the responses with Monica Kumar & Mike Rusch.

S03E24 the responses with Monica Kumar & Mike Rusch.

[00:00:54] mike rusch.: You're listening to The Underview, an exploration in the shaping of our place. My name is Mike Rusch, and today we're doing something different. No guests, no sanctuary, no pulpit. Today, the microphone is going to turn around.

Since the beginning of the season, we've asked you to send us what you're wrestling with, and gosh, you really did, many times over. From small sentences of thankfulness and encouragement, but also comments that are really hard, and maybe comments that haven't been shared out loud before. Many of these were private, and we'll hold them as sacred, but others were meant for us to wrestle through. And while we can't share them all, there are some common questions and thoughts among all of them.

So this episode belongs to you, your voices, your questions, and our honest attempt to answer them, acknowledge them, or just admit that maybe that's the reality that we're in.

Here's why this matters. This season is asking one question about the faith of Northwest Arkansas: How do the things said on Sunday shape the place we live on Monday?

We've been moving through what was planted here, what holds power, and a season like that can't be a monologue. If we're exploring belonging, then the people listening have to belong to that conversation also, including the people who push back, especially the people who push back.

So today you'll hear some of your voices. These will be a word of encouragement from inside the church, and a reminder that the church can be two things at one time. A story from a man who paid a price nearly thirty years ago for standing where one of our guests stands now. Letters and messages, including a question about what growth does to churches in a place like this that I think belongs at the center of this season. And we'll end where the hardest question of this batch lives, a caller from outside Philadelphia asking about a prophetic middle. What is it? Where Jesus stands in it, and what happens when the poles start moving? Reverend Dr. Michelle Morris came back to answer that question herself.

And I would say keep the questions coming. Whatever you're wrestling with, even with this episode, go to theunderview.com homepage, hit the Send Us a Voice Message button , and we'll hear those going forward. This will not be the last time that we bring your voices into it. This episode exists because your voice matters, and we wanna include it.

And one comment real quickly. This is not all of the responses that we've received. There are more, more that are encouraging and more that are challenging, very challenging, maybe even more challenging than what you'll hear today. We're holding a few of those for later in the season because they help us move the conversation forward. So if you don't hear your question, it may be coming in future episodes. But the questions are not closed, so there is still time and space to add your voice to it.

All right, we've got a whole lot to work through today. Let's get into it

mike mcdaniel.

[00:03:32] mike mcdaniel.: Hey, Mike McDaniel here again. just wanted to say here again, the content is rich and diverse across this conversation on faith in Northwest Arkansas.

So thank you for being bold to tread into some difficult and sometimes shark-infested waters. The church is flawed yet beautiful, and thank you for bringing out both. Thank you, man

response.

[00:04:10] monica kumar.: The older I get, the more I seem to have to resolve living with and within tension. I'm finding that the geographical distance between or and and holds multitudes of emotion, capacity, fear, and possibility. I appreciate this contribution so much because it reflected for me my own daily grappling and coming to terms with.

Thank you, Mike McDaniel, for this

[00:04:35] mike rusch.: Well, Mike, thank you. Flawed yet beautiful. That may be the shortest and most honest description of the church anyone's offered this season. And I know that you've walked through the flaws and the beauty personally, and yet you continue to maintain your view of the beauty, recognizing that where you draw your identity from is maybe what allows you to hold both at the same time.

Most of the messages that we get argue for one position or the other, but I think for me personally, I'm also finding that there is great beauty in the diversity of the churches that we've spoken to this season. And yes, there is also great controversy.

Holding both at once is the whole assignment. In fact, Mike speaks into this in a recent podcast episode that I'll put in the show notes for those interested in learning more.

And shark-infested waters, noted and true, but we're gonna keep swimming. Some of those waters are still ahead of us this season

tony hawk.

[00:05:30] tony hawk.: coming from the Church of Christ background myself. It's amazing to me that the Church of Christ is still struggling with these things that I struggled with 30 years ago. Thankful that Marshall is, is uh, helping his group of people on their way through those, those uh, denominational , sectarian barriers that keep people from seeing the broader grace of God.

So it sounds like he's really moved toward that. Grateful that Southside Church of Christ has helped plant that church, which would not have happened a few years ago when I was doing what I was doing. In fact I was where Marshall is back 30 years ago and lost my financial support because I was where he is. So, at least there's some progress there that the restrictions and the legalism within the Church of Christ may be becoming less stringent than, than it was. Or at least there's several people that are embracing a more grace-filled understanding of who Jesus is and what, what grace is.

So I'm grateful for you having the interview with him, grateful for his opportunity to share the message, helping people see beyond the barriers in the Church of Christ. Great people there. I learned myself to study the Bible there.

In fact, it was being in Vancouver 3,000 miles from the South, and a whole lot fewer members of the Church of Christ there in my neighborhood that allowed me to spend time in the Word, just me and God in the Word and answering unchurched people's questions helped me understand and see God's grace.

I'm grateful that His grace was open to me through through scripture. So thanks again, . Appreciate what you're doing. Take care.

response.

[00:07:08] mike rusch. (2): There's a whole episode inside your three minutes. Thirty years ago, you stood where Marshall stands now, and it cost you your financial support. Today, that same tradition that let you go helped plant the church that he now leads. That's not an abstraction about doctrinal drift. That's a man measuring the distance his own tradition has traveled in his lifetime, and with his own losses as the yardstick.

And I don't wanna rush past what that distance cost. , Progress stories flatter everyone, But someone paid for that progress before it was considered progress, back when it was just called being wrong. You did. This season, we keep meeting the version of that story that's still in motion, both historically in how traditions have changed and grown and reconciled and reckoned with their own history, And also here today with people holding positions inside their own traditions that may not be safe for another 30 years.

One more thing you said that belongs to this season. You learned to see that grace 3,000 miles away from the South, in a neighborhood where almost nobody shared your tradition, just you and people asking honest questions. Distance from your place changed what you could see in your faith.

That's one of the main premises of not only this season, but our entire conversation over the past three years. And your story is about how sometimes leaving that place is what lets you read your own tradition honestly. Thank you for your comments. We're truly grateful that you would share them with us

[00:08:32] monica kumar.: I love that Tony chose to share his story with us, and Mike, your response was beautiful. I don't think I need to add much more here, but I want to underscore the piece about distance. If you have been listening to this season, then you have an inkling that I now live in two places, Northwest Arkansas and California.

When we moved to Northwest Arkansas, it was for a hard two years, no more, and of course, we stayed for almost 13. And someone recently asked me if I miss Arkansas, and my honest answer is that I don't have to because my work lives here, and I'm so connected to my community here. And that made me think about how I would feel and who I would be without the ongoing connectedness to Northwest Arkansas.

And the answer for me is honestly rather bereft. Without my regional community, I would have a gap in my life and my heart, and to really learn that truth, I think I had to leave. And so Tony's 3,000-mile journey to understand grace resonated. I'm so grateful for his voice

comment 1.

[00:09:32] mike rusch. (2): And now for our next listener response, not everything comes through in voice message buttons. Since this season started, we've been getting letters, emails, text messages, direct messages, lots of direct messages.

People telling us things I'm not sure they've shared with any other person before. What faith cost them, what a church did to them or for them, where they are now. And we're not gonna read those. Some of those weren't sent to be read on air. But I want you to hear this plainly. We've read every one. We're humbled by them. We hear you, and we see you. And it matters, not just to us, but to what this show is becoming.

However, there are a few that I think are appropriate to read, and we'll keep them anonymous, but the words and the insights matter. One of them, with permission, I wanna bring into the room because it holds 100 years of this place in a few paragraphs

And this is what it says:

"I grew up in one of those churches that preached that they were the only ones that were going to heaven, so ultimately I left the church altogether, which was a scary thing to do in that context. And then I experienced a lot of freedom to find my belief system rather than accept the one that had been given or coerced onto me.

My great-grandfather started a church in a very rural, poor Arkansas county, and I know churches like that were the very core of mutual aid and community, and were a means of literally survival.

But modern churches, in my opinion, moved away from this and became more faith-based instead of works-based, and we've lost a core vehicle for mutual aid, especially as these belief systems have traumatized and driven away so many.

And I think we see the real effect today in our communities, especially among millennials, who have lost a critical vehicle for community work and support. When I was young, if someone in the family had surgery or whatever, there was immediately a group of 20 ladies who had all of your meals prepared for the next month. We lost that mutual aid experience as we began to put conditions on it.

You had to be a part of the in-group and ascribe to that faith tradition. My mother founded a food and clothing drive that ran for 10 years and supported 70 families a year. As the church became more conservative, the leadership decided to end that practice because they believed it was getting too big by inviting too many outsiders, and families were too reliant on us. It was this bootstrap and wealth doctrine.

All that to say, my church experience deeply affected who I became and made me extremely progressive, but in the opposite way, as a rejection of their systems.

I wanna say thank you for the person that submitted that.

This is a story of growing up in a church that preached that they were the only ones going to heaven. That isn't unique, though. This person's leaving isn't unique either. But the fear is real. The part that I can't stop thinking about, their great-grandfather started a rural county church in poor country, deep in the Ozarks, they says something about churches like that one that every history of this region confirms. They were the core of mutual aid. They were a means of survival. And in a poor place, before there were agencies and nonprofits and safety nets, the church was how you made it through.

Somebody in your family had surgery, and there were immediately people who would be able to care for you. Nobody asked if you deserved it. Nobody checked your membership. That was the infrastructure of a hard place.

And then in tracing what happened, the aid didn't disappear. It got conditions. You had to be in the in-group. You had to ascribe to the faith. The thing that was built for survival became the thing that you had to qualify for. And then the part that stopped me cold. This person's mother founded a food and clothing drive, ran for 10 years, and served 70 families a year. And the church leadership ended it, not because it failed, because it worked.

Their reason, as she tells it, was inviting too many outsiders, and the families were getting too reliant. Hear what that is. A church looked at 70 families being fed and clothed and decided the problem was that the circle had gotten too wide and the help too dependable. That is theology making a Monday decision.

And that's not a metaphor for what this season is about. This is what this season is about, one story and one county and one family. This person ends by saying that their church experience deeply affected who they became, made them extremely progressive, but the opposite way is a rejection of their systems.

I want to sit with that too, because we've spent this season asking how faith forms people, and their story is the other half of that answer. Churches don't only form the people who stay, they form the people who leave, and what those people build afterward, and what they'll never trust again.

The formation doesn't stop at the door or on the way out. What was planted is the story of real survival. What broke apart was the width of the circle. And what's emerging in them, and a lot of the people like them, rebuilding the mutual aid their traditions taught them and then took away. If you're one of those people, we'd love to hear your story

scott fiztgerald.

[00:14:19] scott fitzgerald.: Hey, Mike and Monica. It's Scott Fitzgerald calling in, I guess you would say, from the road. I'm road tripping back from Idaho. Went through Wyoming, and now I'm catching up on underview episodes of season three, which has been really amazing.

Just wanna say thank you first and foremost for putting that work in. It's a lot of work, and it's extremely valuable. I've been really enjoying it. Uh, I'm only two faith leader conversations in. Listened to all of your episodes leading up to that, which are fantastic. And I just finished the episode with Reverend Gardner from St. Paul's Episcopal in Fayetteville. And yeah, what a, what a wonderful interview. I-- It's really got me thinking differently about, uh, Christian churches. I grew up as a Catholic, and I've never heard a, a Catholic leader of any of the churches that I went to as a kid speak so beautifully as Reverend Gardner did about belonging and, their ability to accept people on face value without checking for their religious credentials or theological credentials.

And the thing that sat with me most in that episode with Reverend Gardner was his comments about those who seek to sow division are working against the will of God and the, the work of God. And additionally, uh, not speaking up about that is a sin. And that was really powerful to hear him say that, and I think it really relates to the work that I've been trying to lean into with racial justice as a white man. And that's gonna sit with me for sure as a reminder that it's one thing to do the work personally, but to not use my voice and not speak out in critical times, um, to let whoever know that I don't agree with what's happening is a huge part of the work and part of the responsibility that I feel and that I often don't do, that I still need to do better, uh, you know, with and often find myself not using my voice and questioning that in hindsight.

You know, why didn't I? Why do I hesitate, you know, to speak up when the time is, uh, is right for that? Anyways, that was just a really nice reminder that we have to create a whole community for everyone, and we have to speak up when others aren't doing that. And that's a responsibility or as what he called it a sin.

So yeah, powerful stuff for sure sitting with me. I'm listening and, uh, very grateful. Thanks, you guys. Bye.

response.

[00:16:57] mike rusch.: Scott, thank you so much. And there's really something beautiful about catching up on a season about a place while you're crossing half the country to get back to yours. You I love that you heard that line precisely. Reverend Garner says two things, and the second one is the harder one. Plenty of traditions will say division works against the will of God, but that's almost safe. But he didn't stop there. He said staying quiet about it is a sin. The word moves the whole thing from opinion to obligation.

A Sunday sentence that makes a claim on your Monday. You caught it going by. And then you did the honest thing with that. You didn't tell us how much you agree. You told us where it convicts you, the questions you're carrying. You just said it out loud, which is more than most of us do. That's the response we hope for, honestly. Not agreement, conviction, spoken. We'll let Reverend Garner's words just keep doing their work. Grateful you're with us, Scott. Drive safe

comment 2.

[00:17:51] mike rusch. (2): Our next message, and I'll read the whole thing because it's short. It said,

"I just listened to the underview with Monica and Shahid and found it very enlightening and encouraging. I never thought that I would be welcome in a mosque. He was very impressive, and I'm looking forward to next week's segment."

I want to hold up that one sentence because it might be the whole episode.

"I never thought I could be welcomed in a mosque."

Think about what's inside of that sentence. Not hostility, not judgment, just a lifetime assuming that a door was closed and then an hour of listening to Shahid describe his community in his own words, and the door isn't closed anymore.

Nobody argued with anybody to come to that conclusion. Someone described their place and somebody else recognized it. That's the work. If this season has done nothing more than to allow one person to see that they are welcome by someone who may be different from them, I hope that we'll see that it's been worth it

comment 3.

[00:18:47] mike rusch. (2): This next Listener responded with,

"I want to thank you and Monica for this season of the underview. I know it's not finished yet, but it has been such a refreshing listen each week. The timing of its release in our current sociopolitical moment is a gift, and I've often wondered whether you might explore faith traditions beyond Christianity so I was delighted to discover that this week's episode begins to do just that.

You're giving voice to faith traditions outside the larger cultural norm. I'm not sure I have words to express how rare and how needed that is. Truthfully, I couldn't tell you much about the Church of Christ or Assemblies of God tradition, even though they have been far more culturally present in my life than Islam or Buddhism.

That realization has reminded me how little we often know about one another, despite our shared longing to be seen, to be known, and loved, and to become people of peace for those around us.

One of my favorite parts this season has been listening while my children, ages thirteen and eleven, wander in and out of my office or the car. It sparked curiosity in them about their own faith and the faith of their friends, and I'm deeply grateful for that.

I'm also hoping you'll create some space for leaders from larger churches to participate, though I find myself wondering whether they'll accept the invitation. I say that as someone who has walked through my own deconstruction and reconstruction after coming out of these denominations.

Truthfully, one of my prayers has been that people in those spaces would listen to this podcast. I'm also finding myself wondering in our capitalistic culture, and particularly in Northwest Arkansas, where visibility and growth can become intertwined with success, whether larger churches sometimes see themselves as something more akin to growth machines than communities of formation.

Those are simply the questions that I carry. At the heart of it all, my hope is that we can truly see one another as the gifts we are and extend grace as we are each in the process of our own becoming."

response.

[00:20:39] mike rusch. (2): So I wanna say thank you to this message. We'll not name the name where it came from, But I wanted to read it exactly as she wrote it because it belongs to this season. She wonders in our culture, particularly here in Northwest Arkansas, where visibility and growth become intertwined with success, whether larger churches sometimes begin to see themselves as something more akin to growth machines than communities of formation. Hopefully, the episode before this was able to answer some of those questions.

I'm not gonna really dig into the answer today. I'm going to let that sit because that question, what growth does to formation, what it does to belonging, is very close to the center of everything that this season is asking. And I'll say this to those that are leading large churches in the region, if you're listening, the invitation is open. Reach out to us through the website. This listener hopes you'll accept it, and so do we.

kevin eppler.

[00:21:29] kevin eppler.: Hey, Mike and Monica. This is Kevin Eppler calling from, oh, forty-five minutes west of Philadelphia. And first wanted to express a lot of gratitude for this incredible podcast and for the work you're doing together. It's a really stimulating, really thoughtful, thought-provoking and I'm enjoying it tremendously. So thank you both.

The reason I'm calling in today is because I have a question in response to what was for me the most recent episode your conversation with Dr. Reverend Michelle Morris. And my question, I guess it would be technically for her, but interested to hear your thoughts because Dr. Morris introduced the concept of the prophetic middle that she or the Methodist Church perhaps, or at least her Methodist church, is very much trying to uphold, trying to find, to amplify. And I find that admirable and also raises for me the question of what is the prophetic middle?

How does she define it? And if we're defining the middle of something, we therefore, I think by definition or association, have to define its poles. So what are the poles in which or in between which the prophetic middle rest? That's my first question. And so... Or those are my first two questions, I guess.

And then another question for me is, a-as I reflect on the life and teachings and work of what we know of Jesus of Nazareth, and I'm curious what Dr. Reverend Morris might say where Jesus stands, and what are the poles between which Jesus stood. And and was Jesus in the middle of anything, or was Jesus an outlier, or was Jesus staking a claim on a post and called a pole himself? I, I'm-- obviously, that might be a bit of a leading question, but I'm open to... and could possibly answer that for myself, but I'd love to hear the thoughts of Reverend Dr. Morris.

And then lastly I'll ask this question of any faith leader today who's trying to seek to play a bridge or to seek the prophetic middle, and I'm not saying those are the same thing. But what happens when the poles move? What happens particularly when they move at unequal pace and distance, not at the same way or same time? What happens when one pole moves extremely further in, in its direction? Does not the middle then have to move also in that direction in order to stay the middle? And if so doing, if that is true, I'm not assuming that's accurate, but doesn't that risk integrity, or doesn't that risk no longer being principled?

Because we're willing to tolerate and accept so much more of the extreme that one or another pole has moved toward. I don't know if that question is clear, but I hope the spirit of it which-- with which I intended it is coming across.

Once again, thank you all. The guests are amazing. The conversation is intriguing and thoughtful and really engaging, and I'm really enjoying it. So there it is, and I hope uh, I can't wait to hear uh, some thoughts and responses

set up.

[00:25:09] mike rusch.: Kevin, thank you so much for that question. Uh, it's, it's a really good question. Uh, and for this one, uh, Monica and I were like, "Hey, let's go back, uh, to Reverend Dr. Michelle Morris and actually ask her to respond to this." And so what follows, uh, is Reverend Morris's, uh, response. So we hope this is helpful, uh, as we move these conversations forward

response.

[00:25:27] rev. dr. michelle morris.: so what is the prophetic middle? And I think there's lots of ways that you could talk about it. You could talk about it at the at this kinda center point of reason. I also was thinking about it in terms of the location of where the greatest amount of complexity is in any given issue where kind of all of the ideas come to a merging point and and have to be reckoned with amongst each other. You, you might say it's the grayest space, right? Not completely black or white but the space of gray.

But I think ultimately what it is, and ultimately what my church is leading into, is it's the place of holding the people together. And so for me, the prophetic middle is always about that greatest place of love, where we're trying to hold onto everyone.

While it exhibits so often in stances that we take on issues, it, and issues have real consequences in people's lives, I think what the position actually is the position of where and how do we love the most and keep hold of the most people. So that's for me what the prophetic middle is. Which then you know, when he asks the question of where Jesus stands, I think always Jesus is in the middle.

Again, not to say that he doesn't have hard words for people, and in fact, oftentimes what he is doing is trying to get the poles to reckon with each other, right? I think of, like, when h- when when he is standing with the Pharisees on one side and the crowd on another side, and oftentimes he has really hard words for the Pharisees, and i- in defense a lot of times of the crowd.

But he continues to engage the Pharisees and doesn't cast them out. They may cast him out, but he doesn't cast the Pharisees out. And even when he's on the cross, he says, "Father, forgive them. They don't know what they're doing." Right? So Jesus doesn't ever give up on the people. It doesn't matter which side of whatever issue they're ending up on.

But he always holds us accountable to loving each other, and sometimes that means it looks like the pole has moved because Jesus is siding with those who are being unloved. And so it looks like that, but in fact, the pole the s- the middle holds. So he also asked, "What are the poles?"

And I, I really think it's those extremes of where we push to one direction or another, which again, I think exhibits in issues, but is really about our own humanity, our own feelings, our our ethics, our our challenges in life, our privilege or lack of privilege. All of those things are played out, but they're really about our...

who we are as humans. And so the poles are those extreme pushes, and the extreme pushes wh- that push people far apart from each other. I will also say that I, I said the prophetic middle and not the prophetic center. So that's another reason why I would say that the middle doesn't move, with the exception of to take in more complexity, but the middle itself doesn't move.

The poles do, though And because the poles move, it mean, may mean that the middle is not at the center point I wanna reflect a little bit on my own congregation on that. We are a lot of people who have a lot of different opinions about a lot of different things. That's one of the things about the Methodist Church, we allow for that kind of complexity, right?

I have some people who would very much identify as politically conservative. And of course, I have politically progressive people. And our church leans progressive. Because because we do work so much in, on the issue of inclusion, and for right now, not for all time, but for right now, the progressive side tends to draw...

it tends to favor inclusion, whereas what is traditionally or what is currently understood as conservative maybe doesn't. However, my conservatives who are a part of this congregation are deeply committed to welcoming all. It is a shared value. And so for them, they find themselves drawn, at least on that issue, closer to the progressive side than they would identify on a number of other things, right?

Because they are committed to being a space where all are welcome and recognizing the unease of that they find themselves far from that pole that would exclude, even though they might identify with other things that would push them, you know, more on the, what we ty- typically call right and left, right?

That being said, our progressive folks tend to also not be too far on that pole. That would cut out people who identify as conservative, because sometimes the progressive side makes it an all or nothing game as well, right? And our folks tend not to be the all or nothing. They tend to r- be okay with wrestling with the complexity of what it means to try to live in this value and know it's not easy, and know it means some give in both directions.

But it does mean that one pole right now is way farther out than the other pole. And but we, I feel like, have stayed in our same committed place and have made space for each other and all of the difficulty of living in that reality right now. So that answers the question for me of integrity, because we are committed to the love of people, and we are committed to love being our highest value It does mean that our-- I think if I was gonna give a, an image to it, I would say it does mean our arms have to be longer or shorter at sometimes than others.

But our position from which we reach out with those arms doesn't have to change because it's standing on that commitment that we're gonna stand in this complex place that is uneasy and gray in order to always be reaching from love. I wanna say one other thing on this. If you would have asked me...

I was not a, I was not a officially a Methodist until the late nineteen-nineties, but if I think about our politics thirty years ago the middle was the dominant location, right? We really did act much more as a middle group. I don't think it's a, I don't think it's a coincidence that's also when our budget was balanced and things like that, right?

Because there was willingness to compromise, and there was willing to meet in the middle. Our politics acted that way, and our society acted a lot more like that, and I don't think at that time there was a prophetic middle. Because proph-- the prophetic position is always going to be the minority position in the sense of prophecy is trying to get us to pay attention to something that needs to change or something that needs to be taken notice of, and whatever the dominant position is at the time does not need to be drawn notice of.

Problems within the dominant position do need to be drawn notice to but the dominant posi-- the dominant state, whatever that is, is the recipient of prophecy, is the reason that prophecy exists, not the generator of prophecy. You don't have to self-promote, right? When you're the dominant force.

So I don't think there was such a thing as the prophetic middle when the middle was the kind of dominant perspective. I think at that point, either pole was the location of prophecy. Either pole was pointing out things that were potential problems and needed to be accounted for and where things were being erased.

So while I would say the middle holds, the location of prophecy does not. And it goes to wherever the non-dominant reality is. Right now it certainly feels, and I think it's fair to realistically say, we're being driven to the poles And because that is where the push is, and that is what's getting the press, and that is the sort of the supposed or promoted position to be in, is to take extreme positions.

That's not where prophecy is. Now prophecy has moved to the middle. So I don't-- My hope is that the prophetic middle doesn't have to exist for very long. But as long as it does, I think that's where we'll stand.

reponse.

[00:35:51] mike rusch.: I wanna sit with what Reverend Morris just did there because I think it's easy to miss. Kevin asked the hardest version of this question: If the poles move, doesn't the middle have to move with them? And doesn't that cost you your integrity? That's not a gotcha. That's the question every bridge builder in this region is living inside of right now.

And Reverend Morris' answer was to refuse the frame. The middle she's describing isn't a point on a line between two positions. It's a commitment. Hold the people. The poles can move all they want. The commitment does not. Her image was the arms. Sometimes they have to reach longer in one direction than the other, but the placing you're reaching from stays put.

Prophecy doesn't live at an address. It moves. It always speaks from the minority position to the dominant one. Because the dominant story never needs a prophet to promote it. Thirty years ago, when the middle ran our politics, prophecy lived at the edges.

Now the edges run everything, and prophecy has moved to the middle. Her hope, and I hear it as a real hope, not a rhetorical one, is that the prophetic middle doesn't have to exist for very long. The theologian Walter Brueggemann wrote that the prophetic task is to nurture an imagination that's an alternative to the dominant one.

That's what I hear in her answer. The question for this season in which imagination is dominant in Northwest Arkansas right now, and who's speaking the, and who's speaking the alternative. Kevin, you asked where Jesus stands. I'll leave her answer as the answer.

But your last question, what happens when one pole moves further and faster than the other, that one doesn't resolve. That's the one to keep holding, and we will too. And it's the right question to ask on because everything else you heard today, the encouragement, the thirty-year story, the letters, is people trying to figure out where to stand while the ground moves.

That's this season. That's this place​

episode outro.

[00:37:47] monica kumar.: I wanna end this episode talking about something that we actually don't have a button for. There's no send us a voice message for listening, but it's the half of today that made the other half possible, and I don't want it to pass without us sitting in it. Everyone who called in were trusting that if they said their true thing out loud, it would land somewhere. It could be held. That trust is the whole hid-hidden infrastructure of this episode, and it only works if the listening is real. Listening has to be active. It requires something closer to a full body posture.

We're not formulating our responses while the other person is still talking. You're not scanning for the part you agree with so you can amplify it or the part you disagree with so you can correct it.

Communication researchers call this the difference between listening to reply and listening to understand. Thich Nhat Hanh called it deep listening, listening with the sole purpose of helping the other person suffer less or feel less alone without needing to fix or correct or even agree. He said you can listen with compassion even when what you're hearing is full of wrong perceptions because the listening itself is the medicine, not your rebuttal to it.

That feels like a really hard practice to me. It means somebody can be wrong about something in my perspective, in your perspective maybe even, and they still deserve to be heard all the way to the end of their sentence and their thoughts. Parker Palmer, who spent his life thinking about community and faith says this, that the human soul doesn't want to be advised or fixed or saved.

It simply wants to be witnessed exactly as it is. Witnessed, not managed, not corrected mid-sentence, just seen accurately by someone willing to stay in the room.

We often hear people quote a part of John eight three two, "You will know the truth, and the truth will set you free." And in contemporary context, this is often interpreted as being about the speaker.

Say the true thing and be free of it.

But I'm finding that freeing can also happen on the listening side. A truth only sets someone free if it lands somewhere safe enough to be understood all the way through. Listening in every form is what makes freedom come to life.

Our hope with today's episode was to share with you what Mike and I have tried to do through this season, turn towards others the whole way through.

Please keep sharing your voices in every sense. I promise you that we are deeply listening. I'm Monica Kumar, and this is season three of the underviewx