.  

Send us a Question!

Is this it?  Are we now living in the endtimes?  Has America kicked off Armageddon?  Recently some commanders are framing this war as part of God’s endgame. We take a hard, careful look at how Armageddon is being invoked to bless violence and ask what Revelation 16 actually means. Drawing on Israel’s story at Megiddo in Judges 4–5, we show how John’s apocalyptic imagery points to God’s pattern of deliverance, not a geopolitical countdown. Along the way we confront the claim that any person is “anointed” to light the fuse of history, and we return to Jesus’ own warning: no one knows the day or hour. 

From failed predictions and culture-war sermons to modern war rhetoric, we map the through-line: when power borrows God’s name, people get hurt.  We contrast the mountain of Armageddon with the hill of Calvary, where God’s power looks like self-giving love, not shock and awe. Then we pivot to practice—how communities can protect immigrants, rebuild trust, and recover moral credibility before chasing policy wins. The real battle is not a theatrical showdown in the Middle East; it’s the daily war within our hearts against pride, greed, anger, and fear.

Come for the scripture, stay for the honesty. If you’re weary of end-times hype and hungry for a faith that resists empire and clings to Christ, this conversation is for you. 

Terrible Tweets:

Iran is God's plan to start Armageddon

John Haggee's framing...

Marco Rubio on Radical Clerics leading a nation...

Paula White's Prophecy over Trump

If this conversation helps you, follow the show, share it with a friend, and leave a review. Your support helps more people find thoughtful, grounded faith in a loud, fearful world.

For more information, you can follow us at
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Theology in Pieces on Instagram - @theologyinpieces

Email us by emailing [email protected]

Malcolm Foley - on twitter @MalcolmBFoley
Slim Thompson on twitter @wacoslim

For more information on the church,
check us out at www.mosaicwaco.org or on instagram.  

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Mortality on the forehead. Stories in the bones. That’s the current we ride as we swap ash-streaked reflections, step behind the scenes of a first Ash Wednesday service, and welcome Dr. Sorina Higgins—editor, teacher, and scholar of the Inklings—into a wide-open conversation about imagination, power, and the words we use on each other.

We start with the tactile: making ashes from last year’s palms, the awkward tenderness of tracing a cross on a child, and the pastoral decision to preach less and shepherd more. From there, Sorins reframes C. S. Lewis’s “space trilogy” as the Ransom Cycle, where adventure asks real questions: What would an unfallen world look like? What’s the role of science and marriage in a dystopia? How do we name “the heavens” without reducing them to empty space? Along the way we meet Tolkien, Barfield, and Charles Williams, and we learn how their fellowship made room for difference while insisting on beauty, goodness, and truth.

Imagination isn’t child's play; it’s a tool of resistance. Sorina maps the ancient debate over images in prayer, showing how sanctified imagination can serve truth. She also draws a bright line between symbolic “magic” in fantasy—think Aslan’s breath as a sign of the Spirit—and real occult practice. Then we turn to today’s landscape: the strange overlap between spirituality and politics, the speed at which online disagreement becomes dehumanization, and what her podcast, Words Do Things, has taught her about persuasion, pluralism, and patience. The hardest charge lands at the pulpit: Pastor's Are the Problem. We sketch another way—cross-shaped leadership that welcomes those we fear, forms people who can bear difference, and trusts beauty to do its quiet work.

We close with a sonnet and an invitation to keep learning. If this conversation stirred you—if you want a church where ash, story, and courage belong together—follow, share, and leave a review. What story is shaping your faith right now?

Links:

ICE detention camp in Dilley, Texas

Caduceus

If this conversation helps you, follow the show, share it with a friend, and leave a review. Your support helps more people find thoughtful, grounded faith in a loud, fearful world.

For more information, you can follow us at
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Theology in Pieces on Instagram - @theologyinpieces

Email us by emailing [email protected]

Malcolm Foley - on twitter @MalcolmBFoley
Slim Thompson on twitter @wacoslim

For more information on the church,
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Send us a Question!

**As you may be able to tell...Malcolm's mic wasn't on for today's episode. You'll still hear him through Slim's mic, but its noticeably worse.  

All Apologies** Now, for the Episode...

When the Empire Demands Your Gaze, Fix Your Eyes on Christ.  We start with the killing of Minnesota nurse Alex Pretti by ICE agents and the rush to label, excuse, and move on. From media spin to the refusal to apologize even after video surfaces, we trace how propaganda thrives on the rightness of your side and how that rightness corrodes the social order and our humanity. Then we pivot to a harder task: learning to resist the outrage economy without going numb. Attention is formation. If we stare at empire all day, it will shape us.

That tension carries into our deep dive on discipleship and effort. Michael Horton argues: Disciplines don't Save. Christ Does. First we ask... who is making this argument?  He assigns the blame at the feet of John Mark Comer, but we wonder if this is just his own allergic reaction to any striving on the Christian's' part.  

With Lent on the horizon, we make a practical case for a season that trains love: prayer that reshapes attention, fasting that clears space for a greater good, and almsgiving that breaks greed’s grip. Ash Wednesday’s “remember you are dust” is not punishment; it’s clarity. When mortality is set against resurrection, repentance becomes hopeful, not heavy. Along the way we share listener mail on art and hypocrisy, talk through pastoral judgment on addressing current events, and laugh about our own cringey “stop trying so hard” era.

Let us know what you think!  

Video or no-video?

JD VANCE - no apologies 

Garret Bearanger - eyes back on Christ

https://www.christianitytoday.com/2026/01/disciplines-dont-save-christ-does/

Larry Norman - Fallen Angel

If this conversation helps you, follow the show, share it with a friend, and leave a review. Your support helps more people find thoughtful, grounded faith in a loud, fearful world.

For more information, you can follow us at
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Theology in Pieces on Instagram - @theologyinpieces

Email us by emailing [email protected]

Malcolm Foley - on twitter @MalcolmBFoley
Slim Thompson on twitter @wacoslim

For more information on the church,
check us out at www.mosaicwaco.org or on instagram.  

Send us a Question!

A tour is on the calendar, a new book is brewing, and our inbox lit the fuse: what happens to your faith when you step off social media and start searching for unspun news about Gaza, empire, and the stories we’re told? We open the year by taking a hard look at propaganda, grief, and how easy it is to let a nation define “we” for the church. 

Then we head to the movies, where a whodunit surprised us. Wake Up Dead Man puts two versions of Christianity on display: a combative, us-versus-them posture that bleeds people, and a pastoral presence that stops the action to pray, receives confession, and announces forgiveness. 

*** SPOLIERS IN THIS EPISODE***

We push back on TGC's review of the movie contrasted with their review of the animated movie: David, which stays close to the text yet leans triumphalist and one-noted, raising a bigger question: do we want art to be good, or branded as “ours”?

Here’s our take: art is not a sermon. Common grace means truth can surface where you don’t expect it, and excellence matters more than labels. If the New Testament church could live under empire and still sing, confess, and forgive, then we can learn to watch and create stories that widen our empathy and sharpen our hope without compromising conviction.

Articles/Links mentioned:

Two Corrupted Christianities

TGC's David Review

Jake Randolph's Knives Out: Wake Up Deadman Review

Terrible Tweets:

"Today is the most humiliating day in the history of the United States of America. At least until tomorrow."

Trump's Unhinged Letter to Denmark

If this conversation helps you, follow the show, share it with a friend, and leave a review. Your support helps more people find thoughtful, grounded faith in a loud, fearful world.

For more information, you can follow us at
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Theology in Pieces on Instagram - @theologyinpieces

Email us by emailing [email protected]

Malcolm Foley - on twitter @MalcolmBFoley
Slim Thompson on twitter @wacoslim

For more information on the church,
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Send us a Question!

The Winner of 2025's best episode this past year was:

Episode 56 - The Anti-Greed Gospel: A Revolutionary Conversation with Malcolm Foley on the Battle with Mammon.

No surprise.  Malcolm is pretty great.  Thank you all for listening, sharing, and reviewing!  Keep sharing in 2026.  We're working on a few things behind the scenes to make this podcast even better.  

Runner's up from 2025:

• "t"
• I Stand with Israel? When Empires Claim His Name...

If you haven't listened to our back catalog - Start with to today's episode, then check these two out, and let us know what episode has caught your attention! 

Links from this episode:

• Trump Gaza
• "I...We are the Law"
• "He who saves his Country does not violate any Law"
• Megan Basham's critique of the Black Fellowship Dinner
• David French's kind response to an "opponent."

If this conversation helps you, follow the show, share it with a friend, and leave a review. Your support helps more people find thoughtful, grounded faith in a loud, fearful world.

For more information, you can follow us at
https://www.theologyinpieces.com/
Theology in Pieces on Instagram - @theologyinpieces

Email us by emailing [email protected]

Malcolm Foley - on twitter @MalcolmBFoley
Slim Thompson on twitter @wacoslim

For more information on the church,
check us out at www.mosaicwaco.org or on instagram.