Chistmas as Critique of Complicity with Empire
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"This Christmas, let's celebrate in the form of a life lived every day in harmony with the belief that when it comes to those pushed to the undersides and edges of our society, this baby lying in a manger grows up to be an advocate for them."
Advent and the Arrival of a Safer World for Everyone
Herb Montgomery | December 16, 2022 To listen to this week’s eSight as a podcast episode click here. “Can the ethics in the Jesus story, ethics such as the Golden Rule, neighborly love, solidarity with the marginalized, economic justice for the poor, nonviolent resistance,...
The Love and Justice of Advent
Herb Montgomery | December 9, 2022 To listen to this week’s eSight as a podcast episode click here. “Today, we must let the kernel of concern for some people’s material needs found in the Hebrew prophets and the gospels evolve to include everyone, including...
Herb Montgomery | December 2, 2022 To listen to this week’s eSight as a podcast episode click here. “In this just future that we are working for now, may all things death-dealing be burned up like chaff with fire that cannot be quenched. May...
Herb Montgomery | November 25, 2022 To listen to this week’s eSight as a podcast episode click here. “We can desire a future characterized not by some being left and many being destroyed but by change and reclaiming the humanity for all whether they...
Christmas Means Centering the Voices of Women
Herb Montgomery | December 24, 2021 “We, too, can choose to listen when a woman has the courage to tell her story, even if it seems “impossible” to patriarchal men . . . If we are to take these Christmas narratives seriously, then we...
The Feminist Liberation of Advent
End of Year Matching Donations! 2021 has been a year of big challenges. Doing ministry during an ongoing COVID-19 pandemic has brought its share of change along with moments of heartwarming providence and blessings. As this year is coming to a close, I’m deeply...
End of Year Matching Donations! 2021 has been a year of big challenges. Doing ministry during an ongoing COVID-19 pandemic has brought its share of change along with moments of heartwarming providence and blessings. As this year is coming to a close, I’m deeply...
Advent, Hope, and Living on the Margins
[To listen to this week’s eSight as a podcast click here.] Herb Montgomery | December 3, 2021 “The gospel message here, and one of my favorite Advent themes, is that salvation, change, and liberation don’t come from the center of our societies, but from...
Advent and a Different Iteration of Our World
by Herb Montgomery | November 29, 2021 (To listen to this week’s eSight as a podcast, click here.) “As we enter this Advent season this weekend, we are called again to build a better world. Hope can give way to despair if instead...
The Concrete Liberation Narratives of Advent (Part 3)
Herb Montgomery | December 24, 2020 “So many are suffering hardship right now in the U.S. These stories of the birth of Jesus aren’t distractions from that suffering. They don’t turn our focus to postmortem bliss or internalized private and personal piety. Instead, they...
The Concrete Liberation Narratives of Advent (Part 2 of 3)
Herb Montgomery | December 18, 2020 “Notice that, for their first audiences, the stories of Jesus were not Christian stories about getting to heaven. These were stories deeply rooted in the concrete liberation hopes and realities people were facing . . . These stories...
The Concrete Liberation Narratives of Advent (Part 1 of 3)
Herb Montgomery | December 11, 2020 “This Christmas story, far from being about how Jesus would make a way to the afterlife and leave the oppressive systems and structures of this world passively untouched, speaks to its audience of liberation from soul-crushing realities affecting...
Great Joy for All People (Part 3)
Herb Montgomery | January 10, 2020 Luke’s narratives about Jesus, beginning with the Christmas narratives, ultimately offer hope for those society deems less than, and they are still problematic to those in positions of power and privilege. I believe they offer much to those...
Great Joy for All People (Part 2)
Herb Montgomery | December 20, 2019 “Luke skillfully integrates into his story the hopes of Judaism and the subversion of the political theology of the Roman Empire. Jesus, for Luke, is simultaneously the fulfillment of one (Judaism) and the subversion of the other (Rome)....
Great Joy for All People (Part 1)
by Herb Montgomery | December 13, 2019 “Seen in their original context, Luke’s birth narratives for Jesus subvert the Roman economic, political, social, and theological systems of their day. Do these stories offer anything to our justice work today and if they do, what?”...
A Christmas Story for the Marginalized
Herb Montgomery | December 6, 2019 “The question for those presently at the center is not whether they will include the presently marginalized at their table, but whether they will participate in the socially transformative work that is already taking place on the margins...
Christmas and Liberation from Hate
by Herb Montgomery | December 14, 2018 “Beauty is about how different shapes, colors, lines, or objects are arranged together. Humanity is varied and richly diverse. We can hold our differences in relationships that are beautiful or in ways that are destructive. We have...
Herb Montgomery | December 7, 2018 “In the Hebrew sacred text we read an ancient story of a town’s xenophobic refusal to show hospitality out of a desire to protect it’s own affluence from the threat of having to be shared with others ....
Two Visions [or Versions] of Peace (Part 3 of 3)
The Subversive Narratives of Advent: Part 3 of 3 by Herb Montgomery “The angel said to them, ‘Do not be afraid. I bring you good news that will cause great joy for all the people. Today in the town of David a Savior has...
The Subversive Narratives of Advent (Part 2 of 3) BY HERB MONTGOMERY “Where is the one who has been born king of the Jews? We saw his star when it rose and have come to worship him.” (Matthew 2:2) Our title this week is...
The Subversive Narratives of Advent (Part 1 of 3)
BY HERB MONTGOMERY “I bring you good news that will cause great joy for all people.” (Luke 2.10) Advent season has begun! Over the next two weeks I want to look at the birth narratives of Jesus from first century Christian, Jewish, and Roman...
And there were shepherds living out in the fields nearby, keeping watch over their flocks at night. An angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified. But the angel said to them,...