living as people of grace in a conflicted church & world
Friday morning we both woke up to the news that Russell Brand had been convicted of rape and sexual assault by a London court. Brand has been of particular interest to Christians since his conversion and subsequent baptism in 2024.
As we both scrolled over breakfast, we were confronted and disturbed by the various Christian takes. Many of these takes focussed on whether or not Brand’s public conversion to Christianity was genuine.
Whether we live amid the dry savannah or the energy of urban life, we want the people and places we love to thrive for generations to come. We are facing a climate crisis that impacts the most vulnerable the hardest, threatening everything we hold dear. By coming together, we can work to protect our common home.
One thing I have learnt in the last few years is that Australians are terrible at addressing race. The USA having struggled through the Civil Rights Movement has a deeper discussion on race in the public square. But Australians don’t really know how to engage well. For example, instead of the “International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination”, we have “Harmony Day”. This lack of racial literacy is a problem
This week Channel 9 terminated their contract with breakfast tv host Karl Stefanovic due to his podcast featuring a man often described as a far-right extremist, Tommy Robinson. Stefanovic has responded by stating he is wanting to champion a diversity of views. Of course, his lineup isn’t that diverse. He tends to feature guests from the harder right. He is indeed making decisions about who to get on and what kind of audience he wants.
The guests podcasters choose is revealing. Taken as a whole, the guest lineup reveals to us the aims and values of the podcast. Like Stefanovic, as podcasters we come from a different medium and style of speaking. For us, our most common platform is the pulpit. Moving then to a podcast, we have learnt about podcasting through experience, through reflecting together on what we wanted to achieve and what was important to us.
“What do you do research in?”
“Christian disability theology.”
“Oh, what’s that?”
“It’s broad, but it looks at what disability has to do with the Christian God and how we think about God from the experience of disability, impairment, and diversity. I focus on theology, faith, and spirituality for neurodivergence and profound intellectual disability.”
There is an ancient call and response that we say at Easter time. I say, “He is risen!” and the reply is, “He is risen indeed!” This is a saying that unites Christians throughout time and all over the world. In Tanzania, they say, “Amefufuka!” And the response is, “Kweli amefufuka.” I’m sure many of us here would know this phrase in other languages or cultures.
Photo: SA Parliament House with red overlay. Adapted from Wikimedia Commons. South Australians went to the polls on 21 March 2026, and gave us two very interesting stories. Peter Malinauskas’ Labor government has been re-elected in a landslide. But ironically, it is the race for second place that will be more consequential, not just forContinue reading “What on Earth just happened in South Australia!? By Chris Shaw”
On International Women’s Day, people often take the chance to post on social media about being thankful for the women in their family. Is this, though, going to cut it when we are seeing stories in the media every day about a growing misogyny among young men? And, indeed, the day wasn’t intended to be a hallmark ready holiday. It arose out of the labour movement and had goals such as women’s suffrage and rights at work.
Yesterday, for the first time in my life, I led an Ash Wednesday service. And to my surprise, I found it extremely moving.
I say “to my surprise” because my tradition is not one for rituals. In fact, I was formed in church contexts that made a point of not doing things like Ash Wednesday—precisely because they looked too much like a Catholic observance. We worried about outward forms: about the danger that ritual action might substitute for inward faith, or worse, become a kind of spiritual performance.
On January 1st of this year, Democrat Zohran Mamdani was sworn in as the mayor of New York City. He was elected on 4th November 2025, after a year-long campaign built on unapologetically Socialist priorities aimed at ameliorating the average American’s suffering in an affordability crisis. US President Donald Trump, himself a born-and-bred New Yorker, threatened to withhold federal funding from the city because of Mamdani’s election, which he claimed signals a “communist” future for the Democrats
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