Skip to main content

About the Book

June 4, 2022

Many of the blog posts written from about April 2020 through January 2022 were the first drafts of book chapters for what ultimately became The Unjust Steward: Wealth, Poverty, and the Church Today. I'm very excited to share that this book is now available for sale here through Forward Movement. 

Description

"This book is an absolute must read for anyone who has ever wondered what the Bible really says about economic injustice and the wealth gap." -Kelly Brown Douglas, Dean, Episcopal Divinity School at Union Theological Seminary

In the ancient heart of Christianity is a deep longing for God’s reversal of rich and poor. Its depiction of “the righteous poor and oppressive rich” and God’s preferential option for “the least of these” continues to represent something new, countercultural, and strange, both in ancient Rome and today.

Author Miguel Escobar grounds the discussion of wealth and poverty in the teachings of Jesus, weaving in the words of early church leaders and his own personal experience.

The Unjust Steward presents a compelling case for a profound overhaul in the way the church and its people value the poor and transform into servants of God instead of stewards of wealth.

---- 

Reviews

"In The Unjust Steward, Miguel Escobar offers a series of moving and insightful reflections on how wealth and poverty, inequality, and economic justice are treated in the biblical and early church theological tradition. By taking us from Jesus to Augustine, faith leaders will find many theological and biblical resources for deepening their congregations’ discussions on issues of wealth and poverty. Through its thorough scholarship and insightful reflections this book is a call to action from unexpected voices, the early church fathers. This book is an absolute must read for anyone who has ever wondered what the Bible really says about economic injustice and the wealth gap."

-Kelly Brown Douglas, Dean, Episcopal Divinity School at Union Theological Seminary

"Here is a book that inspires, yes, but also challenges and unsettles all who would take seriously Jesus’s Way of Love. Weaving together words of wisdom from spiritual giants of early Christianity with profound reflections from his own life, Miguel Escobar pulls back the curtain of wealth and poverty to reveal our longstanding complicity with systems of injustice and calls us to make better, more humane choices, reflective of the teachings of Jesus of Nazareth, that can change the world."

-The Most Rev. Michael B. Curry, XXVII Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church and author of Love is the Way

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

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 ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Homily for the First Eucharist of the Rev. Dr. Mary Barber

This homily was preached at St. George's Episcopal in Newburgh, NY on September 19th for the first Eucharist of the newly ordained priest, the Rev. Dr. Mary Barber.  Good evening. First and foremost, I want to say that it is a joy to be here with all of you and, especially, to witness and be a part of the Rev. Mary’s first Eucharist. Today is a great day in the life of the Church.  In today’s Gospel from Mark, Jesus and his disciples are passing through the region of Galilee in secret. Jesus was avoiding large crowds and was instead trying to tell the disciples what was about to happen to him, but we read that “they did not understand what he was saying and they were afraid to ask him.”  For instead of asking what Jesus meant, the disciples were engaged in a heated argument among themselves. When I hear this passage, I imagine the disciples fighting in the way that siblings sometimes do – or at least that I did with my siblings. That is, in secret -- trying to keep one’s ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Paul on Payment and Proximity

" You can’t understand most of the important things from a distance, Bryan. You have to get close." Bryan Stevenson’s book Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption is in many ways a meditation on proximity. In it, Stevenson, a defense lawyer for people on death row and the founder of the Equal Justice Initiative in Montgomery, AL, describes what he has learned about the U.S. criminal justice system by getting close to the people he has served, by getting to know their names, stories, and families. In explaining his decision to get close, he speaks about his grandmother, born in the 1880s and the daughter of slaves in Caroline County, VA. He recalls her telling him to stay close. “‘You can’t understand most of the important things from a distance, Bryan. You have to get close,’ she told me all the time.” Recalling how lost he initially felt at law school, he realized “Proximity to the condemned, to people unfairly judged; that was what guided me back to something that fe...
Post a Comment
Read more