Hope and Liberation in Advent: Dr. Angela N. Parker on Womanist Theology

Jen: All right, everybody. Hello? Hello.

Amy: Hello.

Jen: Hello. Welcome to the show. Amy and I are delighted that you are here. Hi.

Amy: Good morning.

Jen: I see you’re in your black uniform. Per usual.

Amy: Yes. Switch to long sleeves, primarily. Oh. Big difference. You know, it’s winter.

Angela: Oh, God.

Jen: Winter is a very loose term here in Texas. But Christmas is here, and it has been here. The Christmas season is now, like, three months long. So we have such a fascinating guest today. We’re going to talk a little bit with her on advent, but nestled inside such an interesting space in which she is brilliant.

Amy: Brilliant.

Jen: Yes. She’s brilliant. We have Dr. Angela Parker with us here today. More on her in just a moment. But we will be talking to her about faith and hope, about power structures, about liberation, about womanist theology and biblical interpretation. Guys, we got a lot in here today. Essentially, we got to the end of it went well, I guess we just went to church slash seminary slash class slash revival.

Amy: And also, she could have done that whole thing in Greek had she wanted to. She really got us. I mean.

Jen: You know, she’s really smart. And I hope we sounded medium. Yeah, well, we’ll find out upon editing. Okay. But before we invite Dr. Parker to the microphone, let’s, let’s do a little Culture Shock.

Jen: All right.

Amy: What do we have today?

Jen: I got a good one for us.

Amy: Okay.

Jen: Top Christmas movie. You have to pick one. You have to pick it. What do you choose?

Amy: I knew that this question was coming. Yeah, and I knew that you would say I can only pick one. Yeah, I did, and I think you know this as my family does. If you tell me I can’t do something, you’re pissed. Well, that’s a real problem. Yeah, I know it is. So I struggle with this “only one” business. So I’ve prepared.

Jen: Literally. That either means you did the assignment and you picked one, or you’re about to give me the reason why you’re picking three.

Amy: No, no. Okay. I mean, the correct answer is three. But I will say verbally, my favorite Christmas movie is Christmas Vacation.

Jen: Oh, that’s so good.

Amy: Always. That’s probably the most quoted, but in my preparation for being limited, sure, I changed my watch face to Buddy the Elf. Let’s see it. Oh my God, yeah, and I wore my Ralphie in a bunny suit earrings because I think obviously they need to be, you know.

Jen: This is some way you disobeyed the question. Yes. You’re like, I’ll do the one, but here’s my watch and here’s my earring for Christmas.

Amy: Vacation is my favorite movie. And also just for a different time and conversation, I would like to reiterate that Die Hard is in fact a Christmas movie, but we don’t have to talk about that.

Jen: I fully cosign, fully cosign. Okay, if it’s not a Christmas movie, nothing is. That’s how I feel about it. Also, I do want to say, okay, is there anything else you would like to say about?

Amy: No, I am, I only prepped for three movies.

Jen: And really, you snuck in a fourth, so,you get a C-minus. To be honest, I do want to say, before I give my answer, that last year, the big kids were all here, and we’re having, like, “decorate the tree” day. Just what we do. We do it with Christmas. As long as they’ve been born, every one of them. This is our thing. Our Christmas tree night is, we do the decorations. We have the whole thing. We have hot chocolate. We turn off all the lights right before somebody plugs it in. We do Joy to the World. I mean, of course we plug it in and then we watch Christmas Vacation. So when I tell you I feel like I could become a stand-in for any singular role in the whole movie, I know it by heart. I know everything. I know the script. So big yes on Christmas Vacation. But here’s what I was about to say. So last year when we did this and we were all like, okay, well, it’s Christmas Vacation, which we watched. But then I was like, oh, let’s add a new fun movie that I don’t think any of you guys have seen. And it is decidedly Christmas, kind of like Die Hard. And it was, Gremlins. 

Okay, so what I want to say is I haven’t watched Gremlins.

Amy: But when it came.

Jen: When did Gremlins come out? Okay. 1984. Oh my God, I was ten years old. So I was ten years. So I have not seen gremlins since the 1900s. And that movie is unhinged. It is the kids going, mom, what for? I’m like, well, I think just maybe, like, keep watching because…. Because I was kind of remembering that the gremlins were cute. Like, they were cute. I mean, like, they, like, put gremlins in a blender.

Amy: Yes.

Jen: And then blend it in a microwave. And it is way more upsetting than I remembered. And so me and the kids spent most of our time just laughing like hyenas. They were like, good choice mom. I’m like, I just remembered there was a Santa. So I don’t know, I’m saying it’s my anti-choice. Okay. 

Amy: I just need to clarify that that wasn’t going to go into rotation just for like a lol.

Jen: Also, it’s real terrible, you know, like movies in 1984. Yeah. It’s just real terrible.

Amy: Well, I do know because I took my children to the theater to see the never ending story a couple of years ago, like on an anniversary.

Jen: Ellicott Alamo, when they’re doing, like old-timey movies or whatever.

Amy: They had the same reaction as yours, said the Gremlins.

Jen: They were like, thanks, mom. I really enjoyed this outing with you. Yeah, with this shitty movie that is, like, terribly shot.

Amy: And this is the worst movie. And then they’re like, oh, and a horse dies.

Jen: Yay! Yeah, yeah. Some of these things live in our memories differently, right? 

Amy: Well, I am not going to go watch Gremlins.

Jen: Well, I now kind of want to repeat it this year with the kids simply because it’s so ridiculous and outrageous.

Amy: Right. But you just said it was your intention.

Jen: Oh, but you know how sometimes you do stupid things cause they’re funny?

Amy: Yes.

Jen: Or because they’re dumb. Anyway, so that’s that. Let’s do one more. This is why we have to sometimes have brilliant theologians with their doctorates, because this is what we bring to the table. Like we got to balance it out somehow, so before we get to that portion of the show, one more. 

Let’s do a little Bless and Release. ‘Tis the season. I have a lot to say about this, and I’m excited to hear what you have to say. Pick whatever category of it you want, but what are you blessing and releasing when it comes to Christmas pressure? There’s so many now. There’s so many little things to try to keep up with and do. So whatever. If it’s like the money of it all, if it’s social, I don’t care. You tell me.

Amy: Well, I have released a lot of it. I actually didn’t adopt a lot of it in the beginning. Like we had a pretty tight budget when my kids were little, thankfully, because I had four. So just getting like one gift from us, one gift from Santa, that’s still eight gifts. Plus grandparents, like, yeah, still so much. So I wasn’t able to buy into all of the house. But I still have some, like, constructs of my own brain that I tend to hold on to. That actually doesn’t add any joy to the season. Like my personal rule, I made it myself when I had kids that we could only listen to Christmas music starting December 1st.

Jen: Oh, well, that sounds like you.

Amy: That’s it. In fact.

Jen: You at that season.

Amy:. Yeah.

Jen: That’s how I originally knew you were like Christmas. Singular Christmas. Yeah. From December 1st on. Yes.

Amy: Not not before Thanksgiving. Not even the day after Thanksgiving. Okay. December 1st. Right.

Jen: Well, that’s not outrageous.

Amy: But because we weren’t doing so many of the activities that cost money, we weren’t buying a million gifts. I was like, I’m going to create this holiday feeling at least with music. 24 seven okay. But, I’ve realized if you release it, that gets old. Oh.

Jen: Like I’m sick of that shit by the end of December.

Amy: I love Christmas music. Yeah, I can also turn on a regular radio station. Oh, yeah. Like, you can only listen to Santa Baby so many times.

Jen: I’m going to be honest with you. I like this growth.

Amy: Yeah. So I actually did that last year. I was like, you know what? I’m going to flip it over to another radio station and see if I get hit by lightning.

Jen: And you lived.

Amy:  I lived. So I’m hopeful for this year. I’m gonna mix it up.

Jen: Look at you. Yeah, okay. I like that. I will say I really like this quite a bit. And I used to do, I want to say all of it. I spent too much, RSVP’d to too many things. Tried to host too much. The decorating situation was out of control. And then by the time Christmas rolled around, I was just so, so tired from it all. And I mean, I was like, driving my own crazy train. So who am I going to blame? So I’ve released a ton of it. I would say the stuff for me that weirdly lifted the most pressure was deciding that, this seems so obvious, but I do not have to have a Southern Living magazine worthy decorated Christmas house on every ledge, in every little nook and cranny. The front porch, the mantel, all of it. I used to do that.

Amy: I know, but I mean.

Jen: It’s ten boxes of Christmas would come out and I just got pissed.

Amy: It was real pretty. Thanks.

Jen: But also it’s just one kid that’s left here. That’s the youngest who loves it the most beyond all words as if I would fill my one acre lot with nothing but inflatables at Christmas. All of them. The Santa, and the snowman, and the reindeer, and all of it. Like, that’s her actual wish is if I would decorate my house pretty extensively for every season: Halloween, Thanksgiving, then Christmas, Valentine’s Day, all of it. Like could we have boxes that come out? And the answer is no.

Amy: No. She can come to my neighborhood because there’s someone at the top of the hill that has inflatables every day of the year.

Jen: What? Yeah. Do they change out?

Amy:  Yeah. Constantly. For every season. Oh, and so they, on foggy nights, I can look out my front windows and like the ambient light from their inflatable yard, like lights up the whole sky.

Jen: Question. Follow up question. Do you know this neighbor?

Amy: No, like its original owner back from when Brad was little.

Jen: Oh, yeah. Yeah.

Amy: So, like, I know who it is, but I don’t know them,

Jen: This makes me very curious about the inside of their house, and I’m wondering if they do a similar interior rotation through all the little tchotchkes and ceramics or whatever we have.

Amy: Do you know I just started twitching, so let’s not talk about it.

Jen: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Amy: But your child can kind of just drive through my neighborhood anytime and see all the inflatables.

Jen: There’s somewhere else to go. You know what else I got rid of? Now, some of this is just because our kids are big. But when they were younger, the hell I drug us to everything. We went to the Trail of Lights. We went to the other Trail of Lights. We went on little hay rides. We went to the Christmas reading at the library. We went to the little festivals and fairs, with the Santas and the oh how, how and why?

Amy: We were really tired and also crabby.

Jen: I think that might be true. And I was so, like both enamored. And I felt pressured to make the Christmas magic situation. I’m not sure I made magic for anybody. And so anyway, I have streamlined all of it. What I say yes to how many parties I’m going to go to, what I’m going to ask the kids to be a part of. It’s much, it’s tighter, and we’re all happier for it, to be honest. 

Okay, that’s enough Christmas talk for you. Let’s move into something a little bit more meaningful. We’re in the same zip code, but we are about to introduce a guest who is gonna take us to church. 

We have Dr. Angela Parker on today, so let me tell you about her. She’s got a doctorate in philosophy. She’s a PhD from Chicago Theological Seminary. In a very, very low key. Her doctorate is in Bible culture and hermeneutics. So, you know, sir, she’s got a master’s of theological studies from Duke divinity and a BA from Shaw University. So, Dr. Parker is an ordained Baptist minister. She’s taught at Seattle School of Theology, and she’s currently an assistant professor of New Testament and Greek at Mercer University, inside the McAfee School of Theology. A very big lightweight, as you can see. 

So we were really interested to talk to her today, particularly about the lens in which she teaches the Bible, which is through this structure of womanist and post-colonial thought. She’s going to explain what those mean. Very fascinating and liberating and exciting for anybody who wants to find a way to still love the Bible. That’s as plain as I can put it. Dr. Parker sees her work as particularly important for sort of contemporary Christian communities, specifically here in the West who want to figure out how to wrestle with Scripture in the face of violence and injustice and, inequitable systems, patriarchy. So these are all the interesting concepts that I am also interested in learning about as it pertains to faith. So that’s why we wanted her to be on today. She talks to us about advent and what advent means in this context, and she is smart. And Amy and I just kind of leaned in and just listened as hard as we could. And I think you’re going to find her brilliant and fascinating and maybe most miraculous of all, still hopeful. And so we are delighted to bring you this conversation with the incredible Dr. Angela Parker.

Jen: Okay, Dr. Parker, welcome. Welcome to the show. We have been looking forward to this conversation. Absolutely delighted to meet you.

Angela: Thank you so much for having me. I am so excited to be with you all today.

Jen: So okay, let’s just get this out of the way. My producer is making me ask you this question because I’m telling you, he is an Orange Theory sociopath, and he and I travel a bunch. He’s my producer on the road to and wherever we are, like, wherever we are. Dr. Parker in Knoxville, Cincinnati, Seattle, that dude is out the door at his Orange Theory. Everywhere we go, it’s obnoxious. Anyway, he wants me to ask you how you did in marathon month.

Angela: Well, I rocked marathon month. I signed up for the 26.2 miles, but I actually think I clocked about 32 miles in the month. So I know next year I will do the ultra and try to surpass that. So I was really pleased with myself for marathon month. 

Amy: You should be. Congratulations!

Angela: I appreciate that. Thank you. 

Jen: If I had run that many miles, nobody could tell me nothing. I would work that into every conversation..

Angela: Funny. I actually posted something on my own Facebook page today about being in Pilates this morning. I wrote yesterday morning and I posted a picture of myself and someone said, oh my God, look at your guns. And I was like, I have guns? I didn’t realize I had guns. 

Jen: It’s fantastic. Oh, gosh. Well, listen, you’ve got some interesting things to say, but I appreciate you letting us start right out of the gate with the ultra marathon. He did the same thing. He signed up for the regular marathon and then exceeded it x I guess you guys are just like blowing it out of the water over at the Orange Theories.

Angela: Oh, you know, it’s self-care. That’s what it is.

Jen: I’m impressed. So impressed, so impressed.

Amy: I do more self comfort than self-care. I learned that from Sharon Lindsey. Yes, I am super supportive.

Angela: Food or wine is self comfort as well. We have a lot of tools. Yes.

Amy: Getting into it. Dr. Parker, for those who may be unfamiliar with womanist theology and postcolonial thought, can you give us an overview of what these frameworks are and how they uniquely shape the way we read and more importantly, interpret Scripture?

Angela: Oh, sure. So one of the theology and womanist biblical interpretations, I do a little bit of both. I take seriously the experiences of black women in the United States of America. And so womanist biblical interpretation and womanist theology are kind of sit at the intersection of black liberation theology and feminist theology. We have a phrase that all the men are black, all the women are white. But some of us are brave. And that idea is that, you know, think about the term intersectionality that, you know, liberation theology was really focused on black men. And the father of black liberation theology, being James Cone, was thinking about black men’s theology and black men’s liberation. But the the woman women who began to study under James Cone, like Jacqueline Gillespie Grant, Delores Williams, Katie Cannon, those women were were seeing the holes in black liberation theology and noting that there needed to be a space for black women to think about their liberation, and looking at the work of Alice Walker and seeing how black women and the South were being called womanist, and that are mothers. I grew up under a black mother who grew up in Alabama, and when I was asking too many questions, she would say, honey, go sit down somewhere. You act, woman. And she asking too many questions, that we got this term womanist from our mother saying we were asking too many questions. And so womanist came from Alice Walker’s phrase in this book, in Search of Our Mother’s Gardens. So womanist sits at that intersection of black liberation thought and feminist thought, where we are combining and critically thinking about these two systems of theology. But also post-colonial thought comes from this idea that the colonizer, when we think about, England, for example, how many nations across the globe celebrate some independence from England often, and England being a colonizer that went to other nations and colonized their nation when they left, those nations had to deal with how to be a nation after England leaves. That’s the idea of post coloniality. So when African Americans were forcibly migrated to the United States of America, either through the Caribbeans like through Haiti or through Jamaica, and then got to the colonies, the American colonies. We also went through a colonizing of the mind. And so postcolonial thought and decolonizing African American minds becomes another tool for how we read biblical texts and how we formulate theologies that decolonize Eurocentric city from the theologies that come from Eurocentric thought and even evangelical theology, evangelical theology very much being Eurocentric in nature. So the work that I do is a combination of thinking about biblical text without this Eurocentric mindset. So I do womanist biblical interpretation with, thinking through postcolonial thoughts and decolonizing mindsets so that I can read biblical texts without the Eurocentric lenses, and think about how we can formulate new theologies for womanist thought and woman. This is the ologies that actually take seriously liberation for larger groups of people. 

So womanist theology is concerned with liberation for everyone. If I’m liberated, I don’t want to be liberated alone. Womanist theology is concerned about liberation for mommy, daddy, uncle, cousin. But not just black folk, but even my white sister groups, my white colleagues, my white male colleagues. And when I go places and speak, I often ask my white male friends who are in the audience, what do you need liberation from? And sometimes that can be drawing for them because they’re like, well, I don’t need liberation from anything. And I’m like, oh yes you do, sweetheart. Because oftentimes our white male colleagues are thinking that they are often the saviors. And that’s a complex that oftentimes our white male colleagues may need liberation from. And they don’t even realize. What does it mean to think that you’re always the savior of everyone else? Well, sometimes you’re not, and sometimes you may need liberation just from that thought process.

Amy: Wow.

Jen: I wish you could just start talking and we could just hit record and just let you go forever. Just keep going like and then what. And then what’s so fascinating is that it’s such a labor to come in in this framework and parse out the Bible and its texts because it is so patriarchal. And it was written in patriarchal cultures by men and, and so I think my first question is. What immediately in like in very, very broad strokes, what immediately begins to shift in interpretations when women, black women particularly come in with this framework, with this hermeneutic and begin understanding such a patriarchal text differently, like, what are some of the very first flags you’ve got to start right? Like raising up the flag poles. That’s a terrible question. That’s the first question ever asked. I don’t know how I can answer it. I don’t even know if you know what I mean. But like, know that’s a mountain to climb there.

Angela: That’s a great question actually, because think about it. We raised this idea of agency. So that’s one of the first questions or one of the first flags that’s raised by the agency of a multitude of women. We begin to see that. I’ll take an example of women in the New Testament. Okay. We see that there’s women named in the New Testament, but we begin to see different levels of women in the New Testament. And so when I talk about the levels of women in the New Testament, I’m thinking that there could be freed women in the New Testament, and then there could be women who are elite women in the New Testament. And so what does that look like when you notice various women in the New Testament? So you can begin to think about hierarchies of women in the New Testament, and how different hierarchies of women may receive the text in their first century context. So I’m reminded of one woman, a New Testament scholar who is Caribbean by birth but writes within woman this New Testament interpretation. I’m thinking of Margaret Amos. She’s at Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary, and she writes about acts of the apostles, and she writes about Rhoda in Acts chapter 12, I believe. And so Rhoda is an enslaved girl in Acts. And so when you read Rhoda’s story, you have to wrestle with the fact that the church in Acts of the apostles has an enslaved girl. So we don’t want to think about the early church being enslaved. But they were. So then how do you read that text as a black woman in the United States of America who is still a part of the church of the United States, but recognizing that the early church had an enslaved person who acts as a body double for the mistress of the house. Meaning if you are a body double for the mistress of the house, when you go to answer the door, if that person who’s on the other side of the door is hostile, then you’re the one who’s going to be killed or harmed or maimed because you are the enslaved body double. So you’re reading the text and realizing that the enslaved person is going to be hurt or harmed before the slave owner, who is another Christian person. So we have to read our text and take seriously that they are also enslavers and are not arguing against the Roman imperial enslaved system. And so we have to wrestle with that, raise up the flagpole of the injustices that are even within our biblical text.

Jen: Everything you’re saying begets for me 100 more questions. I would love to hear you talk about the weight of your work and research and interpretations, and how you may be able to take some of those and speak to the power of the empires. And these systems and the oppressors that we have today, lifting it out of a different time and a different place, clearly, but still with something to say. I know that could just be the whole thing. That could be our whole interview. All of Scripture feels predicated on oppressors and enslavement and dislocation and land and, there’s so much to say here, because here we still are.

Angela: Yeah, here we’re still here. We still are. And yet I still have hope, because the conversations that I have are all about this one thing in my teaching that I argue as a thesis for the entirety of the biblical text, is that our biblical text is wrestling with the idea of empires from Genesis to Revelation, and if our biblical text is wrestling with the idea of empire from Genesis to Revelation, we are wrestling with Empire as well. So thinking about the Assyrian empire overtaking northern Israel, thinking about the Babylonian Empire overtaking southern Israel, thinking about the Seleucids and the Ptolemies overtaking Israel, and what, you know in our evangelical traditions, because I grew up black Baptist but had a tinge of evangelicalism and also some Pentecostalism. So oftentimes I talk about being black to Castile.

Jen: Sure.

Angela: Yeah. So I also learned, you know, 400 years of silence between Malachi and Matthew. But then learning in seminary, that’s not true because you had first Maccabees, second Maccabees, which tells us a lot of history. So learning about the Ptolemy’s and the Seleucids and how they were still battling over Israel and that the empires, those empires give us a lot of history about what Israel was going through. And that time period and how they’re wrestling with what resurrection looks like. And the cultural memory of the Israelites. And resurrection is what’s going into the New Testament as well. And that becomes important for the empire and resurrection. And now getting into Jesus and Paul in the New Testament and the Roman Empire coming into view in the New Testament and Roman Empire becoming equivalent with Babylon in Revelation, that this idea of empire is all throughout our biblical text. So when I think about Jesus and Paul in our New Testament texts wrestling with Empire, that means that their Jewish identity is cultural, it’s religious, but it’s also political. So their Jewish identities as cultural, religious and political means that when we’re reading New Testament texts, for me, as a New Testament scholar, I’m thinking about how our New Testament text is not just spiritual. We cannot just read the text in a spiritual, decontextualized way. So, for example, I’m reading Romans with my Foundations of New Testament class, and I say to students, you cannot read Romans and put the Romans road of salvation in your back pocket, and then pick it up and give it to someone in the grocery store, because that is doing a disservice to Romans. That is not taking Romans seriously in the way that Paul writes it. Paul would be disrespected if you did. The Romans wrote of salvation with Romans 3:23. In Romans 10:10 and Romans five, whatever, and said, if you believe in your heart and confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord, then you shall be saved. That’s a disservice to Romans. You need to understand that Paul goes from Romans one and talks about the Roman imperial context, and talks about Roman imperial worship. And so for you to use Romans one as a blanket statement against homosexuality is completely a misreading of Romans that Paul is actually talking about Romans imperial worship. So that by the time you get to Romans 12 and Paul says, I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of brothers and sisters, actually by the mercies of God, to present yourselves a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your reasonable worship, and he uses a different word for worship than he does at Romans one. And this word for worship that’s different from Romans one. Romans one is says, but some of which is imperial worship, and Romans 12 is the Torah l, which is the worship that we’re used to. And so those two worship are different, so that imperial worship is talking about Roman imperial worship. And this worship at Romans 12 is actually getting us to how we are more hospitable to one another so that we can become the body of Christ, that you’re missing what Paul is talking about on how we can actually be a better body of Christ and citizens to one another as we love one another. How we work together and be with one another in an imperial society that is literally trying to kill us. That’s what this gospel is about. It’s not taking text out of context to condemn homosexuals, taking a text out of context to tell people how to have a personal relationship with Jesus and tell me where Jesus goes to someone and says, here’s how you have a personal relationship with me. Tell me where. Paul does not talk about how to live together in community, because when I teach Greeks and when we read Greek in Pauline context, every time Paul says, you, it’s predominantly a plural. And I tell my students, you all have to become southern. This is y’all. Because it’s all about how we live in community. It’s not about your personal relationship with Christ. And this is where a lot of our evangelical friends get it. Because when I teach another class called the Bible and Critical Theories, and….

Jen: Oh, God. Oh, boy. Katie, bar the door.

Angela: But the gist of it is when we work as a collective, we actually do better to transform society. And so Paul actually writes in collective. So the idea of critical theories is how we do and be in collective so that we can transform society for the better. And so when we’re reading the Bible and we’re seeing the collectivity of working together, that’s actually working together, together for the betterment of the Jesus communities. And I think that’s what we’re supposed to do, actually. So when we actually see how the Jesus communities and even the Israelites are working for their better collective unity across the biblical text in the midst of empires, that’s what happens when we get to revelation and the Revelator sees the new heaven and the new earth, where the new Jerusalem actually comes down from the sky onto the earth, because the earth actually becomes the final dwelling place, not some pie in the sky heaven, but the earth becomes the dwelling piece. Not so that, you know, we were not supposed to kill the earth so that Jesus comes back and we’re actually supposed to take care of the earth and Earth actually is another person that we’re supposed to take care of. We’re not supposed to kill her. So for those climate deniers, you know, we’re supposed to take care of the earth and not try to kill her. That’s a whole other story. But, you know, the tree at the end of Revelation 21 that has the leaves for the healing of all the for all the nations. There’s still this element of all the nations or all the ethnic. When I say ethnic, I hope people here like all the ethnicities, for all the ethnic, that’s the Greek word for all the nations that everyone is around this tree on the earth that is healed, that is together. And that’s what John the Revelator sees in that final vision. And it goes back to that Isaiah, Isaiah’s notion that all the nations are streaming to the mountain of God. That’s what that collectivity is. That’s what we’re all supposed to be working for. That’s what I would imagine when I’m in Romans. When Paul in Romans nine through 11 is asking, what about the Jews? Because he’s still imagining his comrades are part of this Isaiah notion of we’re all streaming towards the mountain of God, that they’re there as well. They are there as well. But there’s something about this collectivity that is getting us there. And in my words, if God still breathes, why can’t Black Lives Matter in the local authority? I hope your listeners pick it up, that we have this notion that we all make it home. And I think that’s what we’re trying to get to when we think about what it means to be Jesus followers today, that we all make it home.

Jen: Mic drop.

Amy: Man.

Jen: I mean, that’s really it. It’s a relief to hear that kind of teaching and to hear that interpretation and to realize that we don’t have to live in perpetual odds against Scripture simply by the by virtue of the way it was taught to us, and that there is another way to embody, you know, those texts and to live them out in liberation that is so different from the way it was taught to me, so different, so different is like it’s like we’re talking about two different books. So it’s relieving to hear this kind of theology.

Angela: I think a lot of us have grown up in, you know, we faced God, our biblical text in such a tight box. And it was only coming through seminary for me and realizing that that tight box was what I write about as very much a. A white male box. And I, I often tell students, please don’t hear “all white men”. I think about it as a white male construct box. I don’t want anyone to hear “all white men or all white people”. It’s a system that we live in that has been really Eurocentric and kind of placed upon us, that we swim in, and we don’t really realize that we swim in. All right. So in my own work, I talk about how I’ve tried to even kind of get whiteness out of me because even as an African-American woman born and raised in these United States, there are elements of whiteness that are even in me and on me and a part of me.

Jen: Yep.

Angela: And that’s just what we swim in.

Amy: Yeah, yeah, yeah. For people who might be struggling with waiting in their own personal lives, whether it’s waiting for justice or healing or reconciliation, how does that advent story resonate with those experiences from a womanist perspective? 

Angela: I love Luke’s Advent story because when I think about the Gospel of Luke, Luke is the only gospel that places Jesus’s advent story within the context of secular history. When you read the Gospel of Luke, Luke places Jesus in the time of Caesar, in the time of Augustus Pilot. So we get this idea that secular things are going on. And so it’s sometimes hard to hope in the midst of seeing all the secular things going on in your life. And it’s sometimes hard to have hope in the midst of all of the problems that we see in the world going on in our lives, we hear about Gaza and Ukraine and Israel going into Lebanon. I think for me, hope breaks forth in the midst of terror, fear and overwhelm. Especially when Gabriel talks to Zechariah in Luke chapter two. I believe, and maybe it’s chapter one, because Zechariah is going about his business in the temple, about to offer the peace offerings that he’s supposed to do. And then Gabriel comes through and tells him that he’s about to have John the Baptist. And because he’s just so terrified. But Gabriel says, this is going to happen. It’s going to be joyful and hopeful. And these things are going to happen. But there’s that initial fear of terror, overwhelm and fear. It’s normal as humanity to have terror, overwhelm and fear that is normal. I would say, do not try to trick yourself to, ignore the terror, overwhelm, and fear. As humans, I think it’s best for us to acknowledge the terror that is around to say, okay, this is what we are seeing around us. This is what we are living in. This is what is going on around us. We see this secular history. We acknowledge the secular history. But I serve a God that kind of gets me over the hump. I surrender all to the God who’s never failed me before. And it’s interesting that we’re having this conversation on this day, because when I think about my life… So you’re catching me in my office, at Mercer University, but I am a woman who was a teenage mom. I have a story that I should not be a seminary professor. As a teenage mom, I have a story where, people know other things about me, from being a teenage mom that I would never get to this place where I’m at today because of that background. But God breaks through when you least expect it. And so the terror, the overwhelm, the fear. Hope breaks through. 

Y’all. Remember that old Sandra Bullock movie? Hope Floats?

Jen: Sure do. Yeah.

Angela: It does. So I think even though, it’s a cheesy Sandra Bullock movie with Harry Connick, Jr., Hope does float and it does come through when we least expect it. And I think that hope can float in this advent season.

Jen: Beautifully said. Last question for you. I would love to hear this. Just for you in your life, with your people and your place and the role that you play, I’d love to hear what your personal hope is for this advent season, for yourself or your family, for your community, for your students, whatever. As you so rightly noted, that it isn’t turning a blind eye to terror or fear or injustice. It couldn’t be it, could it be? We never. That’s not the world. It is not in ignorance of the things that are hard and still very broken, but inside of the season of hope, I’d love to hear what your advent dreamers.

Angela: I think my advent dream is learning more about ourselves and our strengths. For my family, my friends, my students, my children. Learning more about the. Tender spots of our selves that actually become resilient. You know, we have those spots that we touch, that at first we’re sore and hurt a little bit, but then over time they become a little less sore and a little bit more resilient. I want to learn more about those spots. I want to learn more about how I got over. How I was able to make it through, how my friends, family, students, children, mom, dad, brothers, how we were all able to just look back and say, oh my goodness. At some point, we didn’t know we were going to make it through, but we did.

And you know and I have lived long enough to know that I don’t doubt God because I don’t. And I’ve lived long enough to know that God will bring me through, but sometimes it is still hard. Sure, it’s still hard, and sometimes it still hurts right? But even after the hurt, those tender points, those tender spots, they’re tender, but they still get stronger and a little bit more resilient. And I still want to explore those resilient spots in my life and touch them and feel them and kind of remember them. You know trauma does not go away and I don’t think it’s supposed to go away. We remember it. Sure. We don’t have to sit in it. And like a trauma bond, I learned a new word from a student. We don’t have the trauma bond with it, but we can still remember it and kind of just, you know, continue to learn from it. And I think that’s what I’m thinking about for this advent season just to, to learn from it.

Jen: I love that. Yeah. We learn from it in our own stories and from each other. And there’s so much value there. I guess that’s such an interesting answer. Thank you for digging deep for that one. And that is a lovely hope for this season. We cannot thank you enough,  Dr. Parker, for being with us today. And I mean, we just barely even scratched it. Just, the questions I have are billions, but, what I want to say before we close here is just that I really, respect and admire your work in the world and the way that certainly you had to claw your way to it. From, you know, a beginning that other people said, well, you’ve you’ve charted your course and now you have limitations and you’ve exceeded them all clearly. And thank you for the labor that it is to do this kind of work and to reimagine really old interpretations and systems that have caused a lot of harm and a lot of pain. It’s good work. It’s really good work. I can only imagine the amount of resistance you face inside of it. I can only imagine it. So thank you for that labor and how much it means to so many people, and how many young scholars you are inspiring who will take their place in this path and build on what you started. It’s so meaningful and well beyond you and so we say thank you for coming on here and I guess taking us to church. Oh my God, this morning is where I feel like I’ve been.

Amy: And I am stunned not only by the depth of the work and how hard it must be to dig in and find so much injustice over and over and over. But the work it takes to still be hopeful, to still think that this collection of stories is worth studying like that it is still filled with truths and hope. Even though sometimes when you look at it, it seems so flawed. Like that in and of itself is such a battle to get to imagine and seeing that you can do the work and still be hopeful is inspiring.

Jen: So inspiring. Yes it is.

Angela: Well, I appreciate that. You know, I do this, I have students who often come to me and they’re like, how can I continue to do this? And I’m and in my heart, I’m still a Jesus follower. And I often tell folks, you know, I still love and follow Jesus. And, some days I call myself a Christian. But I have to say, I’m not a Christian like those folks over there. So  I still love Jesus.

Jen: Yeah, that’s I mean, that’s really the beating heart of it anyway. So can you just quickly tell our listeners the best places to find you, follow your work, be a part of your community?

Angela: Oh, yeah. So on Instagram and TikTok as @boozybiblescholar, please follow.

Jen: Don’t think we didn’t know that.

Angela: And you can also find me at McAfee School of Theology on the website there and [email protected]. Thank you.

Jen: We’ll have all that rounded up for our listeners. Thanks for joining us today. A real pleasure to meet you. If you’re ever in Austin, let us take you to dinner.

Angela: All right. I will take you up on that. Thank you.

Amy: Thank you. Nice to meet you.

Angela: Nice to meet you, too.

Jen: Look, as mentioned, you know, we barely even got into her body of work. There’s so much more to learn from her and so many places to parse this out. And so, as she mentioned, if you go to Jen hatmaker.com under the podcast tab, I will have all of the links and the addresses and the handles that she mentioned. And you can follow her everywhere. She is on the internet, because this is incredible teaching to put ourselves under her right as we’re seeking to like, grow and develop and evolve and continue to press into our faith and understanding Scripture in a way that is the most liberating for the world, which feels like our North Star. This is the kind of teaching we need to be listening to. So thank you for being here today and we are thinking about you so much during the season. And we have just a few really great episodes that we hope serve you well and give you hope and peace and joy and comfort during this time of year as much as they do for us. So on behalf of Amini, you guys, thanks for being here and we’ll see you next week.

Amy: Thank you.

 

 

Resources Mentioned in This Episode:

 

Orange Theory

James Hal Cone

Jacquelyn Grant

Delores Williams

Katie Cannon

Alice Walker

Rev. Dr. Margaret Aymer

Sisters in the Wilderness: The Challenge of Womanist God

If God Still Breathes, Why Can’t I?: Black Lives Matter and Biblical Authority by Rev. Dr. Angela N. Parker