A Conversation on Koinonia in the Diocese of Northern Michigan

I recently had a chance to speak with Bishop Rayford Ray and Canon Lydia Bucklin about the model of economic fellowship that has taken root in the Diocese of Northern Michigan. This ended up being one of the most radical (and intriguing) conversations I've had about money in the church in a long while. Take a listen and let me know what you think.

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On Eucharist and Economic Justice

By the summer of 2005, I knew I was no longer Roman Catholic. The revelations about the child sex abuse scandal that the Boston Globe began publishing in 2002 combined with the conservativeness of the young seminarians I'd met while studying at a small Roman Catholic university in Texas, as well as the prospect of spending any more time arguing for "the basics" such as women's ordination and acceptance of LGBTQ+ people, led me to realize that I needed to go elsewhere to find a faith community that shared my core values. One year prior, I'd boarded an Amtrak train for a three-day trip to New York to begin studying for my Master of Divinity degree at Union Theological Seminary. Taking a train was both a romantic and terrible decision that I regretted as soon as I settled into my seat. Nevertheless, the train eventually brought me to Penn Station to begin my life in New York. After a tumultuous year of adjusting to life in the city, I was determined to try to find a ...

Nicaea's Prohibition on Usury

Depiction of Council of Nicaea, Basilica of St. Nicholas, Demre, Turkey Did you know that the Council of Nicaea had a canon prohibiting clergy from engaging in usury? It’s true. In addition to framing an initial version of the Nicene Creed, this first ecumenical council from 325 stated in canon 17 that as many clergy had been “induced by greed and avarice”, those found to be engaging in usury or other contrivances for the sake of dishonorable gain “shall be deposed from the clergy and their names struck from the roll.” I did not know this when I wrote about Basil of Cesarea’s homily against usury in this blog post . It was my colleague, Rev. Dr. Patrick Cheng, who sent me a note afterward alerting me to Nicaea's prohibition. So thank you, Patrick! In reviewing research on conciliar prohibitions against usury, particularly the work of Robert P. Maloney on usury, I learned that these took place not only at Nicaea but also at even earlier councils, including the council of Elvi...

Basil of Caesarea

“As you are burying your wealth, you entomb it with your own heart.” The winter rains refused to fall in Caesarea in 369, in what is now modern-day Turkey, resulting in food shortages, panic among the rich, and desperate hunger for the poorest citizens, immigrants, and slaves. By 370, fear had taken root among the city’s wealthy landowners causing them to refuse to release grain from their storehouses. Into this calamity a new voice was heard, that of a Christian bishop, exercising one of the earliest understandings of a bishop’s public role in imperial Roman Christianity to be a ‘lover of the poor.’ In Basil’s homily In a Time of Famine and Drought , he first describes the misery of death by starvation before declaring to a disquieted congregation that “the person who can cure such an infirmity and refuses one’s medicine because of avarice, can with reason be condemned a murderer.” [1] Basil’s homilies to the elite of Caesarea are troubling, direct, and a pleasure to read ...

Wealth and Poverty in Christianity

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