It seems like it is always difficult (but usually important) to foster relationships with those who are different from us. When I was deeply embedded in conservative evangelicalism, it was, more than anything else, burgeoning friendships with folks who were Black, feminists, politically progressive, and/or queer that caused me to question everything and undergo a journey of significant change.
A UCC church in Albuquerque, according to a new article from Paul Hopkins, attempted to engage in a mutual listening experiment with a local conservative evangelical congregation. It went well—until it didn’t. I was fascinated by Hopkins’s account, though I remain ambivalent about the prospects of bridging the US’s political (and theological) divides.
That article was featured in last week’s Going Deeper newsletter (click here to sign up). This brand new resource from the Century delivers two new articles per week along with related readings and a set of questions for discussion or reflection. In this week’s edition, the deep dives will focus on Debie Thomas’s reflection on a prayer of grieving and Heidi Neumark’s essay about community organizing. Below you can read about both of these (plus Hopkins’s) articles, and even more great content.
Email me: Are you in relationship with people across political lines?
“At a time when his contemporaries were traversing the globe on farewell tours and indulging our voracious appetite for nostalgia, Paul Simon was alone in the night dreaming, listening, and writing.”
