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In Resurrection City Peter Heltzel paints a prophetic picture of an evangelical Christianity that eschews a majority mentality and instead fights against racism, inequality, and injustice, embracing the concerns of the poor and marginalized, just as Jesus did. Placing society's needs front and center, Heltzel calls for radical change and collective activism modeled on God's love and justice. In particular, Heltzel explores the social forms that love and justice can take as religious communities join together to build "beloved cities." He proclaims the importance of "improvising for justice" -- likening the church's prophetic ministry to jazz music -- and develops a biblical theology of shalom justice. His vision draws inspiration from the black freedom struggle and the lives of Sojourner Truth, Howard Thurman, and Martin Luther King Jr. Pulsing with hope and beauty, Resurrection City compels evangelical Christians to begin "a global movement for love and justice" that truly embodies the kingdom of God.
Since the 1930s, organizing movements for social justice in the U.S. have largely been built on secular assumptions. But what if Christians were to shape their organizing around the implications of the truth that God is real and Jesus is risen? Reverend Alexia Salvatierra and theologian Peter Heltzel propose a model of organizing that arises from their Christian convictions, with implications for all faiths.
This timely book investigates the increasing visibility and influence of evangelical Christians in recent American politics with a focus on racial justice. Peter Goodwin Heltzel considers four evangelical social movements: Focus on the Family, the National Association of Evangelicals, Christian Community Development Association, and Sojourners. The political motives and actions of evangelical groups are founded upon their conceptions of Jesus Christ, Heltzel contends. He traces the roots of contemporary evangelical politics to the prophetic black Christianity tradition of Martin Luther King, Jr., and the socially engaged evangelical tradition of Carl F. H. Henry. Heltzel shows that the basic tenets of King's and Henry's theologies have led their evangelical heirs toward a prophetic evangelicalism in a shade of blue green--blue symbolizing the tragedy of black suffering in the Americas, and green symbolizing the hope of a prophetic evangelical engagement with poverty, AIDS, and the environment. This fresh theological understanding of evangelical political groups shines new light on the ways evangelicals shape and are shaped by broader American culture.
Disrupting the racist and sexist biases in conversations on reconciliation Chanequa Walker-Barnes offers a compelling argument that the Christian racial reconciliation movement is incapable of responding to modern-day racism. She demonstrates how reconciliation’s roots in the evangelical, male-centered Promise Keepers’ movement has resulted in a patriarchal and largely symbolic effort, focused upon improving relationships between men from various racial-ethnic groups. Walker-Barnes argues that highlighting the voices of women of color is critical to developing any genuine efforts toward reconciliation. Drawing upon intersectionality theory and critical race studies, she demonstrates how ...
In this book Johnny Bernard Hill argues that prophetic rage, or righteous anger, is a necessary response to our present culture of imperialism and nihilism. The most powerful way to resist meaninglessness, he says, is refusing to accept the realities of structural injustice, such as poverty, escalating militarism, genocide, and housing discrimination. Hill’s Prophetic Rage is interdisciplinary, integrating art, music, and literature with theology. It is constructive, passionate, and provocative. Hill weaves through a myriad of creative and prophetic voices of protest -- from Jesus to W. E. B. DuBois, Martin Luther King Jr., Malcolm X, and President Barack Obama -- as well as multiple approaches, including liberation theology and black religion, to reflect theologically on the nature of liberation, justice, and hope on contemporary culture.
What if the kingdom of God is not a place, but a person? In this timely monograph, Christian T. Collins Winn argues that the kingdom of God is Jesus himself. Drawing on a wide breadth of liberation theology, Jesus, Jubilee, and the Politics of God’s Reign amplifies the echoes of salvation history in contemporary struggles for social justice. Collins Winn demonstrates how the institution of the Jubilee year exemplifies the kingdom of God. A semicentennial celebration prescribed in the book of Leviticus, Jubilee prescribed the redistribution of wealth and freeing of prisoners. Hope for Jubilee persists in apocalyptic rhetoric, from the exhortations of Old Testament prophets to those of moder...
“If reconciliation is the takeaway point for the civil rights story we usually tell, then the takeaway point for the more complex, more truthful civil rights story contained in Dear White Christians is reparations.” — from the preface to the second edition With the troubling and painful events of the last several years—from the killing of numerous unarmed Black men and women at the hands of police to the rallying of white supremacists in Charlottesville—it is clearer than ever that the reconciliation paradigm, long favored by white Christians, has failed to heal the deep racial wounds in the church and American society. In this provocative book, originally published in 2014, Jennif...
Justice and the call for change are in the air. Whether it's extreme poverty, human rights, racism, or the Middle East, news outlets bombard us with stories about the need for justice in the world. But how are Christians to respond to these stories and the conditions to which they refer? Here's help. Editors Brian McLaren, Elisa Padilla, and Ashley Bunting Seeber have amassed a collection of over 30 brief chapters by some of the most penetrating thinkers in the justice conversation, including René Padilla, Peggy Campolo, Will and Lisa Samson, Sylvia Keesmaat, Bart Campolo, Lynne Hybels, Tony Jones, and Richard Twiss. Divided into sections, "God of Justice," "Book of Justice," "Justice in the USA," "Just World," and "Just Church," The Justice Project invites readers to deepen their understanding of the pressures our world faces and to take up the challenge of alleviating them. Never has the world been in greater need of Christians who "do justice, love mercy, and walk humbly with God." This resource will help them do just that.
"Jesus's words 'the poor you will always have with you' (Matthew 26:11) are regularly used to suggest that ending poverty is impossible. In this book Liz Theoharis critically examines both the biblical text and the lived reality of the poor to show how this passage is taken out of context and distorted. Poverty is not inevitable, Theoharis argues. It is a systemic sin, and all Christians have a responsibility to partner with the poor to end poverty once and for all"--Jacket