Pope Francis proclaims: “There was a time, even in our churches, when people spoke of a holy war or a just war. Today we cannot speak in this manner.” Yet, we can and have been invited by Francis and others to speak in the manner of centering nonviolence.
Choosing God, choosing lands, and choosing the peoples one lives with, both then and now, is no easy task. Nevertheless, the good news, while not always easy or comforting, is that the borders of our identities and lands have always been permeable. Could that be our embodied witness?
Bread is given to satisfy not only material hunger, but also to respond to emotional, political, and spiritual hunger: it expresses a desire for fraternal and sororal relationships, a desire for the Other.
In his point-blank manner, Francis draws our attention that such solutions suffered from “the irresponsible derision that would present this issue as something purely ecological, “green”, romantic, frequently subject to ridicule by economic interests.”
This article intends to highlight the ways in which political reactionaries have used identities within the therian community as a method to simultaneously pathologise 2SLGBQTIA+ people, diminish the needs of the disabled and neurodivergent, and maintain white, Western cultural hegemony.
Family abolitionists can help us understand why we experience a scarcity of care and help us imagine a society where there is an abundance of care.
Those who commit dehumanizing acts of violence—whether through physical harm, abusive exploitation, or benign neglect—themselves become debased and subhuman, even as they sit in positions of power. Indeed, Micah puts this in sharp relief … where he depicts the corrupt “leaders and rulers” as ravenous animals who cannibalize those who the Lord has placed in their care.
What would change for us if we truly started to see Jesus in each and every creature who comes to our table, as if each were an honored guest?
The Editors of the Political Theologies book series from Bloomsbury Academics seek book proposals.
“If laws are for elders, stories are for children. And the stories that children tell are never general and abstract. They ground us in, or guide us toward, what is really important.”
Rather than read it prescriptively to justify my own identification as a “righteous Christian,” I now read this passage for what it is: a poem that describes the resilience of a people who found true comfort and safety in God, despite attacks from those who would cause them harm.