Six New Things – Week of May 09, 2022

This week’s list is all about you, dear leader, to encourage social transformation, expand biblical studies, hone pastoral care, develop new mentors, reorient preaching, strengthen personal awareness – or simply support you, if all this feels like a quagmire.

ONE

The Flag and the Cross: White Christian Nationalism and the Threat to American Democracy (Oxford University) traces WCN’s history, alliance with individualism and libertarianism, and contemporary implications.

Find info on a moderated discussion with the authors here.

Interested in meeting WCN’s fall-out with justice and equity? Listen to The Soul of Transformation: Exploring Vocations in Social Justice podcast.

TWO

The seminal work of the indomitable Phyllis Trible, Texts of Terror: Literary-Feminist Readings of Biblical Narrative (Fortress), is re-released just in time to consider misogyny in both church and culture.

Find additional resources for Confronting Misogyny and specifically Reproductive Rights in our lib guides.

THREE

Further pastoral care insights can be gleaned from What We Wish Were True: Reflections on Nurturing Life and Facing Death (Penguin).

FOUR

Let that compassion expand to creation – and be returned in the form of spiritual guides – with Saints of Feather and Fang: How the Animals We Love and Fear Connect Us to God (Broadleaf).

FIVE

Nature’s mentors might help to inspire a more “authoritative, engaging, or compelling” approach to Preaching to Those Walking Away (Fortress).

Find more Lectionary & Preaching resources in our lib guide.

SIX

If what you really need is a morale boost, you might start with a smattering of self-awareness brought on by Enneagram Essentials cards (Ink & Willow) – followed up by reading Stuck: Why Clergy Are Alienated from Their Calling, Congregation, and Career… and What to Do about It (Fortress).

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I hope somewhere in here is the encouragement, the jump-start, or the reassurance you need, amazing leader!