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This week on The Collective Table, we’re thrilled to bring you part one of our conversation with the brilliant Rev. Dr. Wil Gafney, renowned biblical scholar, theologian, and author. Dr. Gafney invites us to explore the transformative practice of reading Scripture with a sanctified imagination—a way of engaging the Bible that challenges patriarchal and colonial interpretations while uncovering the richness of diverse perspectives.
In this powerful eight-episode season, we center the voices, experiences, and wisdom of women—who represent more than half of the global population but have often been sidelined or silenced. Through conversations with women theologians, creatives, and leaders, we’ll explore the Divine Feminine, the vital role of women in church leadership, and the patriarchal norms that have shaped domineering Christianity. Together, we’ll reflect on how the progressive church can embrace fuller, truer expressions of Spirit.
We hope you have been tuning in to Pastor Jenell’s daily Advent reflections this month on our podcast channel, The Collective Table. Each week, the reflections have focused around a different theme of Advent. On this final week of Advent, we will look at love together.
In this week’s episode, Claire and Jason listen back to a conversation with Rabbi Sharon Brous, who draws from Arendt’s ideas that loneliness and social isolation are essentially preconditions for totalitarianism. Together, they explore the crisis of loneliness, as well as rituals and practices which go against a current of individualism and competition.
Episode 4 of Season 9 is here! In today’s episode, Jason and Jenell revisit our 2021 interview with author of Black Liturgies, Cole Arthur Riley. What is the role of doubt in opening us to new possibilities? What is uncertainty’s place? What does it look like for us to identify our own beliefs and lean on our own “wisdom giants,” as Cole suggests?
Episode 3 of The Collective Table podcast is here! In today’s episode, Jenell and Jason revisit TCT’s 2021 interview with author, speaker, playwright, musician and former pastor Rob Bell. Listen in as they explore the tension between doubt and conviction, and reflect on mystery, lament, and the discomfort of sitting in the unknown. Can embracing uncertainty deepen our faith? Is doubt simply a part of what it means to be human? What does it look like to seek the “answers” in a healthy way?
In this episode, Jason and Claire explore the themes of cultural fragmentation, hybridization, and the opportunities that arise from cultural shifts. McLaren discusses how living in a fragmenting world can be seen not only as destructive but also as a moment of possibility, where mutation and hybridity create something new. This conversation highlights the importance of befriending multiplicity, and the freedom that can emerge when diverse expressions of Christianity and culture evolve and intersect.
