The Word As Resistance
by The Word As Resistance
“The Word Is Resistance” and its updated version "The Word As Resistance" is a podcast by white anti-racist Christians based on the Christian lectionary, offering an anti-racist Word for other white Christians -- though all are welcome to check it out. Originally a project of SURJ-Faith, the podcast is now lovingly stewarded by the Liberating Lineages Collective as an ongoing resource to help us all get free.Our text work is rooted in collective liberation and committed to dismantling fascist/imperialist, antisemitic, white supremacist, and other harmful readings of these stories. We believe we can tell a different story about what it means to be Christian, a story that is rooted in safety, care, and abundance so that all can flourish.Our traditions were made for these times. They come from these times. So we have resources in our texts, our practices, to help us right now. We can reclaim our stories and re-tell them to nourish our resistance against white supremacy and our work
Episodes
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TWAR 10.18.26 We Will Mend Us
In this week’s text from Exodus, we are still in the aftermath of the incident of the golden calf; in this story, Moses and God remind each other who they are, and Moses asks to see God, all in seeing and hearing distance of the Hebrew people. Join Collective member Rev. Anne Dunlap and guest...
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TWAR 10.11.26 No One’s a Hero, Everyone Plays a Part
Dive into the story of the Hebrew people and the golden calf with Rev. Liz Kearny and special guest (another Liberating Lineages Collective co-founding member!) Amelia Mae Paradise. How does this messy story invite us to take inventory of the ways our carceral society and its logics push us to...
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TWAR 10.04.26 Patterns of Collective Life
On this week's podcast in the Exodus and Abolition series, we hear remixes of the 10 Commandments by M Jade Kaiser and collective member Sharon Fennema who creatively imagine what a recontextualized version of this text so often used as a weapon of white Christian nationalism might offer our...
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TWAR 9.27.26 You Can Ask For What You Need
Our Exodus series continues with Collective member Rev. Anne Dunlap and special guest Jordan Leahy talk about dealing with the practicalities of a mixed multitude on the move. The people have continued on their journey after they pointed out a lack of food and were provided manna, quails, and...
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TWAR 9.20.26 From Master to Mother
Join Rev. Liz Kearny and special guest Rev. Addie Domske as they encounter a God in Exodus 16:2-15 who tenderly responds to the Hebrew people's cry for food and sustenance with bread from heaven (and some quail!). How might we imagine God in this text as a mother, a nurturing parent, who is…
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TWAR 9.13.26 Dreaming Abolition for the Egypt in Us Too
In this episode we wrestle with the story of the parting of the Red Sea, wondering how our abolition dreams hold together oppressed and oppressor in making a way toward liberation. Featuring Dr. Sharon Fennema of the Liberating Lineages Collective and Cole Parke-West of Christians for A Free...
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TWAR 9.6.26 Get Ready: We All Go Together
This week’s Exodus reading is the culmination of the Ten Plagues, the escalating contestation of power between The Divine One and Pharaoh. Join Collective member Rev. Anne Dunlap and special guest Graie Hagans as they talk about this grim final plague in which all the firstborn of Egypt not...
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TWAR 8.30.26 Turn Aside: Curiosity that Cracks Prison Walls
In our text for today (Exodus 3:1-15), Moses gets curious about a bush that burns, but is somehow not consumed. In this wilderness space, God calls Moses into the work of helping his enslaved Hebrew siblings get free from slavery in Egypt. Join Rev. Liz Kearny and special guest contributors…
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TWAR 8.23.26 Abolition as Daily Insurrections: Risking Solidarity toward Freedom
We begin our "Exodus and Abolition" series in Exodus 1, setting the context for the unfolding of the rest of the the story by showing us the contours of what enslavement means for the Hebrew people. Into this this context of oppression, enter three stories of women resisting unjust laws and…
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TWAR 8.16.26 A Woman's Outcry Changes Jesus
In our text this week, Jesus is really going through a rough time, and he manages to offend just about everyone around him with his sharp-edged words and actions. Join Rev. Anne Dunlap, Dr. Sharon Fennema, and Rev. Liz Kearny as they listen to the outcry of the Canaanite woman in the story, and...
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TWAR 8.9.26 All Together In the Boat
This "miracle" story of Jesus walking on water comes on the heels of Jesus feeding over 5,000 people. And they are all still in the raw trauma of learning John the Baptist has been executed. Join Rev. Liz Kearny, Dr. Sharon Fennema, and Rev. Anne Dunlap as they ponder miracles, tormenting storms,...
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TWAR 8.2.26 Angels of Grief and Bread
Join our contributors Dr. Sharon Fennema, Rev. Liz Kearny, and Rev. Anne Dunlap as they talk (and cry) about the famous story of Jesus feeding over 5,000 people. The story follows after the series of parables imagining the kingdom of heaven together in community in chapter 13. And here, we...
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TWAR 7.26.26 Small, Outcast, Essential
This week, Jesus continues his lakeside parable teaching with a string of mini-parables: a mustard seed is sown and becomes a massive tree-home for the birds, a woman mixes yeast into her flour, a man buys the field where he was digging around and found treasure, a merchant sells all they have to...
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TWAR 7.19.26 Seeds and Weeds and Fields of Questions
In this week's text, Jesus entrusts the treasure of another land-based parable to the gathered community. Here, instead of exploring the interconnection between seeds and the soil they are planted in like last week’s parable, the story revolves around the complex interconnection between the…
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TWAR 7.12.26 Sowing Seeds for Dignity and Belonging (Year A)
"The sower went out to sow." So begins one of Jesus' most famous parables. What could he be saying to this crowd of people at the lakeside? Join Dr. Sharon Fennema, Rev. Anne Dunlap, and Rev. Liz Kearny as they talk about seeds, soil, belonging, underground secrets, and more! Transcript available...
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6.22.26 Summer 2026 Teaser: Matthew, Jesus, and the Land ( Year A)
As summer weather draws so many of us outside to dance with a whole host of sky, water, and plant relatives, the Revised Common Lectionary journeys with Jesus in the Gospel of Matthew as he shares stories and works wonders rooted in his relationship with the natural world. Join Rev. Liz Kearny,...
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TWAR 4.5.26 Easter: Claiming Jesus, Claiming Each Other
In this Easter episode, join Rev. Liz Kearny, Rev. Anne Dunlap, and Rev. Brigitta Vieyra as they witness Mary Magdalene's grief, and find life-giving currents of intimacy, waiting, agency, and claiming in the movement of this story. Transcript available here: https://bit.ly/TWARepisodes
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TWAR 4.3.26 Good Friday: No Kings, No Crucifixions
On this Good Friday, our hearts ache with Jesus and his community as they endure his arrest, interrogation and torture, and execution. Join Rev. Anne Dunlap, Dr. Sharon Fennema, and Rev. Liz Kearny as they keep tearful vigil through the Gospel of John's telling of this grievous story. Transcript...
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TWAR 3.29.26 De-Cloaking as Disarmament (Lent 2026)
This week, Jesus-the-organizer and his comrades enact a protest parade in opposition to Rome’s military procession happening on the other side of town, all during the feast of the Passover, when the Jewish people remember God’s liberating acts that brought them out of slavery in Egypt. Join Rev....
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TWAR 3.22.26 A Weeping That Unbinds Us (Lent 2026)
This week we encounter yet another passage from John (11:1-45) where water and bodies play a central role, this time the water of tears and the dead body of Lazarus and the grieving bodies of Mary, Martha, Jesus, and the community gathered around them. Join Rev. Anne Dunlap, Rev. Liz Kearny, and...
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TWAR 3.8.26 Where Every Body Is Met With Dignity (Lent 2026)
The 9th chapter of the Gospel of John is full of questions. What kinds of questions continue harm? What kinds of questions will get us free? Join Rev. Liz Kearny, Dr. Sharon Fennema, and Rev. Anne Dunlap as they wrestle with these questions, and wonder together how this story of a blind man...
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TWAR 3.1.26 Lineages of Wells and Waters (Lent 2026)
In this week's text, Jesus encounters a Samaritan woman at Jacob’s well, and they are both transformed in the course of their rather intimate conversation. Join Dr. Sharon Fennema, Rev. Anne Dunlap, and Rev. Liz Kearny as they navigate the many layers of lineages of Jacob's well and the waters of...
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TWAR 3.1.26 Conversations of Extravagant Love (Lent 2026)
This week we get to eavesdrop on the conversation between Nicodemus and Jesus about what a life moving toward kindom-making looks like. We’re reminded that logos, usually translated as “word,” actually means something more like “conversation,” so here we recognize Jesus/the…
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TWAR 2.22.26 Tempted by The Great Confuser (Lent 2026)
We're back! Join us for this special series for Lent 2026, on the gospel texts for Year A. In this episode, Rev. Liz Kearny, Rev. Anne Dunlap, and Dr. Sharon Fennema meet Jesus at the end of his 40 day wilderness journey, famished, not long after he has been baptized by John in the Jordan River,...
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We Are Building Up a New World
This live recording of Dr. Vincent Harding’s song for the freedom movement is of a multi-racial “movement choir practice” in Denver, CO in December 2014, being led by Minister Daryl J. Walker. We are deeply grateful to the Freeney-Harding family for letting us use the song for this podcast. This...
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TWIR 12.24.23 Parting Gifts: Magnificat
As "The Word Is Resistance" comes to completion, enjoy this final episode from Rev. Anne Dunlap, which includes brief reflections on the Magnificat and highlights offerings from 2 of our long-time listeners. Much gratitude for your presence with us over these 7 years! Transcript available here:...
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TWIR 12.17.23 Parting Gifts: Grief and Community
As "The Word Is Resistance" podcast comes to completion, we are wrapping up with 4 special "Parting Gift" episodes. For this episode, enjoy a group conversation with Liz Kearny, Jean Jeffress, and Brigitta Vieyra, hosted by Anne Dunlap, as they reflect on how the podcast has changed them and what...
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TWIR 12.10.23 Parting Gifts: Unlearning, Wrestling, and Paying Attention
As "The Word Is Resistance" podcast comes to completion, we are wrapping up with 4 special "Parting Gift" episodes. For this episode, enjoy a group conversation with M Jade Kaiser and Sharon Fennema, hosted by Anne Dunlap, as they reflect on their how the podcast has changed them and what parting...
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TWIR 12.3.23 Parting Gifts: Choices and Power and Community
As "The Word Is Resistance" podcast comes to completion, we are wrapping up with 4 special "Parting Gift" episodes. For this episode, enjoy a group conversation with OG contributors Rev. Anne Dunlap, Nichola Torbett, and Rev. Margaret Ernst, as they reflect on their how the podcast has changed…
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TWIR 11.19.23 #CeasefireNow: Keeping Our Resistance Vigil and Rejecting Christian Zionism
Paul is writing to his dear ones in Thessalonica about how to keep up their resistance under Roman occupation. Spoiler alert: This work involves 1) debunking the lie empire tells them (us) about “peace and security” while 2) depending on the beloveds around them (us) to fight off the numbing…
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TWIR 11.12.23 Readying Ourselves
In this episode, Rev. M Jade Kaiser wonders what it means to spiritually prepare individually and collectively for both times of disaster and openings of freedom. What wise or foolish actions or non-actions are we taking in the present that will serve us come what may - tomorrow, next year, or...
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TWIR 10.29.23 The Path to the Water
Join Rev. Anne Dunlap and Rev. Liz Kearny for a conversation about facing, embracing, wrestling with, and healing our lineages as white folx who seek to build up a new world. As we observe All Saints Day, where are the places of trauma in the stories of our own ancestors? What did they give up to...
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TWIR 10.22.23 Everything Belongs to Love
In a world that wants to force us into either/or thinking, wants to push us to choose - with us or against us - Dr. Sharon Fennema explores Jesus' invitation to discern our callings beyond the binaries. Join in lamenting all that we have given over to Caesar, and in imagining what it would look...
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TWIR 9.21.23 BONUS CONTENT! #WrestlingWithRomans: Reflections from the Colosseum
Rev. Liz Kearny was in Italy this month on a family trip and recorded these reflections from her hotel room in Rome after touring the Colosseum. After witnessing these remains of Rome’s death machinery, Rev. Liz wanted to share some #WrestlingWithRomans bonus content as she connects what she saw…
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TWIR 9.17.23 #WrestlingWithRomans: Solidarity Forever
Paul doesn't shy away from practical matters in his letter to the Romans and this week's episode takes a look at his admonitions against letting differences divide us. Dr. Sharon Fennema explores contemporary and historical examples of the ways solidarity is a threat to empire and asks what these...
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TWIR 9.10.23 #WrestlingWithRomans: Dear Rome, We Belong To Each Other. Love, Paul
For our 300th episode, join Rev. Jean Jeffress as they wrestle with Romans 13:8-14. Paul is beginning to finalize his argument to the Roman Jesus-followers. He needs them to understand that what the love of Christ Jesus offers is belonging. And he really, really wants God's people to act like it....
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TWIR 7.2.23 #WrestlingWithRomans: Grounded Grace
What does grace mean? What does grace mean for white Christians hoping to resist white supremacy? Rev. Margaret Ernst wrestles with Romans 6:12-23 to help us get a view of grace as grounded in Paul's Jewish understandings of God's love, and as the gift of being invited to take action for...
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TWIR 9.3.2023 #WrestlingWithRomans: We Are Building Up a New World
This new reality Paul’s been sharing with us - about everyone being included in a mighty tree as one beloved community - seems a long way off, doesn’t it? Join Rev. Liz Kearny as she asks, “How do we get from here to there?” We can imagine that Paul’s Gentile audience in Rome is asking the very...
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TWIR 8.27.23 #WrestlingWithRomans: Radical Tenderness
What is Paul saying about what it means to be a people of transformation? Join Brigitta Vieyra in an exploration of how radical tenderness is a liberatory spiritual disposition of interdependence. Transcript available here: https://surj.org/our-work/surj-faith/twir/
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TWIR 8.20.23 #WrestlingWithRomans: Trees and Mysteries
All means all. Join Rev. Anne Dunlap as she sorts through trees and branches and calluses and grafts in Romans 11 to discover that what Paul really does mean is: All. Means. All. Transcript available here: https://surj.org/our-work/surj-faith/twir/
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TWIR 8.13.23 #WrestlingWithRomans: A Better Proclamation
What is the good news that Paul longs for his beloveds to tell each other again and again, in the midst of Rome’s lies? Join Rev. Liz Kearny in unlearning what the empire’s religion has taught us about “confessing with your lips that Jesus is Lord and believing in your heart that God raised him...
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TWIR 8.6.23 #WrestlingWithRomans: The Anguish of a Love Song
What does Paul actually think about his own Jewish people? Does the love song he sings in Romans 9: 1-5 offer us some clues? (Hint: it is a love song, after all). Join Rev. Anne Dunlap for this episode that definitely required some wrestling with so many layers and burdens of interpretation that...
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TWIR 7.30.23 #WrestlingWithRomans: Finding "Us" for Collective Liberation (doubleposting)
(So good we accidentally posted it twice!) Who do we imagine when we read "us" in the book of Romans? When is "us" just a substitute for dominant and normalized? When is "us" collective liberation? Sharon Fennema explores these questions in starts and stops as she wonders what it means for God to...
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TWIR 7.30.23 #WrestlingWithRomans: Finding "Us" for Collective Liberation
Who do we imagine when we read "us" in the book of Romans? When is "us" just a substitute for dominant and normalized? When is "us" collective liberation? Sharon Fennema explores these questions in starts and stops as she wonders what it means for God to be "for us" as white Christians with…
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TWIR 7.23.23 #WrestlingWithRomans: The Redemption of Our Bodies
So many of us were taught that Paul teaches us that our bodies are shameful, sinful even. Is there any other way to understand Romans 8:12-25? What would it mean if there were? Join Rev. Anne Dunlap for our latest episode in our #WrestlingWithRomans series! Transcript available here:...
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TWIR 7.16.23 #WrestlingWithRomans: Flesh Beyond Whiteness as Revolt Spirituality
Wrestle with Romans 8:1-11 with Brigitta Vieyra to dissect how race is a modern, colonial invention that Paul urges divesting from as a daily act of resistance. Together, we’ll also consider how the sacred, holy work of reimagining oneself beyond and away from whiteness requires us to become...
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TWIR 7.9.2023 #WrestlingWithRomans: 'Who Will Rescue Me From This Body of Death?'
Consider with Rev. Liz Kearny all the ways we have felt hopeless or overwhelmed by despair when we realize how thoroughly systems of oppression have saturated our very ways of being. How does Paul make space for us in Romans 7 to get honest about that? What is the first step from those places of...
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TWIR 6.25.23 #WrestlingWithRomans: Live Recording at NCNCUCC Annual Gathering
Join Jean Jeffress and Nichola Torbett as they talk to a live audience at the Northern Californa Nevada Conference of the United Church of Christ Annual Gathering. We explain to people unfamiliar with the podcast what it is and what it does. And we have a conversation from Paul's letter to the...
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TWIR 6.18.23 #WrestlingWithRomans: Finding Our Share
Explore Romans 5:1-8 with the Rev. Liz Kearny as she learns how to reclaim this heavyweight text of the New Testament from the ways it has been co-opted by empire. What does it mean to remember with our whole selves that Abraham and Jesus are indeed our ancestors? How can we follow them in the…
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TWIR 6.11.23 #WrestlingWithRomans: Participants In the Promise
Our new series, #WrestlingWithRomans, starts off with Rev. Anne Dunlap wrestling with the concept of justification and what Paul could possibly mean by invoking the faith of Abraham. Hint: It's not about arguing that Christianity is better than Judaism. Transcript available here:...
About this show
“The Word Is Resistance” and its updated version "The Word As Resistance" is a podcast by white anti-racist Christians based on the Christian lectionary, offering an anti-racist Word for other white Christians -- though all are welcome to check it out. Originally a project of SURJ-Faith, the podcast is now lovingly stewarded by the Liberating Lineages Collective as an ongoing resource to help us all get free.Our text work is rooted in collective liberation and committed to dismantling fascist/imperialist, antisemitic, white supremacist, and other harmful readings of these stories. We believe we can tell a different story about what it means to be Christian, a story that is rooted in safety, care, and abundance so that all can flourish.Our traditions were made for these times. They come from these times. So we have resources in our texts, our practices, to help us right now. We can reclaim our stories and re-tell them to nourish our resistance against white supremacy and our work
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