The Magnificast

Folks, this week we got a chance to chat with William Gibson on the Student Christian Movement UK podcast. In the episode, we chat about solidarity, faith and action, and voting.

Find more from the SCM podcast here: https://open.spotify.com/show/5K5WY43VsMDucQPJftwZVA?si=5a09edf02d78410e

Intro Music by Amaryah Armstrong
Outro music by theillogicalspoon https://theillalogicalspoon.bandcamp.com/track/hoods-up-the-low-down-technified-blues
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Liberation theology is cool! But, what about theology done from inside revolutionary contexts like Cuba? This week we're discussing Cuban theologian Sergio Arce Martinez and his book The Church and Socialism. You can check out his book here on archive.org. What's interesting about Arce's work is that rather than theology as a critique of capitalism, you get theology as a constructive project of what Christians should do in a socialist society.

Intro Music by Amaryah Armstrong
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This week, we're talking about the recent news about Cornerstone University's decision to shutter all of their humanities departments and Christian higher education as a site of ideological reproduction.

Intro Music by Amaryah Armstrong 

Outro music by theillogicalspoon 

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With the recent passing of Jürgen Moltmann, we thought it would be worth chatting about some of his thoughts about the Christian-Marxist dialogue. In this episode, we talk about Jürgen Moltmann, Christian freedom, and what freedom movements have to say to one another. 
Check out the book here: 
https://archive.org/details/religionrevoluti0000molt/mode/1up

Intro Music by Amaryah Armstrong 

Outro music by theillogicalspoon 

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This week on the show, we're talking about a really neat book called Revolutionary Forgiveness: Feminist Reflections on Nicaragua by the Amanecida Collective. The book is a reflection on 13 theologians who took a number of trips to Nicaragua in the early 80's. The book highlights a lot of interesting interactions between Christianity and politics during the Nicaraguan Revolution. 

Find the book here: https://wipfandstock.com/9781666719802/revolutionary-forgiveness/

Intro Music by Amaryah Armstrong 
Outro music by theillogicalspoon
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Folks, The new Magnificast late night talk show is back with another round of headlines, current events, and rambling takes about democracy. This week we're talking about the conviction of Donald Trump, Global Elections, What's happening in the UK Labour party, and Cuba news. Tune in! 

Intro Music by Amaryah Armstrong 

Outro music by theillogicalspoon 

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This week, we're coming up for air and talking about some of the big trends in Christianity with regards to its declining membership and closing churches. Listen in and hear our takes on what it all means for Christians on the left.

Here are the links we mentioned in the show
https://www.churchofscotland.org.uk/news-and-events/news/articles/transgender-people-are-loved-by-god-and-welcome-in-the-church
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/article/2024/may/21/majority-of-people-in-scotland-do-not-believe-in-any-religion-census-shows
https://www.publishersweekly.com/pw/by-topic/industry-news/religion/article/94218-has-the-growth-in-nones-stalled.html#:~:text=After%20rising%20steadily%20since%202007,Article%20continues%20below
https://news.gallup.com/poll/507692/church-attendance-lower-pre-pandemic.aspx#:~:text=Church%20Attendance%2C%20Past%20Seven%20Days%2C%20Historical%20Trend&text=Church%20attendance%20in%20past%20seven,in%20most%20years%20before%202013.

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We've got another cool interview from the archive this week! 

This week the Magnifiboys are joined by journalist Olga Segura (@OlgaMSegura) a reporter at The National Catholic Reporter and author of the forthcoming book The Birth of A Movement: Black Lives Matter and the Catholic Church. In this episode, we talk about the silence and sometimes antagonism of the Catholic Hierarchy with regards to Black Lives Matter and how Black Catholic Lay people have responded to the movement.

Intro Music by Amaryah Armstrong 

Outro music by theillogicalspoon 

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Folks, we're Ireland pilled. This week we dive into Ireland and how liberation theology shows up in the 20th century struggles. As it turns out, it's complicated! Throughout the episode we talk about the history of Ireland, the troubles, Liberation theology and reconciliation.

Here are the books we talk about in this episode. 
https://archive.org/details/bwb_T2-DWJ-929
https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/journal-of-ecclesiastical-history/article/abs/catholic-church-and-the-northern-ireland-troubles-19681998-by-margaret-m-scull-pp-xii-236-incl-4-figs-1-map-and-1-table-oxfordnew-york-oxford-university-press-2019-65-978-0-19-884321-4/1C08A60FE0E7227967428983925EB301

Intro Music by Amaryah Armstrong 
Outro music by theillogicalspoon 
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Students have been organizing campus protests at universities across the world, so we're going to have a chat about it. This week, we talk about the campus protests from the level of strategy and pull together a few narrative threads about the faith angle to these protests. 

These are the articles we talked about in this episode 
https://sojo.net/articles/student-encampments-echo-jesus-parable-annoying-powerful
https://religionnews.com/2024/04/30/how-showing-up-for-student-protesters-may-teach-them-more-than-shouting-them-down/

Intro Music by Amaryah Armstrong 
Outro music by theillogicalspoon 
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Something cool about having a podcast is that you can talk about whatever you'd like and no one can stop you. This week, we're doing just that. We've both gotten really interested in photography as a hobby and practice, so we're talking about Vilém Flusser's Toward a Philosophy of Photography and also some ideas about how it relates to the photographs of Mev Puleo, a photographer who was involved in liberation theology.

You can find Mev Puleo's book The Struggle is one here: https://archive.org/details/struggleisonevoi0000pule/mode/2up

Intro Music by Amaryah Armstrong 
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This week, we're easing back into podcasting after taking a bit of a hiatus. So, we're getting back into the swing of things with some of our favorite goofs. Don't worry; next week, we'll be back with something a bit more substantive. Also, Dean's audio sounds bad...Sorry. 

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Podcasts are hard for busy and successful people like us. We're away travelling this week and next. But, we'll be back with fresh content later this month.

This time, Brett O'Shea from Rev Left Radio is joining us to talk about everyone's fav Irish revolutionary, James Connolly! If you're following along at home, you can check out the writings by Connolly that we read for this ep here: 
“Socialism and Religion” - 1899
“The Connolly-DeLeon Controversy” - 1904
 “Labour, Nationality and Religion” - 1910
“An Exchange on Rome and Irish Catholics” - 1912
“Catholicism, Protestantism and Politics” - 1913

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Podcasts are hard for busy and successful people like us. We're away travelling this week and next. But, we'll be back with fresh content later this month.

We're still out here doing this Bible study, and this time we're doing a classic, the parable of the talents! You might think God wants you to invest the gifts he's given you so you can grow his kingdom, but guess what, if you knew a ton of extremely niche information about the first century you'd find out you're wrong!

Intro Music by Amaryah Armstrong 
Outro music by theillogicalspoon
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This week, Matt is away travelling, so we're giving you a spicy episode from the vault! 

Theology? Yeah, it's boring. Liberation theology? It's DANGEROUS--well, at least according to the CIA! This week we take a look at a few right wing documents from the 1980's that recognize that liberation theology was a possible threat to US hegemony. 

Last week, we hit you with the first half of Richard Horsley's book, You Shall Not Bow Down and Serve Them, and this week, we have part two on Paul and his economic message. 

Intro Music by Amaryah Armstrong

Outro music by theillogicalspoon

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This week, we're back to reading books! We've got some hot takes about the economic message of the Gospels that you didn't learn about in church from Richard Horsley's book You Shall Not Bow Down and Serve Them. We'll be back with the second part of the book next week. 

Intro Music by Amaryah Armstrong 
Outro music by theillogicalspoon 
https://theillalogicalspoon.bandcamp.com/track/hoods-up-the-low-down-technified-blues
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It's an election year, which means that every person you know will tell you what they think about voting. We're no different. In this episode, we're talking about Joe Biden, the SOTU, Palestine, and the uncommitted vote. 

Intro: Amaryah Armstrong

Outro: theillalogicalspoon

You might have noticed that the podcast feed has been empty for a few weeks. Dean has been travelling the world and went all the way to Nepal to the World Social Forum to rub elbows with liberation theologians and activists. This week, Dean is back and ready to tell us all about it. 

Learn more about the World Social Forum here: https://www.wsf2024nepal.org/organization/activity/59

Happy Valentines Day/Ash Wednesday. Here's a classic ep to help us think about love. 

"Love is a power, and for that reason we cannot sequester it from all politics or keep it trapped in theological and mystical privacy. Love is not a neutral power that agrees with everything. But love lives precariously in a world that vacillates between not knowing what it is and subjecting it to the values of capital."

This week, Matt and Dean talk with Richard Gilman-Opalsky about his new book The Communism of Love
An Inquiry into the Poverty of Exchange Value (https://www.akpress.org/communismoflove.html.) 

Intro Music by Amaryah Armstrong 
Outro music by theillogicalspoon 
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Dean is halfway around the world at the World Social Forum talking liberation theology, so this week we're bringing you one from the archives. This conversation still seems timely given the new round of He Gets Us ads at the super bowl.

This week, Josiah Daniels has joined us from the frontlines of the culture war, where he's been reporting on the He Gets Us campaign for Sojourners. In this episode, we talk about the "elite capture" of Jesus, dark money, and the conservative Christian PR machine. 

Follow Josiah here: @josiah_Rdaniels
Read Josiah's piece here: https://sojo.net/articles/what-he-gets-us-ads-get-wrong-about-jesus
Listen to Josiah talk about this on NPR: https://www.npr.org/2023/02/11/1156344092/behind-the-he-gets-us-ads-for-jesus-airing-during-the-super-bowl

This week on the podcast we're thinking about the way St Francis approached animals in his life. To take the idea of animals a bit more seriously we read the book Animalia: An Anti-Imperial Bestiary for Our Times. In the episode, we talk about the imperial history of apes, dogs, cattle, whales, foxes and even unicorns! 

Check out the book here: https://www.dukeupress.edu/animalia#:~:text=The%20contributors%20to%20Animalia%20analyze,the%20history%20of%20Western%20imperialism.

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This week, we're taking a look at Leonardo Boff's 2014 book Francis of Rome, Francis of Assisi and talking through Boff's thoughts on reforming the Catholic church, how Pope Francis might do that, and what it means for Pope Francis to take up the project of St. Francis.

Intro Music by Amaryah Armstrong
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This week we're chatting with Alex Mikulich about his book Unlearning White Supremacy: A Spirituality for Racial Liberation. In the pod we talk about the importance of understanding the colonialist roots of Christianity, how white people can practice anti-racism, and what ecology and degrowth have to do with white supremacy. 

Check out the book here---> https://orbisbooks.com/products/unlearning-white-supremacy-a-spirituality-for-racial-liberation

You might have heard that this year we're making a big effort to read the Bible. In our reading plan, we just finished up reading Genesis, so in this week's episode, we're going to talk about our experience reading the first book of the bible. 

If you want to join the community of Magnificasters reading the bibe, then joins us over at patreon.com/themagnificast. 

That's right folks, Marika is back to talk about her new book out with SCM Press, Theology for the End of the World! Find Marika's other writing at the AUFS blog: https://itself.blog/author/cmarikarose

Today on the pod, we're taking a moment to think through the ongoing genocide in Palestine and Munther Isaac's Christmas sermon Christ in the Rubble. 

Palestine Resources
https://www.movement.org.uk/blog/palestine-resource-pack
https://www.redletterchristians.org/christ-in-the-rubble-a-liturgy-of-lament/

We're taking some time off for Christmas, so here's one from the archives! 

Ho Ho Ho, we're back with more Christmas content for all you Whos down in Whoville. This week, we talked with Pamela Klassen, a professor in the study of religion at the University of Toronto. She edited a rad collection of essays called The Public Work of Christmas and we're excited to talk with her and figure out what Christmas is all about! You can check out a preview of her book here: https://www.google.com/books/edition/The_Public_Work_of_Christmas/7FWXDwAAQBAJ?hl=en&gbpv=0
Music from NAVIDAD EN LIBERTAD ~ Carlos Mejia Godoy 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7DGwBQzsW4Q
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We're always talking about the importance of Christian solidarity with Cuba, but this week we're talking with some folks who recently went on a trip to build that solidarity! Listen in and hear about their experience, reflections, and thoughts about solidarity with Cuba and why it's important. You can also donate some money to cover the cost of their trip here: bit.ly/SCMCuba

What's Christmas really about anyway? Is it about getting presents? Peace on earth? Or the liberation of the poor and exploited? This week on the podcast we read a bit of Richard Horsley's The Liberation of Christmas, talk about biblical hermeneutics, and talk about the true meaning of Christmas. 

get the book here: https://wipfandstock.com/9781597525756/the-liberation-of-christmas/

COP 28 just got off the ground in the UAE, and we want to tell you about it. There's so much stuff going on in the world, but it's all happening against the background of climate change and the world's politicians and bureaucracies who are failing to take adequate action. In this episode, we talk about what COP 28 is, the loss and damage fund, and Pope Francis' intervention.

This week, Dean is down in Cuba, building Christian solidarity with the Student Christian Movement. So, enjoy this classic episode about the rich man and Lazarus.

Folks, on this podcast, we love the parables. This week we're talking about Luke 16:19 the Rich man and Lazarus. In the conversation, we talk about the historical context of the parable, the trope of class inversion, and just why the rich man was hell in the first place. 

In this episode, here are the books we talk about 

William Herzog - Parables as Subversive Speech
Ernesto Cardenal - The Gospel in Solentiame

Intro Music by Amaryah Armstrong 
Outro music by theillogicalspoon
https://theillalogicalspoon.bandcamp.com/track/hoods-up-the-low-down-technified-blues
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This week on the podcast, we're talking to Jewish liberation theologian Marc H. Ellis, about his new book First Light: Encountering Edward Said and the Late-Style Jewish Prophetic in the New Diaspora. Throughout the conversation, we chat with Marc about Edward Said, what it means to be a person of conscience, liberation theology and even his encounters with Dorothy Day! 

Get Marc's book First Light here: https://www.fulcrum.org/concern/monographs/73666732n

Intro Music by Amaryah Armstrong

Outro music by theillogicalspoon

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This week, we're giving you one of the episodes from the archive while we do some prep work for future episodes!

In 2018, Óscar Romero was canonized as a saint in the Catholic Church. His life and faith have been an important example to Christians on the left ever since his martyrdom. In this episode, we talk about the life and martyrdom of Saint Óscar Romero with Matt Eisenbrandt, author of The Assassination of a Saint. You can find his book here: http://www.assassinationofasaint.com/2017/01/02/247/

Last week, we chatted with Jonathan Kuttab of FOSNA and heard about how to be in solidarity with the Palestinian people. This week, we're digging in further by talking about Naim Ateek's A Palestinian Theology of Liberation. 

Find out more about Friends of Sabeel North America here: https://www.fosna.org

Intro Music by Amaryah Armstrong

Outro music by theillogicalspoon

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For the past 2 weeks, all eyes have been on Palestine. To talk about solidarity with Palestine we brought on Jonathan Kuttab, the director of Friends of Sabeel North America, to tell us about Palestinian Liberation Theology, the horrors of Israel's apartheid, and what the good news of Christianity is in light of that apartheid. 

Find out more about Friends of Sabeel North America here: https://www.fosna.org

Intro Music by Amaryah Armstrong

Outro music by theillogicalspoon

https://theillalogicalspoon.bandcamp.com/track/hoods-up-the-low-down-technified-blues

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With all that's going on this week, we Matt and Dean needed to take a minute, so this week we've got some classic content for you. Tune in next week for something new and interesting!  

We've spent more time than usual reading the Bible lately, but, as you might know, reading the Bible can be complicated. To get into how difficult it is, we read William Herzog's Parables as Subversive Speech and talk about the big history behind the context of the parables. 

Intro Music by Amaryah Armstrong 

Outro music by theillogicalspoon

https://theillalogicalspoon.bandcamp.com/track/hoods-up-the-low-down-technified-blues

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Folks, we’re back at it. Last week, we refreshed our memories about the Pope’s climate encyclical Laudato Si and how it connected with things like degrowth and dependency theory. But this week, we’re back with some breaking news. The Vatican has released Francis’ most recent apostolic exhortation Laudate Deum, and we will talk through it.

Last time, we pulled out some of Francis’ thoughts around dependency and the economy, and in this Laudate Deum, he’s back with a lot of similar themes, but this time, he’s way more cranky about it all––which makes sense given that Laudato Si came out eight years ago and things have only gotten worse.

So, in this episode, we will talk through Laudate Deum and see what’s changed and what’s stayed the same in those eight years.

Folk's we're on high alert here at the magnificast, because we are just DAYS away from Pope Francis dropping his follow up to Laudato Si, Laudate Deum. To get ourselves in the right headspace for this big moment, we're revisiting some of the big themes in Laudato Si. Everyone talks about the environmental themes, but we're really interested in the Pope's use of dependency theory. 

Put on your studying hat and let's get down to business preparing for the hottest Papal document of 2023! 

In China Mieville’s book A Spectre Haunting, he notes that the communist manifesto has an almost religious function. Mieville says it’s a type of catechesis and confession that the world does not have to be as it is. The Manifesto calls people to a type of “committed fidelity” to a world where a small group of people do not disadvantage the many for the sake of profits.

In that spirit of committed fidelity not only to the Christian faith but also a communist faith, we thought we’d make some space to chat about one of the classics, the communist manifesto. We’ve done explainer episodes on the manifesto before, but we’re not doing a 101 today; we’re going to think through the question that Mieville asks: what does it mean to be a person in 2023 and be committed to the vision of the world, for better and worse, presented in the manifesto?

This week on the show, we're joined by William Gibson, from SCM Britain, who recently attended a protest against the DSEI arms fair in London. Throughout the episode, we talk about the DSEI protest, theology, labor, and solidarity. 

You can follow William Here (https://twitter.com/willgibsongla) and find all of William's other projects here: https://www.liinks.co/william.gibson

Also, find out more about the Kirkridge Retreat Center here: kirkridge.org

Folks, we're back with more Planetary Theology. In this episode, we're going to tackle what Tissa Balasuriya thinks about ecumenicism and pluralistic worship and then we'll talk about his spirituality of justice. It's cool! 

Check out Planetary Theology by Tissa Balasuriya here https://archive.org/details/planetarytheolog0000bala/page/224/mode/2up?view=theater

Intro Music by Amaryah Armstrong
Outro music by theillogicalspoon https://theillalogicalspoon.bandcamp.com/track/hoods-up-the-low-down-technified-blues
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On this podcast, we’ve talked about radical theologians from Latin America, the Caribbean, Africa, The US, and China, but this week we’re bringing in the voice of Tissa Balasuriya, a Catholic theologian from Sri Lanka. This week, we’re talking about some pieces of his Book Planetary Theology, Published in English in 1984 by Orbis Press. 

There’s a lot going on in Balasuriya’s work, but it’s a really interesting example of a theologian creating the groundwork for a contextual liberation theology that runs counter to the capitalist world system. Balasuriya sees that the Christianity of the west leaves out a lot of voices and experiences, especially those in Asian contexts.

Check out Planetary Theology by Tissa Balasuriya here https://archive.org/details/planetarytheolog0000bala/page/224/mode/2up?view=theater

Intro Music by Amaryah Armstrong
Outro music by theillogicalspoon https://theillalogicalspoon.bandcamp.com/track/hoods-up-the-low-down-technified-blues
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Nonviolent direct action has been a part of faithful expressions of the Christian left for a long time, and this week, we're talking about it!

Here are the articles we talked about
https://sojo.net/articles/dutch-military-arrest-25-nonviolent-anti-nuke-protesters
https://geezmagazine.org/magazine/article/eucharist-at-gunpoint
http://supportjessicareznicek.com/about

Intro Music by Amaryah Armstrong
Outro music by theillogicalspoon https://theillalogicalspoon.bandcamp.com/track/hoods-up-the-low-down-technified-blues
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Liberation theology is cool! But, what about theology done from inside revolutionary contexts like Cuba? This week we're discussing Cuban theologian Sergio Arce Martinez and his book The Church and Socialism. You can check out his book here on archive.org. What's interesting about Arce's work is that rather than theology as a critique of capitalism, you get theology as a constructive project of what Christians should do in a socialist society.

Intro Music by Amaryah Armstrong
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Hey Folks, Dean is away on holiday, so we're giving you an episode from the archives this week. This episode about Jessica Reznicek is once again timely as the two year anniversary of Jessica's incarceration has just past. Listen in and sign her petition if you haven't! http://supportjessicareznicek.com/

Jessica Reznicek is a Catholic Worker and water defender who sabotaged the Dakota Access Pipeline and was sentenced to prison time for in 2019. Jessica's story is really fascinating, and her sentencing is strikingly unjust! Listen in as Alex from the Support Jessica Reznicek campaign tells us Jessica's story and explains its significance! 

Find out more here: http://supportjessicareznicek.com/

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Folks, we're not done with Franz Hinkelammert. This week we're back with an essay from Hink called Liberation Theology in the Economic and Social Context of Latin America. Broadly, this essay is about liberation theology and its discontents. But, there's a really interesting piece about the IMF's anti-liberation theology that you're not going to want to miss. Also, this is our first transatlantic episode of the pod!

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It's Matt's last episode in the USA, and we're talking about one of its greatest critics among liberation theologians, Franz Hinkelammert! Tune in to hear why even leftists can have a little idolatry critique, as a treat.

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Hey Folks, this is (hopefully) our last transitory episode, and we'll be back after this. But, for this week, we're bringing back reddit questions and current events. Vibe with us as we consider how demons influence the world if there are dinosaurs in heaven, and what current events there are this week. 

The docuseries The Secrets of Hillsong recently dropped, and evangelical megachurch Hillsong is back in the discourse of Christianity. In this episode, we talk about why these documentaries are popular, the perverse draw of these stories, and what's missing from the conversation. 

Ya boys are in a bit of a transition period, so episodes have been a bit slow to produce. We'll have a new one up shortly, but until then, here's some of that good classic content! 

This week on the show, we're talking about a really neat book called Revolutionary Forgiveness: Feminist Reflections on Nicaragua by the Amanecida Collective. The book is a reflection on 13 theologians who took a number of trips to Nicaragua in the early 80's. The book highlights a lot of interesting interactions between Christianity and politics during the Nicaraguan Revolution. 

Find the book here: https://wipfandstock.com/9781666719802/revolutionary-forgiveness/

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This week we welcome Dr. Shannen Dee Williams to the show to talk about her book Subversive Habits: Black Catholic Nuns in the Long African American Freedom Struggle. Tune in to find out how religious sisters went to Black Panther meetings, how Black sisters and the Civil Rights Movement called out segregation and racism in the Catholic Church, what US sisters were doing with Julius Nyerere in Tanzania, and more!

Pick up Dr. Williams' book here: https://www.dukeupress.edu/subversive-habits
Follow her on twitter at: @BlkNunHistorian
And check out her website for more here: https://www.shannendeewilliamsphd.com/
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Evangelicals are always paranoid about a type of Christianity that follows cultural norms more than "Biblical" norms, but what if evangelicals are doing the same thing without knowing it? In this episode, we're vibing about cultural Christianity, how it works and just goofin. 

Climate change seems bad, right? But won't some genius entrepreneur come along and just invent some kind of more efficient energy source? No probably not. In this episode, we're talking about the idea that you can decouple growth from environmental factors. 

Here's Timothee Parrique's study on Decoupling we talked about: https://eeb.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/07/Decoupling-Debunked.pdf
Here's a link to the Future is Degrowth: https://bit.ly/3Nl8z6l 

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You might remember a few weeks back we talked about Angels from the perspective of a weird book by Michel Serres. Well, we decided we couldn't leave the conversation there. We needed an angel expert. So, this week, we're joined by Marika Rose to talk about angels, cyborgs, and her new book, Theology for the End of the World.

If you're in the UK, you can preorder Marika's book here: 
https://scmpress.hymnsam.co.uk/books/9780334060666/theology-for-the-end-of-the-world

You can get it in late July if you're not in the UK.

Also, in the episode, Marika talks about she and her colleagues taking industrial action at the University of Winchester. Support them here: https://www.ucu.org.uk/fightingfund

Pat Robertson is dead and we've got some things to tell you about him. You've probably already heard about all of the goofy stuff he's said on the 700 Club. You also probably know about his short-lived political career, but do you know he supported genocidal Guatemalan dictator, General Efrain Rios Montt? Tune in and get straight on some PAT FACTS. 

Here are the articles we talked about
https://www.counterpunch.org/2005/09/17/rev-pat-robertson-and-gen-rios-montt/ 
https://www.thenation.com/article/society/pat-robertson-obituary/

Ok, folks, don't get too excited--we are talking about angels, just in the weirdest way possible. This week on the podcast, we're indulging our most basest desires to talk about French philosophy. We're reading through Michel Serres' book Angels: A Modern Myth. Throughout the episode, we talk about metaphysics, messages, the angelic, and the problems of defying humans.  

A few weeks back we talked about St Francis and what some Marxists thought of him. But this time, we're bringing you Leonardo Boff's thoughts on St Francis and how Boff thinks Francis relates to liberation theology. Go to Archive.org and read it for yourself! https://archive.org/details/francisofassisim0000boff

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Exploitation? Yeah, it's bad. But, superexploitation? It's super bad. In this episode, we talk about Ruy Mauro Marini's theory of dependency and superexploitation. As it turns out, the exploitation of workers in the global south is just the way capitalism works. 

Read the article about Marini in the Monthly Review here: https://monthlyreview.org/2023/04/01/superexploitation-and-the-imperialist-drive-of-capitalism-how-marinis-dialectics-of-dependency-goes-beyond-marxs-capital/

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This week we're talking about Leonardo Boff's brother, Clodovis Boff, and a letter he wrote parsing out the connections between socialism and democracy and the nod he makes toward Christianity and socialism. In the episode, we talk about the ways Boff thinks socialism and democracy go together and whether or not Christianity is rediscovering its socialist roots. 

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Christians get a lot out of engaging the left, but like we're always saying on this show, it's harder to see what people on the left get out of engaging Christianity as a tradition. But one guy keeps showing up in left literature and weird postmodern philosophy, everyone's favorite silly saint, Francis of Assisi! In this one we chat through how Francis shows up in Karl Kautsky, W. E. B. DuBois, Michael Hardt and Antonio Negri, Peter Sloterdijk, Vilem Flusser, and others, including a wild petition to Pope Francis abolish hell. (And before you ask, no, we didn't talk about Agamben, but we'll get around to it one day.)

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This week we're back to talk through another of Tricontinental's dossiers. This time we're talking about fundamentalism and evangelicalism and how those theologies are connected to imperialism in Latin America. 

Read the dossier here: https://thetricontinental.org/dossier-59-religious-fundamentalism-and-imperialism-in-latin-america/

Buckle up because we've got a big chat about everyone's favorite finance villain, the International Monetary Fund! Liberation theologians are always talking about the IMF, but a lot of us in the Global North have either neglected to keep up with it or haven't gotten around to understanding it. Thanks to a dossier on the IMF, debt, and Africa from the Tricontinental Institute, we've got some explaining to do. Bonus: how Keynes engineered a famine in India...

The dossier: https://thetricontinental.org/dossier-63-african-debt-crisis/

*Also, yuan, not yen at 42.

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Degrowth is becoming an important framework for thinking through capitalist production and consumption for the left, but what if Catholic social movements were already ahead of the curve on this one? The moral, economic, and internationalist thinking in the tradition of Catholic Social Teaching has predispositioned Catholic Social Movements toward degrowth as a paradigm.    

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On this podcast, we talk a lot about the crucifixion but not much about resurrection. Since it's easter, we're changing that! This week we're discussing João Batista Libânio's essay Hope, Utopia, and Resurrection and how resurrection is a political idea!

In the immortal words of Blink 182, "Work Sucks, I know." This week we're talking about Paul Lafargue's book The Right To Be Lazy and working through the mythology and moralism of labor!

The Productivity Pay Gap: https://www.epi.org/productivity-pay-gap/

March 24th was the feast day for Saint Oscar Romero and we're celebrating! This week we're talking about Romero's address, "The Political Dimension of Faith from the Perspective of the Option for the Poor." In the episode, we talk about Oscar Romero in relation to liberation theology, the relationship between faith and politics, and what it means for the Church to throw in with the poor. 

Read Romero's address here: http://www.romerotrust.org.uk/sites/default/files/1980-02-02%20Louvain.pdf
Listen to our episode about the assassination of Romero here: https://open.spotify.com/episode/2Uv9pWFBAeas4KhYgJC3CW?si=ede502ef7db84b15

This week we're diving into the discourse around Pope Francis' papacy at 10 years. Some people like him, some people don't like him. but the question that no one is asking is what do we think? Listen in as we talk about the good takes, the bad takes, and most importantly our takes on Pope Francis's papacy at 10 years!

Here's the bad Ross Douthat article: https://www.nytimes.com/2023/03/15/opinion/pope-francis-catholic-church.html
Here's the good NCR Article: https://www.ncronline.org/vatican/vatican-news/injustice-and-crime-reviewing-pope-francis-apologies-churchs-role-colonialism

Ecclesiastes 3:1-8 says that "For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven." There's a time to talk about Marxism and a time to talk about queer theology. A time to talk about Paul Virilio and a time to talk about communist Saint Francis. But, this week we're entering a new season: getting goofy. This week we're bringing our Patreon only podcast The Lock In out from behind the paywall and giving it to you all for free! 

If you're into this goofy content, then subscribe to our patreon and get it! Or don't! 

We've talked about Queer Theology a handful of times on the pod, but in this episode, we go a bit deeper with Shannon Kearns and Brian Murphy, two folks who are building and encouraging others to build queer theology through storytelling and community. Listen in to hear about sacred storytelling, the all-out assault on trans people in this country, and Matt & Dean have their Cishet horizons widened! 

You can learn more about Shannon and Brian's work at QueerTheology.com. And you can follow them basically everywhere at @shannontlkearns, @ThisIsBGM, @QTheology.

You might have caught it on social media, but we're starting a letter-writing campaign for lent that calls on President Biden and Congressional representatives to remove Cuba from the State Sponsors of Terrorism list and to end the US Blockade on Cuba. In this episode, we talk through the lenten practice we're suggesting and giving you the facts about the blockade, the nuts bolts of the legislation that make up the blockade, and what we can do!

You can find out letter-writing guide here: https://bit.ly/3YW1bTn
 “A Sanctioned Crisis” by Joy Gordon at Commonweal- https://www.commonwealmagazine.org/sanctioned-crisis
Biden Should Reverse Trump’s Designation of Cuba as a “State Sponsor of Terrorism ” - https://www.thenation.com/article/politics/cuba-state-sponsor-terrorism/
Here's the Presbyterian Church's policy on Cuba: https://www.presbyterianmission.org/wp-content/uploads/New-Hopes-and-Realities-in-Cuban-American-Relations-2016-ACSWP.pdf
 

This week, Josiah Daniels has joined us from the frontlines of the culture war, where he's been reporting on the He Gets Us campaign for Sojourners. In this episode, we talk about the "elite capture" of Jesus, dark money, and the conservative Christian PR machine. 

Read Josiah's piece here: https://sojo.net/articles/what-he-gets-us-ads-get-wrong-about-jesus
Listen to Josiah talk about this on NPR: https://www.npr.org/2023/02/11/1156344092/behind-the-he-gets-us-ads-for-jesus-airing-during-the-super-bowl

Dealing with your evangelical past means that sometimes you have to work really hard to recover particular spiritual practices, like praying. In this episode, we talk about learning to pray again through the Psalms. In this conversation, we learn from Ernesto Cardenal's appropriations of the Psalms from his book, Psalms. 

In this episode, we talked about: 
Psalms - Ernesto Cardenal 
Our May 2021 episode Sandino's Nation w/ Stephen Henighan 
Flights of Victroy - Ernesto Cardinal 

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We all know that humans are causing climate change, but in this episode, we're talking about which humans are responsible specifically! throughout this episode, we talk about climate change, colonialism, and solidarity.

Here are some articles we referenced in the episode!
Jason Hickel - Quantifying national responsibility for climate breakdown
Will the People with Guns Allow Our Planet to Breathe
Climate Change: Atmospheric Carbon Dioxide
China’s Emissions Are Made in America

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Jesus is a lot of things to a lot of people, but if you take the gospel seriously, you've got to admit that, if nothing else, Jesus is radical. He's flipping tables, sending the rich away empty, healing the sick, feeding the hungry, and casting out demons! Jesus is as radical as it gets. Yet, a lot of Christians don't see it that way. To get to the bottom of it, this week, we talked with Damon Garcia about his new book, The God Who Riots. 

Get the book here: https://www.broadleafbooks.com/store/productgroup/2050/The-God-Who-Riots

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We've already talked about degrowth a bit on the podcast, but why not talk about it some more. In this episode we talk about the book The Future is Degrowth, discuss what growth is and why it's bad, what degrowth is, and how you can bring some of these ideas to church. 

You can find the Future is Degrowth here: https://www.versobooks.com/books/3989-the-future-is-degrowth

You can read Matt's article about degrowth here: https://sojo.net/articles/creation-care-isn-t-enough-we-need-degrowth

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In this episode, we get back into the conversation about African Liberation Theology by reading Jean-Marc Ela's book African Cry. We meant to talk about an essay he wrote about the Eucharist and the Exodus story, but we got kind of stuck on the Eucharist. We'll be back with more from Ela in the coming weeks! 

Read along with us here: https://archive.org/details/africancry0000elaj/page/n3/mode/2up

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Recently everyone's been talking about Christian nationalism. This week we're offering a definitive take that the US is a Christian nation and that's really bad! Christianity isn't our best hopes we have for it, but instead, what it does and produces!

Here's the article by Diana Butler Bass we mention.  https://dianabutlerbass.substack.com/p/christian-nationalism-everywhere?r=45vbf&s=w&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&utm_source=direct

Here's the article from CNN we talk about. 
https://www.cnn.com/2022/07/27/opinions/christian-nationalism-marjorie-taylor-greene-tyler

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You know us; we love learning things about liberation theology. We've talked a lot about liberation theology in the context of Latin America, but we're completely clueless about liberation theology in Africa. In this episode, we read a bit of Emmanuel Martey's African theology: inculturation and liberation to learn something about what liberation theology looks like in South Africa. 
You can read the book along with us here: https://archive.org/details/africantheologyi0000mart/page/130/mode/2up

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We love to talk about imperialism on this show and what better time to rehash imperialism in light of John Bolton's admission to planning Coups on TV! This week we talk about John Bolton, coups, imperialism, and the farce of rules-based international order. 

Here's the essay from the Monthly Review we mention in the ep - https://monthlyreview.org/2021/07/01/the-new-cold-war-on-china/

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This week we talk about the EPA decision passed down by SCOTUS and the larger context of ecological guidance in the IPCC report. It all seems pretty hopeless, but Leonardo Boff once again tells us what to do! Tune in and find out!

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Ryan Cagle is back on the show to give us an update about Jubilee House, organizing, spiritual direction, and RPGs! Put on your robe and wizard hat and get ready for this banger of an episode. 

Check out Ryan's project at jubileehouse.co 

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After an extremely long break, we've got a guest! This week, we're talking with Hector Acero Ferrer to talk about the recent election of Gustavo Petro & Francia Marquez in Colombia, liberation theology, democracy, and hope! 

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Well, folks, we're just getting back to it after a long vacation, so we're taking it easy on ourselves and doing a prolonged lock-in episode full of reddit goofs and news updates. We'll be back next week with a more substantive episode! 

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We're still out here doing this Bible study, and this time we're doing a classic, the parable of the talents! You might think God wants you to invest the gifts he's given you so you can grow his kingdom, but guess what, if you knew a ton of extremely niche information about the first century you'd find out you're wrong!

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Hey Gang, this week we've got a special episode where we chat with our friend Chase from Faith & Capital about a neat book called A Commentary on the Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church by the Christians for National Liberation. It's a neat conversation where we just walk through some of the interesting beats within in the book. Check it out! 

You can find Chase's podcast here and you can find the book here.

Last week we got into William Herzog's Parables as Subversive Speech to talk about parables and historical readings. This week, we're talking about Matthew 18 and the unmerciful servant.

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We've spent more time than usual reading the Bible lately, but, as you might know, reading the Bible can be complicated. To get into how difficult it is, we read William Herzog's Parables as Subversive Speech and talk about the big history behind the context of the parables. 

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After a kind of long series of goofs, this episode gets into some brief ideas about organizing your faith community. 

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Are you still in the May Day mood? Then take a trip back in time with us to last year when we talked about the Haymarket Riot and Dwight L. Moody! 

--------
In past eps, we've talked about a lot of the cool leftist Christians involved in the Haymarket riot and the gilded age labor movement, but what about the shitty Christians? This week, we're bringing you a wild story about how Dwight L Moody massively profited from the Harmarket riot! 

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There's so much scary and bad news about climate change and its effects. It sucks big time. Though, so as not to just curse the darkness, in this episode we talk about a recent piece in the Monthly Review about points of unity between degrowth activists and ecosocialism. 

Read the article here: https://monthlyreview.org/2022/04/01/for-an-ecosocialist-degrowth/

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Listen folks, we've been hitting the bible and theology pretty hard over the last few weeks. But, now that Lent is over we're taking a breather and talking about some a little less biblical. Dean and Matt have been reading Kerala: Another World is Possible by T.M. Thomas Isaac and they're pretty excited to talk about it. So, in this episode, you'll hear all about Kerala, India, Participatory democracy, and liberation theology in India. 

You can find the book here: https://mayday.leftword.com/kerala.html

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We've been making our way through lent and talking about all of the themes along the way. This week we're talking about the last supper and the betrayal of Jesus. 

Intro Music by Amaryah Armstrong 
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We're getting close to the end of Lent and heading into Holy Week, so we're going to talk about Palm Sunday! A lot of Christians on the left have made a lot out of Jesus' entrance into Jerusalem as a countercultural event. In this episode, we talk about it from the perspective of street theatre and social movements.  

In the ep, we talked about the Documentary "What would Jesus Buy" you should watch it https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mAxuNdtZt7c

Intro Music by Amaryah Armstrong 
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We're still chugging on through this big lenten situation. We've been talking through all of the big lenten themes and this week we're reaching harder than ever by talking about penance and reconciliation!

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In this episode, we're talking about the shortcomings of substitutionary atonement and Ignacio Ellacuria's The Crucified People. 
Substitutionary Atonement is a weird idea that gets Christians into all kinds of problems, but what if there's actually an interesting and helpful way to think about soteriology that isn't just making God an angry computer. 

Get the essay here: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1yaSdCWCjqsqofnwEimWOHHOGJnXK6B7O/view?usp=sharing

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Over the last few weeks, we've been talking about the big themes of lent. So far, we've talked about fasting & temptation. This time, however, we're talking about almsgiving and charity. You're going to love it. 

Intro Music by Amaryah Armstrong 
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We're into week 2 of our Lent theme and this time we're talking about temptation! We're reading Luke 4:1-13 and talking through the three temptations the devil brings to Jesus in the desert. To back us up, we bring in some ideas around political power and temptation from liberation theology. 

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Lent is a time of fasting that gets co-opted by capitalism in all kinds of very gross ways and that sucks. But, what might fasting look like as a political idea? We might work this out by thinking about fasting in terms of degrowth in the face of climate change! 

Here are some of the books we talked about in this episode

Less is More: How Degrowth Will Save the World - Jason Hickel
Inventing the future -  Alex Williams and Nick Srnicek
Freedom Church of the Poor - Colleen Wessel-McCoy

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This week, we have no choice, but to weigh in on what's happening with Russia and Ukraine. A lot of people have particularly hot takes about this chapter in geopolitics, and so do we: war is bad, actually and we have the moral imperative to build a peace movement. 

Here are the statements we talked about on the show
Pax Christi - https://paxchristiusa.org/2022/02/24/pax-christi-usas-statement-on-russians-invasion-of-ukraine/
Poor People's Campaign - https://kairoscenter.org/press-releases/statement-on-russias-attack-on-ukraine/

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You know we love books, so this week we're reading Leonardo Boff's Cry of the Earth, Cry of the Poor and talking about liberation theology, ecology, the poor as a protagonist class, and more! 

Intro Music by Amaryah Armstrong 
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This week on the podcast we're continuing our theme of talking about money and economics in the context of the Bible. This time, we're talking about Jubilee and what it means to do that work in 2022! We mentioned a lot of cool stuff in the podcast, so here are some links! 

Get the Geez Magazine Jubilee issue here: https://geezmagazine.org/magazine/issue/geez-63
Find out more about the Committee for the abolition of illegitimate debts: https://www.cadtm.org/English
Find out more about the Jubilee USA Network: https://www.jubileeusa.org/
Find out more about Development and Peace: https://www.devp.org/en/

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This week on the show, we're talking about a really neat book called Revolutionary Forgiveness: Feminist Reflections on Nicaragua by the Amanecida Collective. The book is a reflection on 13 theologians who took a number of trips to Nicaragua in the early 80's. The book highlights a lot of interesting interactions between Christianity and politics during the Nicaraguan Revolution. 

Find the book here: https://wipfandstock.com/9781666719802/revolutionary-forgiveness/

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Last week, we talked about the Beatitudes and how to take them seriously means you can't really be a capitalist. Yet, many right-wing Christians do read the Beatitudes and other admonitions of wealth and still find ways to be capitalists. In this episode, we talk about the hermeneutic process of ignoring wealth as a problem in the bible.

Here are the articles we dunked on:
https://www.acton.org/pub/religion-liberty/volume-20-number-34/views-wealth-bible-ancient-world
https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/blogs/kevin-deyoung/luke-evangelist-rich/
https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/article/jesus-loves-rich-people/ 

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Have you ever read the bible? Dang, there's a lot of stuff in there. But, in the gospels, we get some really good words straight from Jesus that people call the "Beatitudes." The beatitudes are a sermon the Jesus preaches that tells you exactly where and with who God's priority lay. This week we talk about the Beatitudes and some of the things liberation theologians have said about them. 

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Earlier this week, Dave Ramsey and many other right-wing Christians were musing about whether the markets were moral. Don't listen to them! Listen to us. We unpack Dave Ramsey's bad takes about being a landlord and the economy and give our own good take. 

Intro Music by Amaryah Armstrong 
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Theology? Yeah, it's boring. Liberation theology? It's DANGEROUS--well, at least according to the CIA! This week we take a look at a few right wing documents from the 1980's that recognize that liberation theology was a possible threat to US hegemony. 

Ho ho ho, it's Christmas time! This week, we're taking it a little bit easy with a Christmas party. In this episode, we dial it back and answer some hot reddit questions and we talk about current events! We hope you have a good Christmas! 

The final week of advent is all about love! As we're heading into Christmas, we talk through Christian love as a political idea. Let's go! 

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We've got the joy joy joy joy down in our hearts...Well, we're trying our best. It's the Joy week of advent and we're talking through how to be joyful at the end of the world. 

Intro Music by Amaryah Armstrong 
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Alright folks, it's the second week of advent and now we're thinking about peace. In this episode, we consider peace as a political idea and talk through some of the big picture stuff about pacifism and violence.

Intro Music by Amaryah Armstrong 
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It's not Christmas yet! It's Advent! Advent is the time where we're getting in the spirit of Christmas and getting our brains right before the birth of Jesus. Advent is 4 weeks long and traditionally has weekly themes (Hope–Peace–Joy–Love.). For this Advent, we're just following along with the themes of the liturgical calendar and talking about hope! 

Intro Music by Amaryah Armstrong 
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When it comes to activism, people are always talking about human rights, but what are these things anyway? In this episode, we get into the political philosophy discourse around rights. In the episode, we talk about What's Wrong with Rights? Social Movements, Law and Liberal Imaginations by Radha D'Souza (https://www.plutobooks.com/9780745335414/whats-wrong-with-rights/), Marx's Critique of the Gotha Program, and some stuff about rights from Alasdair Macintyre

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Yesterday, we went to a solidarity protest downtown Toronto to show solidarity with the land defenders in Wet'suwet'en territory. There’s a lot going on in that situation, but the gist of it is that Coastal Gas Link is trying to run a pipeline through their territory without the consent of the indigenous people there. This past week, the people resisting the pipeline evicted Coastal Gas Link and gave their workers several hours to leave, before they blockaded a major road used by the company. Canada deployed federal police, the RCMP, arresting and assaulting land defenders to end the blockade. The action in Toronto was powerful, starting outside the bank RBC, which is invested in the pipeline, and ending in a building with Coastal Gas Link offices. All that got our wheels turning more about all kinds of things like Christianity, colonization, climate change, ecosocialism, and the recent COP26 conference. 

So, in this episode, we’re going to make some connections about what happened in COP26 and something that the decolonial theorist Walter Mignolo called the Christian afterworld. 

Here's the statement from Development and Peace we referenced in the ep: https://www.kairoscanada.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/11/Wetsuweten-Ecumenical-Solidarity-Nov17.pdf

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When it comes to Christianity and politics everyone loves to talk about the "political imaginary." This week we're going to talk through the political imaginary and what it's all about! To do that, we read a really fascinating article called Bhima Koregaon and the “Powers of the Other Shore by Saroj Giri you can read the article here: https://monthlyreview.org/2021/10/01/bhima-koregaon-and-the-powers-of-the-other-shore/ 

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This past week, Qanon believers from across the US gathered in Dallas TX to witness the return of JFK Jr. That's wild, right? But what's even wilder is that Qanon is a thoroughly Christian movement! Last week we talked a bit about the Christian right rehabilitating itself, but this week we're talking about what they're trying to rehabilitate themselves from. 

Intro Music by Amaryah Armstrong 
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Woke culture, critical race theory, postmodernism, Christians have a history of locating struggles in culture rather than politics! In this episode, we talk through the culture war as it's presented in Peter Wehner's The Evangelical Church is Beaking Apart. ( https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/10/evangelical-trump-christians-politics/620469/)

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In this episode, we talk through Pope Francis' recent address to popular movements. As it turns out, the Pope is good and we're here to tell you about it. Also, it's really hard to make sense of anything of this without socialist politics. Read the Pope's address here: https://www.vatican.va/content/francesco/en/messages/pont-messages/2021/documents/20211016-videomessaggio-movimentipopolari.html

Intro Music by Amaryah Armstrong 
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Liberation theology isn't just a thing that happened in the 60's and 70's. Many of the folks involved in liberation theology are still around and publishing, but their voices are strangely missing from contemporary conversations around Latin American politics. In this episode, we get a little cranky about the lack of coverage around liberation theology and talk about why it matters. 

Intro Music by Amaryah Armstrong 
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It's the spookiest time of the year! So, we're going to put a pause on all of the politics talk and direct our attention toward some fun and spooky stories about saintly apparitions and think a little bit about death! 

Intro Music by Amaryah Armstrong 
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We've spent a lot of time trying to figure out some of the politics around evangelicalism, but we've never really talked through the exvangelical response to evangelicalism. In this episode, we work through deconstruction, evangelicalism, and some of the weird cultural artifacts that emerge around it. 

Intro Music by Amaryah Armstrong 
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Just a week ago, we passed the 20th anniversary of 9/11. To mark the occasion the worship leader and failed Republican politician Sean Feucht, of Bethel Church fame, held an event at the national mall in DC. The event was part of his “let us worship” tour that has been taking place around the country to protest COVID restrictions on churches. Notably, Donald Trump joined the rally through a pretty bizarre pre-recorded speech.  You might be wondering, “who cares?” Good question. As people who are now very outside evangelicalism, it’s easy to just ignore these folks, yet I think there are some reasons to pay attention despite how cringy it all is.

Feucht is probably one of the more visible figures in evangelicalism and is clearly interested in conservative politics. He had a failed congressional run in California. He even took a trip to the White House to lay hands on and pray for Donald Trump before his first impeachment. Given all of that, we thought it’d be good to spend the episode talking about Feucht and the current state of Christofascism. 

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Hey, isn't debt as an idea and as an economic reality pretty messed up? It is. In this episode, we talk about debt in Christianity and economics and how both ideas intersect and break our brains. 

Intro Music by Amaryah Armstrong 
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Christian universities have a long history of creating the institutional levers and buttons by which they can harass and discriminate against their LGBTQ+ students. But, that's not the end of the story! A new project is engaging with these universities and organizing LGBTQ+ students on their campuses to start fighting back! This week, we talked with Erin Green, an organizer, with REAP (Religious Exemption Accountability Project) about how they're pushing back against discriminatory practices within Christian higher ed. 

Find out more about REAP here: www.thereap.org
Follow Erin on twitter here: twitter.com/ErinGreenbean

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The last time we talked about climate change we were kind of doomers about it, but so we're back to complicate the whole notion a bit more with some tools from the monthly review. In this episode, we investigate the term "Anthropocene" from a Marxist perspective and consider just how capitalism fits into it all. 

Intro Music by Amaryah Armstrong 
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On this podcast, it's always Catholic church this and the Pope that, but this week we're talking about anglo-Catholicism. That's right, folks we're talking about the tradition of socialism in the Episcopal church with Tony Hunt & Caleb Roberts of The Hour Magazine. The Hour is a magazine that explores the often forgotten and even more often unexplored history of socialism within the anglo-Catholic tradition. 

Read The Hour here: https://www.thehourmag.com/

Intro Music by Amaryah Armstrong 
Outro music by Paul Robeson
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We all love St Francis, but did you know he was a communist? Well, according to Karl Kautsky he was. There are a lot of wild medieval Christians who, for theological reasons, didn't believe in private property and Francis was one of them! However, unlike the Waldensians or the Brethren of the Free Spirit, Francis' movement was assimilated into the Catholic Church. Listen in and hear all about how this works out. 

Intro Music by Amaryah Armstrong 
Outro music by Paul Robeson
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Did you know that we have a whole second podcast behind our patreon paywall? Dang, well now you do. This weeks episode was kind of a downer, so we decided to drop our patreon-only podcast out here in the open in case you need something to distract you from all the bad news. 

You might have heard all of the bad news about the state of the climate in the recent IPCC report. In this episode, we talk through what it means and try to parse out what it is that Christians and the left should think about it. Honestly, it's a tough one! 

We're taking a break from all of our Cuba conversations to talk about Christianity in an expansive sense and think through claims that people on the left and the right make about what counts as "true Christianity." 

 Intro Music by Amaryah Armstrong 

Outro music by Paul Robeson

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Over the past few weeks, we've talked a lot about Cuba. We decided to keep the Cuba train running with an interview with Rev. Elice Higginbotham, who formerly worked with IFCO/Pastors with Peace. In this conversation, we talk about Pastors with Peace, their history of sending aid to Cuba, Christians in Cuba, and a lot more!   

Learn more about IFCO here: https://ifconews.org

 Intro Music by Amaryah Armstrong 

Outro music by Paul Robeson

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Due to capitalist media and deeply seated ideological positions, it's hard to get real information about what's happening in places like Cuba. As usual, we invited Jim Hodgson on, an individual with a history with and good relationships in Latin America and the Caribbean. Throughout the episode, Jim tells us what's been happening on the ground with the recent wave of protests in Cuba, gives some good context for protest and expression in Cuba, and tells us where all of the churches are at in this particular moment. 

Check out Jim's blog here: unwrappingdevelopment.ca

 Intro Music by Amaryah Armstrong 
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This week on the Magnificast, we chatted with Austin González who recently went to Venezuela with a delegation from the DSA International committee. In this interview, we hear a bit about Austin's time in Venezuela, his visit with the communes, Nicolas Maduro, and just what the DSA international committee is up to! 

Follow Austin on twitter: twitter.com/Gaius_Gracchus_
Check out Austin's podcast: https://twitter.com/MacheteyMate
Learn more about the DSA International Committee: https://international.dsausa.org/

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Sometimes, on the pod, we focus a lot on what's wrong in Christianity and its kind of a bummer. So, what if we talked with someone who is doing something good with Christianity? This week we're talking with Ryan Cagle about his new project at Jubilee House in Alabama. Listen in and soak up this good stuff. 

Check out Ryan's project at jubileehouse.co 

Intro Music by Amaryah Armstrong 
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Since we talked with Richard Gilman-Opalsky a few weeks ago, we've focused a bit on the idea of morality and communism as a relationship between people. To keep riding that theme, we talked with Taylor Genovese about his essay The Necessity of Communist Morality! 

You can find Taylor's article here: https://www.peacelandbread.com/post/the-necessity-of-communist-morality

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Dan Walden is a damn treasure, so we're bringing you an interview with him this week! In this episode, we talk with Dan about his writing for the Bias and Current Affairs as well as his participation in the recent strike at the University of Michigan. You can check out Dan's writing here https://www.currentaffairs.org/author/daniel-walden, https://christiansocialism.com/catholic-socialism-capitalism-horn-pakaluk/ and follow him on twitter: https://twitter.com/thauma_idesthai

This week, we talk with Sargon Donabed, author of the book "Reforging a Forgotten History: Iraq and the Assyrians in the Twentieth Century." Sargon tells us some of the history of the Assyrian people, an indigenous people to West Asia/North Africa who are often overlooked and misunderstood. We also talk about how the Assyrians do and don't show up in the academy and in public discourse, what role media plays in shaping our understanding of the WANA region, and how non-Assyrians can do better when it comes to showing solidarity. There's also some bonus stuff on "panenhistoricism," which is the coolest methodology word you'll learn this week for sure. The suggestion for this episode and for reading Sargon's book came from our new friend Meia, who blogs at ninwa.home.blog. Meia is an Assyrian who spent a lot of time helping us put this episode together. In her blog "WANA Christianity and Western Leftism," she explains the left's general ignorance and failure to acknowledge the persecution of minority Christian groups like Assyrians. We encourage you to read Meia's post in full, and also to check out her patreon for more! https://ninwa.home.blog/2018/12/22/wana-christianity-and-western-leftism/ https://www.patreon.com/ninwa Music by Amaryah Armstrong and theillalogicalspoon.