Breonna Taylor's death and the lawlessness of law and order Breonna Taylor, a Black woman sleeping in her bed, was shot and killed by a white police officer who burst into her home on what is now regarded as an improper warrant. Thinking they were being robbed, her boyfriend, Kenneth Walker, fired his legal and licensed weapon in self-defense, which the police used as justification for killing her and wounding him. The verdict in the case against the officers found that, as long as someone—in this case a person outside of their home, after repeated questioning and several different responses—said that he heard the police identify themselves, then the shooting was justified, no matter that Breonna and Kenneth did not...... Read More

A psalm of rage and lament to the tune of black women’s tears.... Read More

If I were to riot
I would riot against those institutions that actively harm Black people
I would riot against those businesses built on the stolen labor of Black people
I would riot against those churches built with bloodied Black hands...... Read More

Ahmaud Arbery, 23 Feb 2020
Breonna Taylor, 13 March 2020
George Floyd, 25 May 2020
Rayshard Brooks, 12 June 2020

And–and still: Trayvon and Ayanna and Sandra and Mike and Amidou and Freddie and Miriam and Rekia and, and, and…... Read More

What does Pentecost look like when the world is on fire? A rushing wind. Does it blow out the flames or does it whip them into and even more furious inferno?
What meaning does the ancient imagery hold today, human tongues forked like fire? What are those tongues saying? To whom are they speaking? Who can even hear or understand them in the roar of the flames? ...... Read More

Not every woman was at the tomb. Not everyone was in that locked room. Some picked up the broken pieces of their hearts and went home. Some would have visitors bursting into their homes to tell them unbelievable news. Some would be snatched by the arm in the market and dragged under an archway to...... Read More

Her child hung dying on a cross, Mary the mother of Jesus. Her child was snatched off the road and said to have hung herself, Geneva Reed-Veal the mother of Sandra Bland. Her child was slaughtered in a maelstrom of forty-one police bullets, Kadijatou Diallo the mother of Amadou Diallo. Her child hung dying on...... Read More

It is for you that paradise is opened, the tree of life is planted, the age to come is prepared, plenty is provided, a city is built, rest is appointed, goodness is established and wisdom perfected… 2 Esdras 8:50 Let us pray: In the name of the One who waded in the waters of Miryam’s...... Read More

Yesterday we covered grotesque violence in Judges in my Introduction to Interpreting the Hebrew Bible in Context course at Brite Divinity School. The texts were traumatizing. I was traumatized. I felt the trauma of my students and held it through the night. This morning I sent them this pastoral professorial epistle. Gentle Students, Yesterday’s readings...... Read More

In the powerful image by Pauline Williamson (who creates as Sea), Bathsheba sits with her dead or dying child produced from David’s rape while he prays for the child. See her own interpretive work on this passage here. It is Shrove Tuesday, the Tuesday before Ash Wednesday when Christians traditionally went to confession and were...... Read More