Favorite Pandemic Reads

What are you reading, viewing and listening to during this Pandemic?

 

I bet we are not the only ones who have been spending more time engaging in these activities during our extra hours at home.  What has been expanding your mind and your heart?  Here are some of the things that we’ve been ingesting and reflecting on:

 

Prophetic Lament  A Call for Justice in Troubled Times:  Soong-Chan Rah is helping me learn how to engage in this spiritual practice  

Black SpiritualLeaders Unfiltered  A friend and former pastor of ours recently hosted this unfiltered conversation with 8 black spiritual leaders about where we've been, where we are now, and where we need to go individually and communally.  I watched this twice in order to take it all in.  

The Science of Well Being is the most popular class at Yale, and no surprise the topic is Happiness.  The online class is free! One big take-away is the fact that knowing what makes you happy doesn’t change things, we have to do the work. You’ll take a happiness assessment both at the beginning and end of the class and if you’re like me, your happiness will increase.    

 Oprah hosted a two-part conversation with Black leaders “Where Do We Go From Here”                Part one                     Part two 

 1 Corinthians: I’ve been seeing some interesting things here I hadn’t noticed…or been taught…before.  Such as, it seems that at least some of the divisions in this church were a result of this body being composed of people of varying economic and power levels, from the wealthy to slaves…a body of unequal relationships in society/culture who were now expected to share privileges with each other and follow Jesus’ pattern of self-emptying.  Wow!

 Just Mercy: a movie based on the true story of Walter McMillian, who, with the help of young defense attorney Bryan Stevenson, appeals his murder conviction.

13^th   Currently available for free: A poignant and revealing documentary of how our criminal justice system and policing have taken over for slavery after emancipation. 

 A couple favorite Podcasts:

 Code Switch which has been a wide-ranging education about race issues for us. Most episodes are under 30 minutes. 

 Ear Hustle is a podcast produced by and about incarcerated people from San Quentin Prison. This is eye opening and at times tough subject matter to listen to.    

 

 Please do send us your recommendations!