Rethinking Faith

If God is real and loving, why do so many people who sincerely search for God come up empty? Thomas Jay Oord returns to help Josh wrestle with a question that has been nagging him for a while: the problem of divine hiddenness. They start with what Tom means by “God” (a universal spirit of love who is relational, uncontrolling, and not omnipotent) and why everyone should probably be an agnostic theist. From there they question the line between general and special revelation, explore non-sensory perception and Whitehead’s idea of prehension, and ask whether we might be experiencing God all the time without knowing it. Josh also presses the pastoral question: how is “you have the wrong idea of God” any different from “you don’t have enough faith”? Along the way, they talk Caputo and theopoetics, the Bible’s contradictory witness, material-mental monism, and why Aquinas keeps getting picked on. Tom also previews his talk on love and disruption at WISR’s November 9–11 conference and his systematic theology of love, which he’s writing chapter by chapter on Substack. Enjoy! Love, Conflict, and an Unfolding Universe: Get your ticket(s) HERE. Resources: Tom's Substack A Systematic Theology of Love: Vol. 1 God and Creation Andrew Davis on Closer to Truth *Special thanks to Josh Gilbert, Marty Fredrick, and Dan Koch! Love you guys <3* Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

What does a Jesuit paleontologist who served as a WWI stretcher-bearer have to teach us about therapy, AI, and finding God in a diaper change? Dr. Andrew Del Rossi, retreat center director and author of Sacred Synergy: Spiritual and Psychological Growth in an Evolving World, joins Josh for a deep dive into the mystical vision of Pierre Teilhard de Chardin. They unpack the Omega Point, the noosphere, the “God of the ahead,” and Teilhard’s law of complexity-consciousness, then ask whether machines could ever become conscious and where Teilhard sits alongside Whitehead and Caputo. Andrew also brings in Carl Jung and Roberto Assagioli to show why psychological and spiritual growth weave together like a double helix, and why the order–disorder–reorder pattern of deconstruction is far older than we think. The conversation closes with Teilhard’s call to “build the earth,” and a preview of Andrew’s keynote at the upcoming WISR conference. Enjoy! Love, Conflict, and an Unfolding Universe: Get your ticket(s) HERE. Resources: Sacred Synergy: Spiritual & Psychological Growth in an Evolving World *Special thanks to Josh Gilbert, Marty Fredrick, and Dan Koch. Love you guys <3* Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week on (Re)thinking Faith, Philosopher Myron Penner returns once again to help Josh work through something that’s been bugging him: what happens when attachment theory gets applied to our relationship with God? The conversation starts from Geoff and Cyd Holsclaw’s Landscapes of the Soul. Josh loves the book’s take on attachment science, but he gets stuck when it turns to “secure attachment” with God. Attachment depends on faces, touch, and co-regulation. Josh’s question is how you do any of that with an incorporeal spirit. Myron places the question inside the long history of religious language. That history runs from Aquinas and Scotus on analogy to the evangelical idea of a “personal relationship with Jesus.” He argues that every way we talk about God needs an asterisk. He also raises a few complications: Attachment research holds up better in Western cultures than elsewhere. Language about “God’s design” can crowd out evolutionary explanations of our psychology. Theory of mind works differently when we turn it toward God. We can’t check our picture of God the way we check our picture of a friend. Along the way they discuss: Tanya Luhrmann’s When God Talks Back and how Vineyard churches train people to hear God What the cognitive science of religion says about spiritual experience across traditions The difference between real interdisciplinary work and pastors borrowing authority from fields they haven’t studied Influencer culture and prestige bias Whether worship music is “manipulative” Josh closes by turning the critique on himself. He asks what it means to be an agnostic theist who chooses love, and whether that means he should cut the attachment folks some slack. Enjoy! RESOURCES: Landscapes of the Soul: How the Science of Spirituality of Attachment Can Move You Into Confident Faith, Courage, and Connection When God Talks Back: Understanding the American Evangelical Relationship With God FOLLOW ME ON SUBSTACK, IT'S FREE! (Re)thinking Faith Substack *Special thanks to Marty Fredrick, Josh Gilbert, and Dan Koch. Love you guys <3* Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Why would an atheist spend his time with the Bible? Dr. Anthony Pinn is a former AME minister who is now a secular humanist and professor at Rice University. He returns to (Re)thinking Faith to talk about his new book, Biblical Outlaws: What the Bible's Most Despised Characters Can Teach Us. Pinn no longer believes in God, but he still values the Bible as powerful literature that shapes millions of lives. He argues we have to read it differently: "the Bible against the Bible." We talk about why Lot's wife looking back was a defiant "why?", why Job's wife may be the only character in the book of Job with any integrity, and how Nimrod's tower celebrates human creativity even when it fails. Along the way, they bring in Camus and the absurd, the "economy of giving and receiving," the beauty of defiance, and whether AI is a new Babel. Enjoy! RESOURCES: Biblical Outlaws: What the Bible's Most Despised Characters Can Teach Us (Book) THEOLOGY BEER CAMP ONLINE TICKETS: Grab your favorite beverage and join us ONLINE. *Special thanks to Marty Fredrick, Josh Gilbert, and Dan Koch. Love you guys <3* Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week, Dr. Simon Critchley is back, and this time we try to cover Being and Time in a single episode. (Yes... ridiculous... I know!) Simon's new book, Heidegger Thinking, grew out of 35 years of teaching Heidegger and a pandemic-era podcast he recorded at his desk. We talk about how Heidegger's break with Catholicism and his turn to Luther, Paul, and Augustine shaped Being and Time into something like a conversion experience with no God in it. Simon sums Heidegger up in three M's: meaning, movement, and mortality. We also get into why he thinks Heidegger's account of death leaves out grief, what "authenticity" meant before it became a buzzword, why the New Atheism has lost its hold, and Heidegger's decision to join the Nazi Party. We end at Simon's dream "reticence bar," where nobody has to say anything at all. Slow philosophy for a fast world. Enjoy! RESOURCES: Heidegger Thinking: Being and Time Explained (Book) The Faith of the Faithless (Book) Apply-Degger Podcast THEOLOGY BEER CAMP ONLINE: Get your online ticket to theology beer camp HERE *Special thanks to Josh Gilbert, Marty Frederick, and Dan Koch. Love you guys! <3* Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Dr. Aaron Stauffer — theologian, Presbyterian clergy, and author of Listening to the Spirit: Radical Social Gospel, Sacred Value, and Broad-Based Community Organizing — joins Josh to unpack what the Social Gospel actually is, why it became a slur in some corners of American Christianity, and how sacred values (not just political issues) build the kind of relational power that outlasts a news cycle. The conversation moves through Christian social ethics, the difference between relational and unilateral power, worker cooperatives, and a candid take on why progressive Christian influencer culture is failing the movements it claims to serve. Grounded in decades of interfaith and labor organizing, this episode is a wonderful introduction to thinking theologically about power, democracy, and community. Enjoy! RESOURCES: Organizing Visions: Social Ethics and Broad-Based Solidarity Activism Listening to the Spirit: The Radical Social Gospel, Sacred Value, and Broad-based Community Organizing THEOLOGY BEER CAMP ONLINE TICKETS: Get your online tickets for Theology Beer Camp HERE. *Special thanks to Marty Fredrick, Josh Gilbert, and Dan Koch. Love you guys! <3* Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

What happens when the God of "God Can't" meets the God of the Black church's "God Is Able"? This week I sat down with my friend, the Reverend Jill Elizabeth — public theologian, ordained Curian Network board member, and self-described "barbershop theologian". Together we dig into the real friction between Black church theology and open and relational/process thought, the prosperity-gospel undercurrents nobody wants to name, and why a God who could stop injustice but chooses not to is a harder sell than it sounds. Along the way: a decade-long practice of lament over police violence in Phoenix, the theology of the barbershop as sacred space, storytelling as the doorway to empathy, and why building the kingdom of God always costs us something. This is a conversation about bridges — between traditions, between suffering and hope, and between the ideas we argue about and the bodies those ideas actually affect. Enjoy! RESOURCES: The Curian Network Systematic Geekology Podcast THEOLOGY BEER CAMP ONLINE: Get your online tickets today! YAY TICKETS *Special thanks to Josh, Marty, and Dan! Love you guys <3* Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week, John D. Caputo returns to talk about his new book, A Radical God: Theopoetics, Phenomenology, and the Future of Religion. Religion has been incredibly busy making itself unbelievable, and the question isn't whether we can save it from its critics, or whether we can save it from itself, but if religion is even worth saving at all. Caputo's answer is theopoetics, what he calls "religion's last stand". It's not that God exceeds our language so we resort to poetry; it's that the poetic imagination is where God comes from in the first place. We get into what's left of God after you suspend both belief and disbelief, whether you can actually pray to a God like that, and why any of this should matter to the person still showing up on Sunday morning. Enjoy! RESOURCES: A Radical God: Theopoetics, Phenomenology, and the Future of Religion THEOLOGY BEER CAMP: Tickets are running out! It's not too late... grab yours today! TICKETS *A special thanks to Josh Gilbert, Marty Fredrick, and Dan Koch. Love you guys <3* Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week I was joined by Dr. Joerg Rieger to discuss his book "Christ and Empire: From Paul to Postcolonial Times" and his upcoming class with Homebred Christianity & Dr. Tripp Fuller, "The Christ Empire Couldn't Keep". Empire shapes more of your life than you think - your theology, your politics, your algorithms, even your emotions. Dr. Rieger reveals why the real battle is not just against obvious hard power, but against the softer, more invisible forms of control that shape what we believe is normal. Together we unpack the 2,000-year story behind Christ and Empire, from Paul and the early Jesus movement to Nicaea, medieval theology, liberal Protestantism, and the present moment. Along the way, discuss how Christianity has never existed outside empire - and why that makes the question of power unavoidable. Rieger also challenges easy progressive answers. Simply rejecting violence is not enough, and simply handing Christianity over to empire is not an option either. The deeper invitation is to reclaim the radical edge of the tradition, reread the old symbols in a new way, and build communities that actually embody a different future. Enjoy! RESOURCES: The Christ Empire Couldn't Keep (Free 6 Week Class) Christ and Empire: From Paul to Postcolonial Times (Book) Other Books by Joerg Religion and Justice Solidarity Circles THEOLOGY BEER CAMP 2026: Come hang out with Dr. Rieger and me at Theology Beer Camp! Get your tickets HERE. *Special thanks to Marty Fredrick, Josh Gilbert, and Dan Koch. Love you guys <3* Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Most of us have been taught that strength means suppressing emotion, staying stoic, and keeping our true selves hidden. But what if the real power lies in embracing your full humanity—your fears, wounds, and passions? Jeff Mount, a former Krav Maga instructor turned contemplative coach, shares how he navigates the tension between being a commanding physical presence and a poetic, vulnerable soul. He reveals how pilgrimage, both literal and metaphorical, becomes a sacred pathway to healing, wisdom, and belonging. In this episode, you'll discover how stories from Celtic saints to modern trauma give us a universal language of connection. Jeff explores the significance of embracing paradox—how being a "warrior poet" is not a contradiction but a vital expression of what it means to be fully human. We break down the profound healing power of witnessing suffering—your own and others’—and how self-compassion is the ultimate act of courage. Jeff shares stories from his journeys across Scotland and Newfoundland, illustrating how sacred travel becomes a mirror for self-awareness, belonging, and resilience. You'll learn practical frameworks for integrating contemplative practices into a high-performance life, the importance of embracing mystery over certainty, and why storytelling is a form of sacred medicine. Whether you're a leader, a creative, or someone seeking authentic connection, this episode offers insights to cultivate strength without strengthlessness, vulnerability without vulnerability abuse, and a deep sense of belonging in a fragmented world. Enjoy! RESOURCES: Seeking Thin Places (Book) JeffMountCoaching Myth and the Warrior Poet (Substack) THEOLOGY BEER CAMP 2026: Tickets are almost gone! Don't miss out and get your ticket(s) HERE! *Special thanks to Marty Fredrick, Josh Gilbert, and Dan Koch. Love you guys <3* Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices