Homebrewed Christianity
Our goal is to bring the wisdom of the academy's ivory tower into your earbuds. Think of each episode as an audiological ingredient for your to brew your own faith. Most episodes center around an interview with a different scholar, theologian, or philosopher.
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Why Postliberals Want Authoritarian Power (And What to Do About It) with David Congdon
David Congdon came on to talk about his lecture from the Democracy in Tension summit, and man, did we get into it. We're unpacking what liberalism actually means - not the Fox News version or the MSNBC version, but the philosophical tradition that emerged because people were literally killing each other over interpretations of the Eucharist after the Reformation. David makes this case for why we need to rejuvenate liberalism as a framework for dealing with diversity, because the postliberals basically want to recreate medieval Christendom through authoritarian power, which is... problematic. We talked about historical amnesia, why privatizing religion isn't the same as excluding it from public life, how both the left and right misunderstand what liberalism offers, and why we can't just abandon institutions even when they're flawed. Plus David schooled me on what he's learned spending eight years working in political theory and philosophy, which has given him a way more nuanced view than most theologians have about this stuff.You can get access to Congdon's lecture and the entire Democracy in Tension series here.You can WATCH this conversation on YouTubeJoin us at Theology Beer Camp, October 8-10, in Kansas City!UPCOMING ONLINE LENT CLASS: Jesus in Galilee w/ John Dominic CrossanWhat can we actually know about Jesus of Nazareth? And, what difference does it make? This Lenten class begins where all of Dr. John Dominic Crossan's has work begins: with history. What was actually happening in Galilee in the 20s CE? What did Herod Antipas' transformation of the "Sea of Galilee" into the commercial "Sea of Tiberias" mean for peasant fishing communities? Why did Jesus emerge from John's baptism movement proclaiming God's Rule through parables—and what made that medium so perfectly suited to that message? Only by understanding what Jesus' parables meant then can we wrestle with what they might demand of us now. The class is donation-based, including 0, so join, get info, and join up here.This podcast is a Homebrewed Christianity production. Follow the Homebrewed Christianity, Theology Nerd Throwdown, & The Rise of Bonhoeffer podcasts for more theological goodness for your earbuds. Join over 75,000 other people by joining our Substack - Process This! Get instant access to over 50 classes at www.TheologyClass.comFollow the podcast, drop a review, send feedback/questions or become a member of the HBC Community.Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Burnout, Burn Up, Burn It Down: Hartmut Rosa's Diagnosis of Modern Life
What is up, Theology Nerds! This week I'm joined by my buddy Matthew Segall from the Footnotes to Plato Substack to announce something exciting: we're doing a joint reading group on Hartmut Rosa's new book Time and World. Rosa's a German sociologist who does big-picture thinking—like old school "let me tell you about modernity" stuff—and his work resonates deeply with process philosophy. His diagnosis? We're stuck in what he calls a frenetic standstill—exhausted, burnt out, running faster just to stay in place. I gave Matt my above-ground pool whirlpool metaphor: we're all running in circles, and if you stop, you get pulled under. Modernity promises us the good life through control—making everything available, accessible, attainable—but the cost is a mute world and the birth of monsters. Rosa's antidote isn't slowing down; it's resonance—a mode of relationship where we're genuinely touched, we respond, we're transformed, and we accept it's all gloriously uncontrollable. Process folks will eat this up: it's Whitehead's prehension, creativity, and divine persuasion in sociological clothing. The invitation? Stop. Listen. Let the world address you again. If you want to join us for the Zoom sessions this February, become a member of either Process This or Footnotes to Plato—preferably both. See you soon.You can WATCH the conversation on YouTubeJoin us at Theology Beer Camp, October 8-10, in Kansas City!Dr. Segall is a transdisciplinary researcher and teacher who applies process philosophy to various natural and social sciences, including consciousness. He is also an Assistant Professor in the Philosophy, Cosmology, and Consciousness Program at the California Institute of Integral Studies in San Francisco, CA.Make sure you check out SubStack Footnotes to Plato, his YouTube channel, and his recent book.Previous Podcasts with Matt The Meaning Crisis in Process Processing the Political Cosmology, Consciousness, and Whitehead’s God. Science, Religion, Eco-Philosophy, Etheric Imagination, Psychedelic Eucharist, Ecological Crisis and more…UPCOMING ONLINE LENT CLASS: Jesus in Galilee w/ John Dominic CrossanWhat can we actually know about Jesus of Nazareth? And, what difference does it make? This Lenten class begins where all of Dr. John Dominic Crossan's has work begins: with history. What was actually happening in Galilee in the 20s CE? What did Herod Antipas' transformation of the "Sea of Galilee" into the commercial "Sea of Tiberias" mean for peasant fishing communities? Why did Jesus emerge from John's baptism movement proclaiming God's Rule through parables—and what made that medium so perfectly suited to that message? Only by understanding what Jesus' parables meant then can we wrestle with what they might demand of us now. The class is donation-based, including 0, so join, get info, and join up here.This podcast is a Homebrewed Christianity production. Follow the Homebrewed Christianity, Theology Nerd Throwdown, & The Rise of Bonhoeffer podcasts for more theological goodness for your earbuds. Join over 75,000 other people by joining our Substack - Process This! Get instant access to over 50 classes at www.TheologyClass.comFollow the podcast, drop a review, send feedback/questions or become a member of the HBC Community.Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Bonhoeffer’s Warning, Unheeded: the Moral Collapse of White Evangelicalism
This is an audio essay from my SubStack, Process This. You can head over here to read or watch the entire essay.I grew up as a Baptist church planter's kid, and the church gave me everything that matters most to me—my faith, my love of Scripture, my relationship with Jesus. But for over two decades now, I've watched the tradition that formed me transform into something I barely recognize. In this essay, I explore the concept of "sequential complicity"—how small, seemingly reasonable compromises lock communities into escalating patterns of moral accommodation. Using research on how ordinary German Christians became bystanders during the Nazi era, I trace a similar pattern in white American evangelicalism: from the real origins of the Religious Right in the 1970s (hint: it wasn't abortion), through Reagan, through the Iraq War, and into the Trump era. The data is stark—white evangelicals have undergone the most dramatic ethical shift of any religious group in modern polling history. And the most devout churchgoers aren't the exception; they're the most captured. This isn't an outsider's attack. It's a lament from someone who still reads his Bible every night and talks to Jesus before bed. I'm not asking anyone to become a Democrat. I'm asking whether the sequence has carried us somewhere we never intended to go—and whether it's too late to find our way back.I hope you enjoy it and consider supporting my work by joining 75k+ other people on Process This. If you want to read or watch the essay, you will find it here on SubStack.UPCOMING ONLINE LENT CLASS: Jesus in Galilee w/ John Dominic CrossanWhat can we actually know about Jesus of Nazareth? And, what difference does it make? For over five decades, Dr. John Dominic Crossan has been one of the world's foremost scholars of the historical Jesus—rigorously reconstructing the life, teachings, and world of a first-century Jewish peasant who proclaimed God's Rule in Roman-occupied Galilee. His work has shaped an entire generation of scholarship and transformed how millions understand the figure at the center of Christian faith. This Lenten class begins where all of Dom's work begins: with history. What was actually happening in Galilee in the 20s CE? What did Herod Antipas' transformation of the "Sea of Galilee" into the commercial "Sea of Tiberias" mean for peasant fishing communities? Why did Jesus emerge from John's baptism movement proclaiming God's Rule through parables—and what made that medium so perfectly suited to that message? Only by understanding what Jesus' parables meant then can we wrestle with what they might demand of us now. The class is donation-based, including 0, so join, get info, and join up here.Join us at Theology Beer Camp, October 8-10, in KansasThis podcast is a Homebrewed Christianity production. Follow the Homebrewed Christianity, Theology Nerd Throwdown, & The Rise of Bonhoeffer podcasts for more theological goodness for your earbuds. Join over 75,000 other people by joining our Substack - Process This! Get instant access to over 50 classes at www.TheologyClass.comFollow the podcast, drop a review, send feedback/questions or become a member of the HBC Community.Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Practicing Love Without Being Naive About Power with Marvin Wickware
Marvin Wickware came on to talk about his lecture from the Democracy in Tension summit and his book Loving Through Enmity, and we got into some really beautiful and difficult territory. Marvin's story is powerful - raised by an interracial couple in 1980s Indiana who were treated terribly by churches, converted through evangelical campus ministry, ended up at Union studying with James Cone, and that's where his faith, his values, and his intellectual work all clicked together. We talked about need-based love as an ethical framework, how both democracy and Christianity are aspirational projects that we're always falling short of, and how to navigate the gap between ideals and reality without either abandoning the dream or using it to mask our failures. Marvin shared about being a black theologian in predominantly white mainline spaces, the importance of having people on your side who can tell you you're not crazy, and how to practice love toward enemies without being naive about power and harm. It's the kind of conversation that makes you think differently about what love actually requires of us in this political moment.You can get access to Dr. Wickware's lecture and the entire Democracy in Tension series here.You can WATCH the conversation on YouTubeJoin us at Theology Beer Camp, October 8-10, in Kansas City!ONLINE CLASS: The Rise of the NonesOne-third of Americans now claim no religious affiliation. That's 100 million people. Ryan Burge & Tony Jones have conducted the first large-scale survey of American "Nones", which reveals 4 distinct categories—each requiring a different approach. Understanding the difference could transform everything from your ministry to your own spiritual quest.Get info & join the donation-based class (including 0) here.This podcast is a Homebrewed Christianity production. Follow the Homebrewed Christianity, Theology Nerd Throwdown, & The Rise of Bonhoeffer podcasts for more theological goodness for your earbuds. Join over 75,000 other people by joining our Substack - Process This! Get instant access to over 50 classes at www.TheologyClass.comFollow the podcast, drop a review, send feedback/questions or become a member of the HBC Community.Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Paul Tillich's Socialist Decision and the Crisis of American Christianity
This is an audio essay from my SubStack, Process This. You can head over here to read or watch the entire essay.In this episode, we explore Paul Tillich's largely forgotten 1933 work The Socialist Decision, written as Hitler rose to power and costing Tillich his professorship and homeland. Here, I explore what it reveals about the current crisis of American Christianity. Tillich argued that authentic human existence requires holding two roots in tension: the "powers of origin" (belonging, tradition, community) and the "prophetic demand" (justice, critique, openness to the stranger). When we collapse into one or the other, we get either authoritarian tribalism or rootless abstraction, and Tillich saw both failures at work in Weimar Germany. The parallels to our moment are striking: white Christian nationalism offers powerful symbols of belonging without prophetic self-criticism, while progressive Christianity has often provided critique without the embodied community and sacred symbols that move the human heart (something I explored here in The Perfect Storm). Tillich's prescription—what he called "theonomy"—charts a third way: a faith rooted in Scripture, sacrament, and particular community yet free because all these point beyond themselves to a God no finite form can capture. This essay was inspired by two recent Substack posts from two of my regular reads, Tony Jones’ What the Hell is Going On and Robert Wright’s Some useful Trump-Hitler comparisons (in light of Minneapolis and Venezuela). Tony ends his post by saying, “I don’t know what will replace Christendom as our moral framework... Some days — and today is one of those days — I fear that we’re too fragmented to come back together under any single umbrella of morality.” Tony and I had a rather lengthy text exchange about it, and in it, I said, “It seems as we lose the cultural and ethical inertia of Christendom, Evangelicals get mean, and Mainline Protestants turn to vapid nostalgia.” As I was doing dishes and ruminating, I thought of Paul Tillich’s The Socialist Decision, an often-neglected work, and found it helpful in processing the current moment. What sparked it? Robert Wright’s measured and provocative reflections on useful Trump-Hitler comparisons. If this essay is interesting, then check out all three.I hope you enjoy it and consider supporting my work by joining 75k+ other people on Process This. If you want to read or watch the essay, you will find it here on SubStack.Join us at Theology Beer Camp, October 8-10, in Kansas City!UPCOMING ONLINE CLASS: The Rise of the NonesOne-third of Americans now claim no religious affiliation. That's 100 million people. Ryan Burge & Tony Jones have conducted the first large-scale survey of American "Nones", which reveals 4 distinct categories—each requiring a different approach. Understanding the difference could transform everything from your ministry to your own spiritual quest.Get info & join the donation-based class (including 0) here.This podcast is a Homebrewed Christianity production. Follow the Homebrewed Christianity, Theology Nerd Throwdown, & The Rise of Bonhoeffer podcasts for more theological goodness for your earbuds. Join over 75,000 other people by joining our Substack - Process This! Get instant access to over 50 classes at www.TheologyClass.comFollow the podcast, drop a review, send feedback/questions or become a member of the HBC Community.Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices