Bill Pannell was an evangelical in the truest and best sense of that word. He believed fervently that humanity needed to be reconciled to God, and to each other. But he was a Black evangelical, who were and are still so different from white evangelicals in America. And that made all the difference in this disciple’s pilgrimage that has now been documented for us.
God’s first house — the tabernacle — is movable, following the Israelites as they wander from Egypt to Canaan (Exodus 40:34; Numbers 1:47-53). The theme of migration continues into Jesus’ life, where Matthew’s gospel tells us that he fled political violence and spent much of his childhood in Egypt (Matthew 2:13-23). Even when he is back in his own country, he is unwelcome in his hometown and “has nowhere to lay his head” (Matthew 8:20).
In this virtual conversation moderated by Sojourners editor in chief Betsy Shirley, panelists Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove, Rev. Caleb E. Campbell, Rev. Pamela Cooper White, and Sojourners president Rev. Adam Russell Taylor explored hopeful actions that can counter the dangerous beliefs and strategies of Christian nationalism.
Early in the morning on Oct. 3, reproductive choice advocacy group Catholics for Choice unfurled a 50-foot long, 41-pound quilt on the road leading to St. Peter’s Square in Vatican City. Their words, written in bold, large letters across the bottom of the quilt summed up their message: “POPE FRANCIS, LISTEN.”
“Some people out there in the readership are all in a tizzy that ‘Richard Hays has changed his mind! He’s changed sides! He’s not on our team anymore!’ They think this is some kind of a radical reversal. In spite of what he wrote in the first book, [The Widening of God’s Mercy] is consistent with the man that I had grown up with and known my entire life.”
As an opinion journalist who is also a Christian, I believe my primary responsibility is to provide a myriad of perspectives that challenge or — when necessary — correct readers’ opinions, all in the hope that through reading Sojourners’ opinion section they might realize that Christ is inviting them to make the world a more just place.
For several years, I pastored a small church in the Northwest Bronx. In the summer of 2022, the church leadership decided to dedicate one Sunday a month to do a service project where we engaged in direct political action. It was the summer when Roe v. Wade was overturned, and we focused our attention on reproductive justice. Instead of simply looking at reproductive justice as a pregnant person’s right to receive an abortion, we started thinking of it in broader terms: a better family welfare system in the U.S., honoring the bodily autonomy of birthing people, and taking steps toward improving the material conditions of Black and brown children in the Bronx through mutual aid, collective care, political education, and political solidarity.
The present political and religious environment is both intense and toxic, making any judgements about Israel and Palestine perilous. Anyone who dares speak is immediately subject to interrogation, often followed by indictments of antisemitism, or religious zealotry, or blind ideological bias. It’s hard to articulate a message that cuts beneath entrenched, polarized rhetoric — and even harder to listen. But we must try to speak, for silence is complicit resignation to evil, terror, and calamity.
Horror fiction is one of the first spaces to grapple seriously with concerns of justice. (No, really!)
With that in mind, I present five movies you can watch during spooky season that will not only thrill and chill you, they’ll also spur you to think and act for justice.
I contain multiple identities. On the one hand, I am a Black man whose ancestors were enslaved, then pushed into ghettos, and now exploited through the unjust prison labor system. On the other hand, I am living on the stolen land of the Duwamish people. I can’t escape the colonial history of the U.S. and its reverberating effects.
There are times when I try to convince myself that, because I am a Black person living in the U.S., it’s not my responsibility to wrestle with the legacy of colonialism and how I might be a beneficiary of that history. However, after my conversation with author and activist Patty Krawec, I am convinced that I need to view myself through a more complicated lens.