On Memorial Day 2022, Elaine & Ched interviewed Rose Berger, Senior Editor at Sojourners Magazine and veteran Catholic peace and justice activist. Rose was 48 hours back from a week-long international, interreligious Peace Delegation to Ukraine—the first such group to visit Kyiv since the Russian invasion began on Feb 24, 2022. The religious leaders visited Kyiv and surrounding areas and met religious and political leaders, Ukrainian nonviolent activists, and survivors of the war’s violence.
  In this half-hour conversation, Rose lays out the purpose of this trip and shares poignant moments from the trip: stories of bombing victims, faith leaders doing relief work on the ground, and continuing calls for solidarity (“Do not forget Ukraine!”).

Bartcast 59: Rose Berger; Interfaith Delgation to Ukraine

Bartcast 58, recorded Feb 14 2021, is another presentation from last year’s BKI: “ACTIVISTS OF COLOR AND INDIGENOUS SOLIDARITY” is a wide-ranging panel conversation between Rev. Sue Park Hur (left), Dr. Jimi Valiente-Neighbours (second from left), and Linda QuiQuivix (second from right) and Jeannette Ban (right)—all activist-educators and dear friends!

Bartcast 58: Activists of Color and Indigenous Solidarity

Recorded live at the 2021 Bartimaeus Kinsler Institute, Sat Feb 13, 2021.
Alison McCrary is a tribal citizen of the Ani-Yun-Wiya United Cherokee Nation, a social justice movement lawyer, Catholic activist, restorative justice practitioner and an internationally sought-after speaker on social justice, spirituality and liberation.
Alison currently serves as the Practitioner-In-Residence at Wake Forest University’s School of Divinity, a Spiritual Advisor on Louisiana’s death row, and the Movement Capacity Building Strategist supporting about 50 formerly-incarcerated-people-led nonprofits in the United States.

Bartcast 57: Alison McCrary - "Incarnational Engagement with Restorative Solidarity: Contemplative Activism, Community Justice Work, and Holy Resistance in and between Red, Black, and Brown Communities”

Recorded July 15, 2021. Elaine and Ched offer a Bible study from Healing Haunted Histories (which is part of CLBSJ’s imprint at Wipf & Stock). Our comments are followed by a response from Maria De Freece Lawrence (Lenape) and Gretchen Thies Brokaw (Shinnecock), founding members of the Sweetwater Cultural Center, and a conversation about this indigenous-led organization which represents an example of indigenous-settler solidarity, and a project the CLBSJ supported.

Bartcast 56: CLBSJ 10th Anniversary - HHH Bible Study

In November 2020 Ched gave this brief (9 min) reflection for the Graduate Theological Union's Alumni in Conversation series, explaining concisely why BCM uses the rubric “discipleship at the intersection of seminary, sanctuary, streets and soil,” and what it means for our personal and political spiritual formation and activism.

Bartcast 55: A River of History and Change

In 2020 Ched gave this devotional for the Nomad Podcast in the UK (www.nomadpodcast.co.uk). In this devotion, Ched takes us on a journey down the Ventura river, where he lives in California, and goes on to open up the radical political imagination of the many biblical visions of rivers, in a world where colonization and empire habitually steal water and turn fertile places into deserts.
Thanks to NOMAD for the recording and production - original version at https://www.nomadpodcast.co.uk/ched-myers-roll-like-a-river-n245/

Bartcast 54: Ched reflects on the theology and ecology of rivers

Elaine and Ched were interviewed in mid-January 2021 by Jamie Pitts, editor of the Anabaptist Witness journal, about Healing Haunted Histories. They discuss the background and motivations for this project, the evocative title, and major themes addressed in the volume.

Bartcast 53: Healing Haunted Histories - Anabaptist Witness Dialogues Jan 2021

This Bartcast is a 20 minute section of the memorial to Murphy Davis in early November. It features Ched and Elaine’s reflection on Murphy’s vocation as a “Charon” figure, who traversed back and forth across the Great River over 25 years, teaching us about life and death. The recording ends with a beautiful song by Robin and Linda Williams. We encourage you to read Murphy’s memoir, Surely Goodness and Mercy, and to pray for her husband Eduard and daughter Hannah and family.

Bartcast 52: Memorial for Murphy Davis

In honor of the All Saints triduum, Bartcast #51 features Ched’s reflections on his father, who passed away almost 30 years ago. He reads from a piece originally published in the mid-90s titled “Pulpo en su Tinta”; you can find it in the Appendix to his book Our God is Undocumented (https://www.bcm-net.org/resources/books). (20 min).
We encourage you to remember a loved one during this season.

Bartcast 51: Ched's family story - All Saints 2020

Mauricio and Ched got together in August 2020 for a CLBSJ Scholar-Activist Encounter and discussed their work to create capacity for movement-building through arts, documentation and scholarship, and the way this work has shaped and been shaped by their faith.
Mauricio is a BCM friend and Partner, former intern and is currently an Assistant Arts Professor of Theatre Studies in the Department of Drama at NYU Tisch School of the Arts.

Bartcast 50: Mauricio Tafur Salgado

Occasionally we feature guest voices on our Bartcast. We are pleased to introduce you to Mark Pestak from Cleveland. Mark is a longtime participant in Bible study at the Catholic Worker there, which along with the Los Angeles house, is exemplary in the Catholic Worker movement for its devotion to scripture study. This is a community Ched has visited many times, and co-founder Mike Fiala has been very supportive of our Bartimaeus Institute since its beginnings, often sponsoring his community members to attend.

Mark Pestak, a physicist, delivered this fine homily on Jeremiah Ch. 19 and 21 on Father’s Day 2020. His Community of St Peter is a Roman Catholic church excommunicated for its refusal to disband during massive closings of Roman Catholic churches in Cleveland by the Bishop over ten years ago. Ched had the pleasure of staying with Mark and his family during a visit to Cleveland in October 2000 to work with the Interreligious Task Force on Central America. Thanks to Mark for his permission to share this reflection, which we hope you’ll enjoy.

Bartcast 49: Mark Pestak - Jeremiah Ch. 19 and 21

On Summer Solstice 2020 Elaine & Ched led an online liturgy for our local Farm Church. As it was also Father’s Day and Indigenous Peoples Day in Canada, we had a conversation with our friends and colleagues Harry and Germaine Lafond from the Muskeg Cree First Nation in Saskatchewan. The Lafonds talked about the importance of the Sundance among Plains peoples, and their own indigenized Catholic faith.
Photo: Germaine and Harry pictured at the 2020 BKI.

Bartcast 48: Harry and Germaine Lafond

On the Thursday morning of the BKI2020, Ched looked 'haunting' as it relates secrecy, lies and 'myths of innocence' plaguing our settler histories, and compares this to Jesus' diagnosis of, and unmasking of 'unclean spirits', both political (Mark 5) and personal (Mark 9).  He looks further at Luke 11 (v24-26) and the twin healing stories in Mark (8:22-25 and 10:46-52) which speak to the complex healing and 'strong medicine' required in the journey of decolonization .

Bartcast 47: BKI2020 Thursday Bible Study: Seven more demons came back

On the Wednesday morning of the 2020 Bartimaeus Kinsler Institute: Unsettling Histories | Decolonizing Discipleship | hukišunuškuy, Elaine again set the scene for the day's work by looking at the place where her ancestors came to and their complicity in the impacts on people of the not-vacant land, but a land under siege by government programs to drive the indigenous inhabitants (Cree) off the land. Ched contrasts this with the story of the settlement of the area around the Ventura River Watershed.
Image: Young Chippewayan First Nation hereditary chief George Kingfisher raises the Treaty 6 flag at Mennonite Central Committee board member Ray Funk’s farm (left) near Stoney Knoll, SK during the Spruce River Folk Fest

Bartcast 46: BKI2020 Wednesday Framing: Where did our People come to?

On the Tuesday morning of the 2020 Bartimaeus Kinsler Institute: Unsettling Histories | Decolonizing Discipleship | hukišunuškuy, the day's work was framed by Elaine as she told of her family's history, their former home places and the circumstances of their leaving Europe.

Bartcast 45: BKI2020 Tuesday Framing: Where did our People from and how?

On the Tuesday morning of the 2020 Bartimaeus Kinsler Institute: Unsettling Histories | Decolonizing Discipleship | hukišunuškuy, Ched looked at  1 Kings 21 and Naboth's nahala.

Bartcast 44: BKI2020 Tuesday Bible Study - Naboth's nahala

On the opening night of the 2020 Bartimaeus Kinsler Institute: Unsettling Histories | Decolonizing Discipleship | hukišunuškuy, Elaine and Ched set the scene with the presentation "The Nightmares of Sleeping Dogs"

Bartcast 43: BKI2020 Opening Night Introduction to Theme

At the 2019 Bartimaeus Kinsler Institute, June Lorenzo (Laguna Pueblo and Dene) presented an overview of the process, creation and the contents of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.  June is a lawyer and a member of, and in house attorney for, the Laguna Pueblo in New Mexico. She is a member of the Laguna Presbyterian church, where she is an elder and currently the Clerk of Session.

Bartcast 42: June Lorenzo - International Human Rights Instruments to Advance the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.

Elaine recently recorded some reflections on her work in Restorative Justice and life in the United States, over the last thirty years. The text of this reflection is also available here: www.bcm-net.org/programs/restorative-justice

Bartcast 41: Journey into Restorative Justice with Elaine Enns

In June, 2013, Ched and Elaine interviewed Liz McAlister, a mentor and “mother of the movement” for peace and justice, on the occasion of the 40th anniversary of Jonah House, the Christian peacemaking community in Baltimore, MD Liz cofounded.  This podcast is in honor of her 80th birthday, and in solidarity as she is awaiting sentencing as one of the seven defendants in the Kings Bay Plowshares disarmament action of 2018, and may be facing more time in jail on top of the 18 months she has already served.
Image: ALGERINA PERNA/Baltimore Sun

Bartcast

Bartcast

Get Started

Download the App