From the earliest days of the church Christians have been engaged in what we now call political activity, whether it was Paul liberating the slave girl from her owners who used her to make money or feeding pagan populations who were starving. As Christians, we have ever separated the so-called “spiritual” from the realities of our daily lives.
Yale Divinity School’s Center for Public Theology is part of our tradition to speaking to the critical moral issues that confront us today. Christians have always spoken out against abuse, whether it was slavery, poverty, or wars fought in the name of national glory. All theology is public, to quote Rev. William Barber, who speaks to us in the long history of Christian activism.
Speaking to moral issues that affect us all is not only steeped in our Christian tradition, but goes back to the prophets who railed against the injustice of the few having much wealth while the poor starved. Ultra-conservatives have long focused on their vision of moral issues; others look at a different vision. Our issues may differ but each of us must decide how we who call ourselves Christian will respond to the important questions of our day within the context of our faith.
Prayer for the Day
Calling for justice, prophets and preachers invoke your name, O God,
For you are a God of this world as well as the next;
Caring for those cast aside by political leaders, O Lord,
You call upon us to create a better world for all.
Empower us, O Holy One, to be your face to others,
As we work to create a realm of justice, mercy, and peace.
In the name of the One who is our guide,
Even Christ Jesus our Lord, Amen.
Thoughts for the Day
Public theology is never just about cursing the darkness. It has to be about giving hope, giving answers, saying there’s another way, whether that way is accepted or not.
Rev. William Barber, speaking at Yale, April 14, 2026
Rich right-wing entities and people fund and feed the ultra-conservative social issues agenda on one hand while they use a bait-and-switch maneuver to pass economic and tax policies that will transfer more wealth to them and hurt the same poor and working-class people they need to get elected. This must be exposed as not only morally indefensible but constitutionally inconsistent and economically insane.
Laurel Ashton, organizer
Is this not the fast that I choose: to loose the bonds of injustice,
To undo the thongs of the yoke, to let the oppressed go free,
And to break every yoke?
Is it not to share your bread with the hungry,
And to bring the homeless poor into your house,
And when you see the naked to cover them?
Isaiah 58: 6-7