Sally Douglas on Jesus Sophia, the divine feminine and the trinity

Sally Douglas comes on the pod to speak about her latest book, ‘Jesus Sophia’ and we explore the divine feminine, the limitations of our metaphors, a trinitarian universe and more.

The Spiritual Misfits Survival Guide (FREE): https://www.spiritualmisfits.com.au/survivalguide

Sign up to our mailing list:
https://spiritualmisfits.com.au/

Join our online Facebook community:
https://www.facebook.com/groups/spiritualmisfitspodcast

Support the pod:
https://spiritualmisfits.com.au/support-us/

View all episodes at: https://spiritualmisfits.buzzsprout.com

Transcript

Will (00:02.626)
Sally Douglas, welcome back to the Spiritual Misfits podcast. Round two, you are on our Melbourne panel discussing if Christianity is still good news. It is definitely good news that you are back on the podcast for another chat.

Sally Douglas (00:18.989)
Thanks, well it's lovely to be with you.

Will (00:21.31)
Yeah, wonderful. So I would love to hear a bit more Sally. I feel like in that panel chat, it was my first time meeting all four of you lovely people, but we didn't get to go into the backstories as much as I normally would in a podcast sort of interview. So why don't you give us a little bit of your backstory, particularly as you think about faith, what has that looked like in different stages of your life and have you ever felt like a spiritual misfit Sally?

Sally Douglas (00:50.326)
big questions. It's so interesting is how we tell our own stories to ourselves at different times in our lives. I've been thinking about the power of story a lot recently so there's probably lots of different ways I could tell the story but a brief version is I have always had a sense of God and it's been a topic that's been engaging for me from a very young age and I grew up in the

Church in the Uniting Church was very involved as in youth group and Sunday school and youth singing or the choir is more like a singing group and so on by choice throughout all of those things and took on different leadership roles. And so I guess in some ways the church was on a pedestal it was quite a vibrant congregation with quite a lot of young people and there were some beautiful older people who were...

nourishing as well.

Sally Douglas (01:52.39)
I had friends outside of church, it wasn't that kind of sense of you have to only have Christian friends or anything like that. So there was a space for God but I didn't have that experience that many people have of it being imposed or a life denying expression of faith that wasn't like that at all. So I'm thankful for that actually. So then I went to uni, that was in a regional setting and a rural setting. Then I moved to Melbourne for uni and

was probably quite naive about how different Christian expressions could be. And I joined the Christian Union group, not kind of understanding the nuances and the contrast potentially between uniting church and other Christian traditions. And the leader told me I should not consider being a minister because I was a woman. And I hadn't actually considered probably my 10 years that had emerged as an idea, but certainly not at that time. I was studying sociology.

literature and so on. So that was an interesting experience and there was a very particular agenda running in there, understanding of theology and Pauline theology and a whole lot of other things. Then I took a year off uni because I wanted to do something, I didn't want to study about poverty, you know I was quite idealistic and as you can be as a young person and I did what's called a in the United Church.

I don't think it's running now. It was called the Order of St Stephen where you did a year of sacrificial service as a young person and so you were appointed to a role. You went through a process of applying and you were matched to a role where you weren't paid very like you paid a tiny amount enough to almost live, not enough to live but as a way of serving the church and I guess it could help you in your discernment potentially though the purpose was to serve the church and I was

put in a placement in a rural setting in a very different part of Melbourne, on the other side of Melbourne. I didn't know anybody and I was put in a youth worker role when I was 19. A foolish decision of the church, I think. Foolish of me. Like I could, well I don't know, this is what you could run different stories about. It is what it is. The placement, you know, the people were beautiful, but I didn't...

Will (04:02.22)
Hmm.

Will (04:11.46)
Yeah.

Sally Douglas (04:16.262)
experienced much support from the wider church. Maybe I didn't know how to access it well. I mean, I was really from the country. I didn't have all the kind of Melbourne networks, which was the closest town. And I just saw the church not being at space, not terrible, but just it felt like a lot of meetings and where is the action and so on. And I left the Uniting Church at the end of that year. And I think it would be fair to say it's not just the church.

fell off a pedestal for me, like the pedestal was smashed, everything was smashed.

And in retrospect, I'm quite glad for that experience. I left the church for a number of years, left the Uniting Church, went to some other tradition, Christian traditions for different periods of time, and then realized they weren't better. They just had faults in different expressions. You know?

Will (05:12.694)
Would you say was belief kind of consistent throughout that or did you did you wrestle with doubt about the existence of God at that time or?

Sally Douglas (05:17.665)
Oh, beautiful question.

So not the existence of God, but the nature of God was a really big question for me. Who is this God? So I continued to yearn for God and when I left, after seeing other denominations acting terrible ways as well, I'm going, oh this is a shared pattern of the church. This is not just one part of the church. I remember Sunday after, Sundays just hate, like so sad on Sundays really, but I wasn't going to church. I couldn't find somewhere. Occasionally...

I would go to Mass because no one would talk to me and that suited me and I had a spiritual director for the last few years at that wilderness time and she was a wonderful nun who was appalled that the reason I liked going to Roman Catholic Mass was that no one talked to me and I'm like no it's actually a strange gift that you guys are offering because when you often go to Protestant traditions people race up and introduce themselves and sometimes ask you to sign up like it's just...

depends on where you're at but for me at that time it was too much so um so no thoughts at all that I would contemplate a quarter ministry or be studying theology any of those things but in that time I had discovered the contemplative tradition so this ancient Christian and obviously in other traditions but the Christian expression of that about learning how to shut up

and be quiet and to be open. And that was profoundly transformative, not in one sitting, like it's a practice of a lifetime. And I really, really struggled at first, at being able to sit quietly, but made a kind of commitment, not out of that kind of guilt about I should be having a quiet time, like I'd left all of that by then, but this yearning for the divine other. And so I made a little.

Sally Douglas (07:19.006)
in this shared house which had an outside toilet and in Richmond and my bedroom had no window like it was shared house in the middle of uni and seeing bands at night but I made this little kind of sacred space in my tiny room I think with an upside down cardboard box and an icon and a candle and I would I would have a set liturgy that I would use after drinking Celtic.

traditions, cultic Christian traditions, and then have some stillness around that. And often with quite music in the background because I couldn't quite make complete silence at the time. So I think if I hadn't done that, experiencing a call to ministry or contemplating even going back into the church would have taken a lot longer because I just wasn't in the place at all.

Will (08:09.734)
I love the image of the monastic within the group house uni life. There can be too many people doing that.

Sally Douglas (08:15.586)
Oh, definitely. And like I had, yeah, and I had, not that it mattered, but you know, I had some nice dreadlocks happening and some goth hair and like I was doing drama and wanted to work with refugee kids in, which I ended up teaching in a setting with mostly refugee kids. Yeah, so that all amidst of that, and I began reading.

Will (08:25.684)
Yes.

Sally Douglas (08:42.582)
some people like Thomas Merton and, and I guess particularly Celtic kind of Christian side of things. So things were shifting, but I didn't know how quickly that was gonna move. Yeah.

Will (08:57.346)
Wow. It seems like those things, Celtic spirituality, Thomas Merton, the contemplatives and mystics, like they're just, they're having a fresh wave of rescuing people's faith, I would say, for a lot of people, right?

Sally Douglas (09:10.098)
Yeah, yeah absolutely, absolutely and I mean the cynical part of me was really excited about the contemplative because I knew no one could lie to me in the silence, like there was a kind of authenticity to that. I still think that's true, I mean well we actually know but we can still avoid God in the silence, like we can make the actual, the practice the idol rather than the actual

sinking into the stillness. Humans have the most incredible ways of avoiding contact with the living God. Like we'll use anything, whether it's the liturgy or rock bands or site, like we will use whatever it takes to try and avoid contact. Yeah, yeah.

Will (09:51.374)
That's so true. I've thought a lot about how often our religious expression, our churches, they do help us to keep God at bay. They're doing the exact opposite. It's not a statement of blame. I think like you're saying, it's a statement of human nature that there's so many ways that we can mask up and we can hide.

Sally Douglas (10:04.214)
Yeah, they do.

Sally Douglas (10:08.522)
No. Yeah.

Will (10:18.874)
And we can create very elaborate ways of doing all the right things, but also still running from the scary place of the stillness and silence, which is what you partly spoke about, you alluded to in the panel discussion, is that silence can be terrifying. It's a very confronting space. It's not for the faint of heart, is it?

Sally Douglas (10:18.903)
Yeah.

Sally Douglas (10:38.446)
No, it's not. And the analogy or the image that comes to me more recently is like, if there was a line of people, you know, walking in a queue and one stops, then people just bang into them, behind them. And if we stop all those things, the thoughts we run away from, the unattended wounds that we have, the legals we have with, you know, whoever part of our lives, it bangs into us. Like it will hit us, all the things. And so I think...

I think that in the same way that we all express love differently, you know, there's the love languages or whatever, or we all find joy in different ways, express sorrow in different ways, there will be different pre-practices that will connect with different people. But I think that being brave enough to begin to attend to the contemplative is so often the source, the location of...

deepest truth really, encounter with God and the way that happens can vary too. I think that's the other thing that we haven't, I feel like we've so, when I say we I just mean the whole church, of course the nominations, we've really failed people in not talking at length about prayer. I don't mean, or sometimes technique, but also just the honesty of sometimes it feels like there's nothing.

In the same way in friendships or other relationships there can be periods when you're kind of communicating but you're not going deep. You know, or sometimes what worked for you for a number of years in terms of a way of being open to the divine just dries up. And so then it becomes an invitation, well, rather than blaming yourself or thinking God is absent, so what could be the new prayer invitation in this period of my life?

because we are evolving. And so I think it makes complete sense that the ways in which we pray will or should, I don't like the word should very much, but we're invited to continue to evolve in those ways of prayer as well. Yeah.

Will (12:49.598)
Yes. Yeah, I think the expectations that people are given both around prayer and scripture really do set people up for disappointment, but then you have to hide the disappointment, because it's supposed to be just easy and natural and just pray and read the Bible. Like as a walk in the park when both of them can be brutal exercises and maybe if we did help people just to expect, hey, you're reading ancient literature from thousands of years ago, it's not like picking up, you know,

Sally Douglas (13:00.323)
Um, I

Sally Douglas (13:08.398)
Right.

Sally Douglas (13:16.215)
Yeah.

Will (13:19.478)
of Stephen King novel. And prayer, part of the transformative power of prayer is actually in, I think, the discomfort and in the wrestle and in the invitation of that. I'm interested, Sally, today you find yourself working both as a pastor as well as being kind of a theologian, scholar, and those aren't all. I have felt the frustration that there's

Sally Douglas (13:21.218)
Yeah.

Will (13:48.298)
between the academy and then the pulpit. And when I was a pastor and studying at Bible College at the same time, I would be reading about different theories of atonement or different views on things like, hang on a second, in most churches, people have no idea that there's even disagreement about this stuff. So how did you find yourself doing both of those, being both in the pastoral space and in the theological academic scholarly space, and how do you find that they interact?

Sally Douglas (13:48.472)
Yeah.

Sally Douglas (14:05.154)
Correct, I know.

Will (14:18.026)
Do you find it liberating to be able to bring that kind of academic knowledge into the actual pastoral space of people's lives?

Sally Douglas (14:26.686)
Yeah, beautiful question. I really resonate with what you're saying. I remember when I was, so after I had these experiences to a call to ministry, I was pretty shocked as you might not be surprised to hear. And I was teaching full time in Bromendo's, which is in a school which was I think the second most disadvantaged school in Victoria at the time. But I did as part of my period of discernment, which you have to do in the United Church, which is excellent, like at least a year of discerning whether the call is

ordained ministry or to something else do some formal study and so I was doing a subject at night coming into the city, my first formal biblical studies and so excited to learn, begin to learn things but also quite angry because I was like why has no one told me this? Like why I have, I attended, I mean I know I had been out of churches for much of my 20s but I, I had grown up in the church and so things like the word hamatea which is the Greek

The word for sin usually in the New Testament, it's a bow and arrow term and it means missing the mark. Now that shifts, I think, it expands our whole understanding of what sin might mean. What does it mean to miss the mark? What is the mark? And obviously from a Christian or maybe Jewish perspective, you know, I would argue loving God and loving neighbor. So what, and self, you know, loved over as self. And so that's just the whole conversation around what we think sin might be and how...

repent metanoimic turn around. I mean turning around from missing the mark sounds very different from repent from your sins. So I became incredibly passionate and then I did you know like you hear things like people don't want to hear Greek in the in the parish and blah blah. Well thankfully I didn't believe it and in my first parish placement it was a rural setting with six congregations, beautiful people many of whom had not finished high school.

they were just as interested as anybody else in hearing that. You know, the assumption that things have to be dumbed down for parish is so insulting to people, I think. It's tricky in the context of worship, you know, how do you make complex ideas accessible in 10 minutes or, you know, in a sermon? But there are other ways as well, like part of my practice in this current placement.

Sally Douglas (16:50.682)
inner-city placement and so people have all kinds of educational backgrounds from leaving high school before finishing to you know uni like really diverse but I regularly send out links to podcasts and articles and if I have a pastoral care time with someone it might end up with a recommendation to read a particular book or to follow up a particular podcast to explore some things like you know working with the assumption that people are really curious of not always but

very often and want to explore more in their own time. So how did I end up doing both? So I did my first placement in a rural setting and then did my PhD. I'd been encouraged to do my PhD straight after finishing my studies as a candidate and my masters but I wanted to be out again and so coming back after my first placement we had little ones and I wanted to be home with them.

but I also knew that I would need some intellectual stimulation. So I wanted to complete, and so the thing about parish ministry is you're always on call. Like there's an intensity to it that's quite, as you've known, like it's quite distinct from other vocational expressions. And I wanted to be able to just focus on these, we had twins, these little ones, and be home with them. And my partner wanted to go back to work, paid work, being home is work. So.

Will (18:13.984)
and

Sally Douglas (18:14.886)
Doing my PhD then worked for me because I made a commitment never to work when they were awake but I could study do my research and running every night and When they began kinder I was able to work when they were kinder and then My partner was able to go point eight or something. So I got a day You know, it was always a massive enterprise, but it worked for us and then after I finished that The call to Richmond

came and so then it's been this ongoing balance. So I, they wanted full-time, I said look I need to be 0.8 so that I can write and teach, which is what I've done. It's a lot, like it's an interesting, I would quite like a time turner so that I could be in more places at the one time, but it definitely enriches both. Like the questions that people come to me with in a parish setting are the

I'm not saying academic questions aren't real, but they're really pressing on the ground, raw questions, and I love that my academic work is infused with those kind of questions, you know, even if they're not explicit, they're in the background of my work. So it definitely infuses the academic work, and I think, well, the feedback is that in a parish that people really value the rigorous engagement with the biblical.

and theology. So I think they really nourish one another and I actually wish there was much more of it out there. I really, really wish.

Will (19:41.748)
Yeah

Sally Douglas (19:44.736)
I really appreciate it.

Will (19:44.81)
I think it's so helpful. You know, I think, uh, I worked in a full-time role for one year. It's the only time I worked in one job. Um, and since then I've done two or three things the whole time and it does have its own stresses and it does have its own, yeah, just extra layers of management, but whatever those two or three contexts are, it's amazing how they infuse in unique ways.

Sally Douglas (19:51.799)
Yep.

Yeah.

Sally Douglas (20:06.295)
Yeah.

Will (20:13.374)
and give you different ways of thinking. I think that's just true, even if people aren't in ministry, but just like across different sectors, seeing outside of your silo and being able to bring that perspective into other spaces is so valuable.

Sally Douglas (20:18.undefined)
What?

Sally Douglas (20:21.985)
Yeah.

Sally Douglas (20:25.69)
Oh, I completely agree. And there's a refining process about, you know, speaking clearly, like in this particular context, about speaking clearly, making complex things, except not dumbing them down, but making them accessible, stepping them out, being aware of... We were talking before about the Bible and how we read it. Not only is it complex and ancient and written in all different contexts, we also bring our own stuff to it.

And so that completely changes how we hear a text. And so being aware of the kinds, not all, but the kinds of lenses that people are bringing to the text, being constantly reminded of that is really helpful.

Will (20:52.866)
Yes.

Will (21:08.486)
Yeah, yeah, it's so true. I mean, I, you know, my view of the Bible has shifted over time, but I always thought even if the Bible was inerrant or whatever people want to put around it, which I definitely don't think it is, but you are errant. And so, you know, it doesn't matter whatever it is. It's just as much about learning to read you as it is reading the text. And that's, the magic actually happens in that space in between.

Sally Douglas (21:22.706)
Yeah.

Sally Douglas (21:28.853)
Ah!

Sally Douglas (21:33.462)
Absolutely.

Absolutely and sometimes the awfulness. So a few weeks ago the Sááin, we use in the United Church a lectionary cycle so it's often overlaps with the Anglican and Roman Catholic and possibly I don't know the Orthodox, so like a three-year cycle, a year on Matthew, a year on Luke and John's interspersed and so on and then different Old Testament and Psalms throughout. But a few weeks ago the Psalm was 139 which you know, you knew me before I was born and I can run the first way and you're there and you hand me.

But I began, before we explored it, by saying that this text will be landing really differently for different people. So if you have had...

If you have been brought up in contexts where God was to be feared, or you've had experiences where your trust in God has been smashed, or perhaps you've had relationships in which there was intimidation and so on, this could be a terrifying psalm. Like if you read it through that lens, it's actually chilling. I can't get away from you. You hem me in. You know my thoughts. Like it's quite correct.

Will (22:44.398)
Sounds like a stalker.

Sally Douglas (22:46.698)
If you read it through that, it is a stalker. And then I invite people to say, but if your experience of God, and we all change, our experiences of God change, as a loving parent who wants to scoop you up in her arms and comfort you and you hear the exact same words, you know my thoughts, you're with me, your hand is upon me, even if I go the furthest that you are there, like it's entirely different, entirely different experience and exactly the same words.

Will (23:18.027)
Yeah, it's.

Sally Douglas (23:18.677)
And that's just what we bring, let alone what the text is bringing.

Will (23:25.014)
Yeah, that's the work. That's the work. So I love that you do this work, Sally, of taking the kind of more, I guess, what could be the more complex ideas and trying to help present them in a clear way for all kinds of people. And if I'm correct, your most recent book, Jesus, Sophia, is not your first book about Jesus as kind of the expression of the feminine divine.

Was that your PhD or you wrote a book previously about some of this? Yep. But this one is probably more the more accessible, um, every, everyday person kind of, of book. Um, we spoke a bit about it during the Melbourne panel, but do you want to kind of just sketch out birds eye view, what the Jesus Sophia book is and what it's trying to do?

Sally Douglas (23:53.586)
Yeah, beautiful question.

Sally Douglas (24:14.942)
So the first book is, I think it's written in an accessible way but it's very footnote heavy as an academic text. So people are welcome to go there if they want to, but this new book came as a result of people continuing to ask me to speak or teach or write about this particular aspect. So my research began, so my research, as well as being a scholar-pastor, I also work in the fields of New Testament.

Biblical Studies and Theology, which is quite unusual in the Academy. Usually people stay in their line of just Biblical Studies or just Theology. But I did my PhD interdisciplinary way so that I could attend to the questions. Because often in Biblical Studies, what happens is this amazing engagement with the tech, which I adore, I kind of love, love. But then at the very end, it's like, this might have implications for our understanding of Jesus, but we don't have time to explore it. There's that kind of, not always, but often narrating.

And then often, and not always, but often in theology, my dear colleagues in theology, it is so removed from the biblical text that I struggle with that. So by doing my research across both, I was seeking to hold the tension. So the research began because I was really curious actually in the debates about who Jesus is. So the word, some people watching or listening will know the word Christology. It means understandings of Jesus' divine status.

And there are big debates that have been quite popular over the last, probably the last century, but they've been going since Jesus began ministry about is Jesus, was Jesus understood as divine in the very early church or was he made into a divine figure later on, just to put it in really broad brushstrokes. And I was, and so in more progressive circles, that second understanding of being made divine later on is quite popular.

and I wanted to go back to the sources myself and see what they say. And what is astonishing is that so far, I mean, there could be an archaeological find tomorrow, but so far the earliest evidence we have within the New Testament are these fragments which are quoted within letters by Paul and others. And we don't know if they were sung or prayed, like spoken, but they're evidence of liturgical...

Sally Douglas (26:39.058)
expressions. I like to think about it, this is the way different Jesus communities were loving Jesus, I think is a way of putting that. And I just love that they exist. So the Colossians hymn, in Colossians 1, in the image of the invisible God, the beginning of John's gospel, in the beginning was the word, but the dating of that text, like dating about John's gospel is heated and ongoing, but the beginning is part of a fragment is commonly recognised.

There's a little fragment at the start of Hebrews. The Philippians hymn is another one. And what's astonishing about these early fragments, so they're written before the letters are written, and they're well enough known that the authors feel confident to quote them without kind of explaining. Remember the letters were read out in communities, and so possibly people joined in at that point, either in song or word. We don't know, but it is, you know, when someone breaks into a song and everyone joins in, that kind of sense of it.

What's astonishing across these hymns is that the Christology is very high, like Jesus is understood an exceptionally high divine term. So it's not just that these communities are saying Jesus was raised, which would be pretty extraordinary on its own considering Jesus is executed by the state, but they also say all things came into being through this one. I mean...

This is the image of the invisible God. In this one, the fullness of God was pleased to dwell. These are extraordinary, extraordinary claims. In the beginning was the word, the word was with God and word was God, you know, extraordinary. And so that was the first part of it. Well, that's curious. But as I dived in more deeply, was astonished to discover that it's commonly recognized by biblical scholars that in those hymns, Jesus is being imaged as Sophia.

Holy Sophia, woman wisdom, this female divine figure who is present in the Old Testament. So she's featured significantly in Proverbs, but she's also in the wisdom of Solomon and Sirachim Baruch, this intertestamental text, which in the early churches, by many early church writers, considered part of sacred texts. And the qualities of Jesus and her overlap. So she's in the beginning with God. She delights in humanity in Proverbs. And...

Will (28:53.77)
Mm.

Sally Douglas (29:02.946)
different texts in Jewish tradition reflect her differently. So sometimes she's imaged as Torah, sometimes she's imaged as companion with God, sometimes she's imaged as God. Like it's actually very different communities reflect on her differently. And debates about why she's in these texts continue and I'm happy to talk about what I think about what's going on there.

To me it was astonishing to discover that all these Biblical scholars acknowledge that Jesus is being imaged as her, but very often as they do this they sublimate her in the acknowledgement. So they'll say things like, here Jesus is imaged as personified wisdom, which is true, but unless you know that personified wisdom is a female divine figure, you just glide over that, or she's referred to as it.

Will (29:51.148)
Mm.

Sally Douglas (29:54.486)
bizarre, which is always imaged as female in the Old Testament texts and inter-testamental texts. So my work was about uncovering these sources, going through them in quite significant detail, and then both, and then in the New Testament as well. So Jesus quotes Sophia in Luke's Gospel and Jesus speaks as Sophia in Matthew's Gospel and it's commonly recognised in John's Gospel throughout Jesus is imaged as Sophia. And Paul calls Jesus

Sophia of God, the wisdom of God. And early church writers explicitly say, when they're talking about the incarnation, Jesus is Sophia. And then quote from Proverbs. So Justin Martyr does that and Origen and others. So my work was around tracing the evidence, but then asking some questions like, why? Why would they be doing this? This is my first book. Why would they be doing this? And then why does it get suppressed? And what might it mean to engage with now? So that's that kind of book. The new book in shorter detail.

places the evidence because it's no, there's no point talking about it if people don't have a solid biblical grounding. Well particularly for Christians, like curious readers who are not Christians might not care about the biblical stuff but for Christians it's important for us to have the, have the evidence. So there's a chapter on the Old Testament evidence, a chapter on the New Testament evidence and then in this new book I explore some of the key overlapping themes that Jesus and Sophia share because this is where it gets really exciting and ask, so what might this mean for us?

how we live. So hospitality is integral for Sophia. She offers the bread and the wine. She prepares the feast like Jesus. She offers her own self to feast from like Jesus. So what does, so I trace the evidence but then explore the question. What does it mean that we might be called to be nourished, like literally, oh not literally, seriously nourished by God, like actually in our in our hungers and that we're then

actually called to be part of the nourishment of others, like literally go out and help in the nourishment. And what does it mean? What does it mean that so much of Jesus' ministry is over meals? And what does it mean that, so in the passage where Jesus speaks to Sophia and Matthew and quotes Sophia and Luke, it's in the context of him saying how people are slagging off on the Baptist because he's not eating and drinking, and they're slagging off him because he's got this

Sally Douglas (32:18.506)
me a glutton in a drum cube. Like what's the...

Will (32:20.782)
That's like one of my favorite verses in Scripture. I love that Jesus was called a drunkard and a glutton.

Sally Douglas (32:26.694)
Yeah, it's the best. And James Darn, a biblical scholar I've got a lot of time for, he argues that he thinks that probably original, as Ian goes back to the ministry of Jesus, because why would the writers include that? Like you just, if you're trying to say this is the God one, that's something you probably wouldn't invent. You know, this is a known reputation that Jesus has. So what does that mean for us, that the one we claim as the God one?

Will (32:42.293)
Yeah.

Sally Douglas (32:56.514)
for Christians is this feasting and friend-making one. What does that tell us about the character of God, like the texture of the divine? So the next chapter talks around about the critical place of friendship for both Sophia and Jesus, so in John's Gospel Jesus says you no longer slay the clue of friends and what it so what does it mean to take seriously that we're called into friendship with God?

And what does that mean for how we interact with others? Like, I think it's such an amazing shift to think of what if a core expression of discipleship is being friends with people, not trying to fix them.

Sally Douglas (33:39.675)
What does it mean as a core expression of discipleship and being church is to have feasts with people. Like to actually, not to serve them, but to be at the table next to the person you find a bit awkward or they don't like you, you know, and actually eat together. As a core expression of faithfulness. Like these are, I think it's been an amazing process to

I knew the themes I wanted to explore but it was amazing to dive into because I didn't have set conclusion, like to wrestle as I wrote. So the next chapter then talks about, and it was wild to do, the critical place of anger. So at the beginning of Proverbs, Sophia arrives on the scene, she calls out everyone, but then she quickly turns to anger. Like she is sick of people not listening. And then in the very famous and...

Will (34:14.741)
Do you?

Sally Douglas (34:36.429)
probably not loved, passage in Matthew 23 when it's woe to you, scribes and pharaohs is for this and that and so on. Jesus speaks to Sophia again in that passage and in the Lucan equivalent Jesus quotes Sophia. So what does it mean to think about divine anger? It's so unpopular for good reason in many progressive circles because you know the wrath of God has been used as a way to manipulate and intimidate people in many Christian institutions so I totally understand that.

reservation but if we think about anger in terms of justice and the to know that we are allowed to feel furious that um that people are being trafficked in Australia, furious that the Russian government has um targeted wheat supplies and then putting people at jeopardy you know and not only that we're allowed to feel furious but that

that God is, that she is furious as well.

Will (35:39.09)
It's also interesting that I'm sure that you've made this link before, but you know, a big problem people have with femininity, you know, is, yep, stay in your lane and don't be angry. There was that whole thing about, um, the tennis player, Ash Barty, um, you know, being an angry tennis player. And somehow that took away from her success as a female. She's not, she's not feminine enough. Ridiculous, but it's also like, I love the.

Sally Douglas (35:51.894)
and

Sally Douglas (36:00.642)
Yeah.

Will (36:07.17)
double problematizing here of like, okay, we've got this patriarchal male oriented set of images of God. We're going to problematize that by recovering the feminine, but also we're going to problematize these kind of very simplistic images of femininity that God can be the angry expression of divine femininity.

Sally Douglas (36:12.34)
Yeah.

Sally Douglas (36:24.436)
Exactly.

Sally Douglas (36:28.414)
Yeah, exactly, exactly. And that was amazing to stay with in that writing of that chapter. And I share a story quite early on actually about when I was teaching in Broadmeadows, I vividly remember this day. So most of my kids were from the Middle East, many from Iraq. And this was around the time of September. Like it was a pretty intense time in the global village.

And most of the kids were from non-English speaking backgrounds, but the kids that I taught were the ones who had just come to the country, like, had no English, or maybe yes, and not like, literally, they had an intensive language program before here in the mainstream. And some of the kids raced in this morning before school, so I had to let me know that one of the newer little, little girls, her toy had been taken from some, by some of the big kids in the mainstream part of the school.

and I hadn't had kids or anything at that time, but the level of mama bear fury that I felt, and I just remember pounding down the corridor and opening the door, and I yelled in the schoolyard, give it back. And I'm not a yeller, like it shocked me, and I remember the vice-president was walking past and he looked at me like, oh my goodness, I've never seen that. But this level of fierce anger about justice.

and the protection of the vulnerable. It was kind of primal. And if we can begin to think about what damage it does to us to suppress our anger when there is injustice, when we should be angry, and then how can we work with God to creatively use that anger in non-violent ways. So that chapter then goes on to talk about non-retaliatory ways of standing for justice. And I think very often it-

people from contexts who have experienced ongoing oppression who are our best teachers in this. So I talk about some of, um, astonishing civil rights leaders, for example, as one expression of that. Yeah, it is amazing. And then, and I think in the church, it's even worse too, that culture around women should be nice. Um, and, and not, and not just for women, it's fair. Like I think men have been, um, tended by that too, like this, we've mixed up.

Will (38:31.371)
Hmm.

Will (38:40.823)
Mm.

Sally Douglas (38:49.034)
our understandings of love and niceness or love and politeness. You know, love is being polite. Jesus is not polite. Jesus says some really harsh things to people and yet I would argue in love but it's a fierce love that is trying to get people to recognise their blindness or their participation in violence or corruption. Yeah, and in the final chapter, sorry, okay.

Will (39:13.89)
Yeah.

Will (39:17.23)
I could quickly give us a bit of the file type. Yeah.

Sally Douglas (39:17.834)
Yeah, I jumped. Yeah. So the final chapter looks at if we take seriously, and I'm always about let's take things seriously, so in those hymns, there's this incredible refrain and it's also a refrain in texts around Sophia, but in those Christian hymns it's all things are reconciled or all things came into life through this one or all things are infused with the light of God. If that's seriously true, like at the deepest heart of mystery,

Well then what does that tell us about our care for all things? It has to be integral, like it's not an optional extra. So the final chapter talks about, kind of traces the way in which Christian, some Christian voices have kind of read against the importance of creation and what it might mean to take seriously again that all things are infused with divine light and not only draw from

Sally Douglas (40:17.286)
more of the contemplative writers that recognise this. So Hildegard and some of the Celtic saints and also I draw from the work of an Indigenous uniting church theologian, Reverend Denise Tampion. So there's kind of travel through history, you know, through our ongoing path as humans and reflecting on this. And so taking, yeah, how we live today actually has implications, if we take seriously that whole thing.

Yeah, so that's the summary of the book. Yeah.

Will (40:49.462)
Beautiful. Such a good and important book and I hope people listening grab it and read it with other people and discuss it. I do want to talk a little bit more about some of those areas you brought up in a bit of deeper depth. But first, I just thought, you know, like one of the things that's kind of behind it all is the limitations of our metaphors when it comes to God and the fact that our metaphors can so easily become idolatrous.

Sally Douglas (41:03.862)
Yeah.

Sally Douglas (41:12.702)
Yeah.

Sally Douglas (41:18.039)
Yes.

Will (41:19.25)
And what you're really getting at is to recapture this sense of the fullness of God, which kind of actually transcends the gender categories or particular single singled out metaphors. In the opening pages of the book, you've got some lines there where you say the notion that the God who composed the universe is a man or must be addressed in male language reflects inadequate theology.

Sally Douglas (41:28.383)
Yeah.

Will (41:42.482)
Indeed, when the vastness of the universe is considered, the obsession with making God male is seen for the absurdity it is. What is more, for Christians, insistent male-only imaging of God makes a mockery of Trinitarian understandings, the mystery that we hold to that within God's self, God is in community, the Holy One, sacred three. So I wondered if you'd be happy to share a few more thoughts around, like the Trinity is, is a central location of the Divine Boys Club for a lot of people.

Sally Douglas (42:11.544)
Yes.

Will (42:11.722)
It could be possible that we just, we just rearrange the divine boys club to make it a bit more gender equitable. But even that is still limited and, and is not really honoring the, the full understanding of the Trinity as beyond these categories. I wondered if you'd be happy to share a bit about God and metaphor and gender and Trinity and a big stuff, but just.

Sally Douglas (42:32.718)
Oh, beautiful question. Yeah, beautiful. And I just follow on from what you think. I completely agree. And part of the awfulness of that kind of boys club reality is that many people, I think, kind of withdraw from thinking about the Trinity at all. Like it's either too hard. That can be part of it sometimes. But also but I think it's also this male. It feels like a boys club. And so what's the point? And

Oh my goodness, we have this like curious astonishing treasure which sets us apart. I mean, there's a lot of things to set apart Christians as quite distinct from other faith traditions for example that we claim that God walked among us in person. I mean, and that we have a person at the centre of our faith, Jesus, the Word, Holy Wisdom, rather than a book or a set of rules. I mean, that's all astonishing. But that we also claim that somehow within God, self, God, as in community, is incredible.

and in my own...

Sally Douglas (43:37.034)
journey and studies, like this was a really big issue for me because I had lots of questions about Trinity and I'm sure I came to some of that Boys Club baggage, like, well not even just baggage, like I just felt the male, emphasis on male language, male expressions for the Trinity were so alienating that it was difficult to even engage. But because I was studying, not at the private studio, but

preparing for ordination and would need to make promises in ordination about central faith in the Christian faith. I knew that I needed to be really clear and at ease, like confident and at ease with affirming the Trinity if I was going to go on to ordinate. I couldn't do it any other way and so it meant that it was an agonising period of time as I wrestled and wrestled and wrestled and I had the most wonderful lecturer.

who went on to be one of my PhD supervisors, Jan Gray. She was a sister of Mercy, unfortunately died a few years ago, but just astonishing and rich thought and introduced us into all kinds of thinkers, played music at the start of every week. But towards the end of that course, she proposed, and I found really compelling, that while early church writers in the New Testament don't have a full doctrine of the Trinity spelled out.

What we see are glimpses of them.

expressing their experience of God as Trinity. And for me that opened up a whole new door around taking seriously the place of experience. So for example when in Romans Paul talks about the spirit yearning with your spirit in words when you can't find the word and in leading you like through Christ we are adopted by the Father. So there is male language in that but the sense

Sally Douglas (45:35.51)
He's not saying when I experience this, he's saying we, like he's talking about collective shared experiences of being encountered by the Holy Spirit who is drawing them into deeper communion with Christ in whom they are experiencing the ground of our being. It's just incredible when you begin to really, instead of coming to the sacred texts, looking for doctrines or proof texts to actually take seriously for a moment, oh my goodness, they're claiming.

they're claiming that, well Ephesians does this prayer and in these other texts I love called One Clement, it's written by the church in Rome, back to the church in Rome, the eyes of our hearts have been opened, they're experiencing and so when, and the blessings of the love of God and the communion of the Holy Spirit, those expressions are coming out of their experiences. So that's the first thing I would say. And that it wasn't easy, it wasn't like, I know.

as a brand new religion, let's claim that this guy who was crucified by the state was raised and he's the God one. And on top of that, let's just claim that God is three and yet one. Like it's not like a logical, sensible way to go in terms of marketing. Like it comes out of experience because they have nothing else they can say, if that makes sense. So then...

Will (46:50.437)
I'm sorry.

Will (46:54.446)
And he's a drunkard and a glutton. They need a PR guy in there, right? Or PR gal. Yes.

Sally Douglas (46:56.759)
Yeah.

Sally Douglas (47:00.434)
I love it so badly. And everyone betrays him except the women. You know, like it's an astonishing story to be swept up into. So I think part of the work and maybe certainly not only my work, but part of my work has been to seek to offer faithful, biblically grounded expressions for how we might approach the Trinity that help hold the metaphor in larger ways. So for example, so in the book at the end of its chapter there's

prayer, there's wondering questions and then there's a prayer. So some of the naming of the Trinity that I use for example is ground of our being, water of life, fire of truth. So you think of the Spirit's presence in the Pentecost story, you know, ground of our being, water of life, fire of truth. So deeply biblical. Another one, being of light.

Will (47:45.134)
That's beautiful.

Will (47:51.755)
Yeah.

Sally Douglas (47:58.03)
Bread of life, breath of love. So again, deeply biblical, because I think that's really important, but hoping to expand it.

so that people can break free of that kind of prison of the thinking it's boys club or nothing.

Will (48:18.678)
Yeah, yeah. And I love that because even just adding more, like the more metaphors we add to the arsenal, and the scriptures are full of metaphors, and so many doctrines that become kind of problematic throughout history, it's because they attach themselves to one metaphor over all others. We can think about that with atonement. We can think about that, obviously, with these conceptions of what God is like. It's like...

Sally Douglas (48:27.191)
Oh, yeah.

Sally Douglas (48:39.73)
Yeah, yeah.

Will (48:47.834)
No, no, more metaphors rather than, than less. Um, yeah, you know, the Meister stuff, like God rid me of God, like, because any of these categories and containers, when they become the thing, they need to be shattered so that I can be reopened to the, you know, the mystery and the broadness of it all that goes beyond any of my categories.

Sally Douglas (48:49.966)
That's right. That's right.

Sally Douglas (49:03.76)
Yes.

Sally Douglas (49:10.739)
Yeah.

Because to even take our understanding of the Trinity, just to take it seriously for a moment, like it blows away all that idolatry of Santa on a cloud. It's not this lonely old man dispensing judgment. It's a God within God's office, within community and who's saying come to the table. There's a place for you. I mean, the other thing I would

say too about it that I've been thinking about in more recent years is if we are, this is a theological reflection, if we are actually made an image of God in some mysterious ways the first creation story says and God within God's self is in community, what does that tell us about ourselves? And I would argue that it tells us that we're made to be ourselves because part of a true

is not that God is like pink mush as in, you know, the people, the persons of the Trinity are interchangeable or, you know, they're all the same and they just have different expressions, that kind of heresy of modalism. So that we're made to be ourselves, like our actual eccentric, full people, but we are also made to be in community, to be in

reflexive loving, giving and receiving of love as the Trinity is. And I think that's a really good place to start a conversation about who we are as humans. You know, if we are made in the image of God and God within God's self is in community, then we are made to be ourselves and to be in community. So what is the challenge of that for us and the gift of that for us?

Will (51:02.538)
Yeah, it's funny, isn't it? Cause on the one hand, the Trinity is like the most paradoxical and confusing part of Christian tradition. On the other hand, it's like, that seems to make sense of the universe that we live in more than anything else, that there is kind of a oneness to all things, but there is a uniqueness and an individuality to things. And that both of those are true. It's like, it's like, that's like modern physics as much as it is ancient tradition.

Sally Douglas (51:28.475)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Will (51:31.834)
And so, yeah, it's weird, but man, you live in a weird universe. So like, get on board with it. I wanted to ask you, Sally, about, about the Bible because obviously you're passionate about the Bible and about the foundation that it creates. I've been having my own little frustrations with, with the Bible recently. And it kind of goes back to what I was saying at the beginning about that gap between the Academy and the everyday person.

Sally Douglas (51:35.178)
Yeah.

Sally Douglas (51:42.145)
Yeah.

Will (51:58.298)
And thinking about, so a few episodes back, I probably had a bit of a rant about how I kind of, it's almost like I want to find myself halfway between back when the Bible was only handled by the expert voices. And then printing press happens and everyone can get a copy of the Bible. And now there's like this expectation that everyone will become a little Bible expert. But

They're not. And the thing is someone like you, Sally, like you've done this brilliant work that takes time going into the history, going into the Greek, going into, you know, the layers and ordinary person is just flipping open their NIV at the table is not going to see all this divine feminine woman wisdom stuff that you're talking about.

Sally Douglas (52:37.172)
Yeah.

Sally Douglas (52:47.342)
Correct. Yeah.

Will (52:49.99)
And I just, I find myself going, so like, should everyone actually read the Bible or should we just get Sally to read the Bible for us? And I'd be interested in your, like at a, at a practical, like, you know, day-to-day level for people, what does this stuff look like if, if you're, if you're wanting to engage in a fresh way, but you approach the text and it just feels like it's so much work. Um, and, and it feels like it's, it's so inaccessible. Uh.

Sally Douglas (52:54.845)
No.

Sally Douglas (53:04.481)
Yeah.

Sally Douglas (53:14.187)
Yeah.

Sally Douglas (53:18.87)
Yeah.

Will (53:19.726)
know, what are your thoughts around just practically reading the Bible and seeing this stuff for every day kind of people?

Sally Douglas (53:26.286)
That's such a great question. And I think probably maybe it's harder for people who've grown up in the church to approach the text sometimes too, because it's not just that it's hard and from different contexts and different times, but we've been taught years of particular readings of it. So we're coming with quite a number of backpacks. So look, I actually think there can be time.

Will (53:51.004)
Yeah.

Sally Douglas (53:56.535)
So.

and I'll get directly to question in a second, but I think if someone's going through a particularly difficult time in their life, whether it's they've been through something horrendous or they're attending to trauma from their past, there can be times when the best thing to do is to have a break from reading the Bible, because if we're just gonna read it throughout trauma lens, we will be zooming in to find any passage which subconsciously, like we will notice the passages which reaffirm whatever we're already.

fearing, you know, or thinking. So I think there can be a faithful time to say this is not the time for me. But to that question about the complexity, it's so incredibly true.

There are some, well, a couple of responses and that I don't mean that people should do all of them, but here are a couple of thoughts. There are some gentle and good commentaries on the Gospels, which just might be helpful in opening up just a little bit of a taste of the complexity. There's a Jesuit biblical scholar based in Melbourne who's

renowned overseas as well, Brendan Byrne, and he wrote a little bit of BYRNE. He wrote a small accessible book for Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, and doesn't address every single passage but it certainly covers the themes and he's writing it thinking of people reading it in clergy but also parishioners, you know, and so I think it's a great, so something like that, just to have, if you're going to get one book, just a general book around, I mean, because you know.

Sally Douglas (55:38.946)
biblical books, like I remember when I first went to the theological library and I'd like mouth on the, like draw on the floor because you know there's books this thick on two chapters of Romans or you know like it's vast but you don't have to go there but even just have a little taste of the complexity If people are curious, the United Church in Melbourne actually offers a podcast called By the Well and I'm one of the co-hosts

Will (55:50.92)
Mm.

Sally Douglas (56:05.502)
I'm not on particularly often because I'm just doing too many other things, but it just looks at the four readings coming up for that following Sunday. And it doesn't come, what I love about it is that it's two people on each week, biblical scholars, mostly biblical scholars, sometimes theologians, it doesn't try and sum it up with, and therefore that's the answer. Like it's much more, this is the context, this is a bit more about the Abraham story, or this is, this is the context for this psalm, this is the part...

passage here in Philippines or whatever and I loved it. So then people can take it wherever they want to but just to have a taste and so it's called By the Well and it's free so that could be a resource. There are probably others too but I know that one the best. I have been diving, oh last year particularly I started diving back into Eugene Peterson's writing who he wrote the translation The Message but he writes other good books.

And his advice for clergy going out, but I think it's great advice for anybody really, is tomorrow read someone and the next day read some too. And without an agenda, like without pressure to then analyse it or relate to it or

pray, even pray with it, just read the Psalm and read right through and then when you're finished go back. And I've taken up that invitation over the last year and at times it's just like yep, okay we're here. But other times it's like particularly I've talked about anger before, tell you what, if you want a template for how to express anger to God, we've got it. The Psalms are, there are so many.

Will (57:57.204)
Hmm.

Sally Douglas (57:59.146)
And we miss it if we don't read the whole psalm and we don't read one after the other, like sometimes in churches the happy psalms are chosen or the pretty parts of the psalms, but that's a different way of engaging with the text than trying to analyse it, but just let it be. Let it be a prayer companion from another century. So that's another way. And then the other way I would really encourage people if they're wanting to.

engage differently, particularly I think in the Protestant tradition we've got so schlepped up into our heads into analysis, is through contemplative ways of praying. So there are some really beautiful practices and one of them is one of them is called imaginative prayer and that's where you and you can look online and you'll find resources.

If you just put in an imaginative prayer or imaginative composition in your search engine, you begin by becoming aware of what you desire, beautiful question, and letting God know. So it could be truth, it could be rest, it could be meaning, it could be healing. And then you read the passage, and it's usually a short passage, and it might be just...

Will (59:04.684)
Mm.

Sally Douglas (59:16.106)
usually gospel like so Jesus healing a particular person or speaking to Peter or whatever but then rather than analyzing it you imagine yourself in the same what does it smell like what does it look like what's the weather like who's there what does Jesus look like what is his face communicating where are you in this thing how does the person who's being healed look how do they react how do you react

And it's a process where you're not looking for the right answer. It's about actually trusting that the Spirit is present and will meet you where you are today. And it would be different if you do it tomorrow, even this afternoon, but you just allow yourself to be present. And it can be astonishing. It takes time and it's not always going to be amazing. It's not like a trick. It's a form of prayer which helps us to bring our whole being into prayer.

I think particularly in the post-audition where we have been so much focused on analysing or trying to extract the right meaning or the moral message, it can be a really helpful way of relearning how to approach the text. So I'm certainly not saying we shouldn't do the deep analysis, I love the deep analysis, but there are other ways as well. So finding out about them I think is really helpful.

Will (01:00:38.411)
Mm.

Will (01:00:44.002)
some great, great thoughts there. And I'm very grateful for the people like you, Sally, that are guides for the rest of us doing that important work. And I kind of feel like where I'm at is that, I guess it's one of the ways that I push back against the whole solar scriptura thing. It's just a thing I think is kind of ridiculous, but I'm like, even in this, it's like we need the scripture with community. We need the scripture with

good guides, we need the scripture in a whole range of different ways and in amongst other practices like that, contemplative practices, not just always analytic. And I think, you know, it's again, it's kind of a big part of what your work seems to be doing is liberating things to be more expansive and to be more free, to be experienced in their fullness.

Sally Douglas (01:01:20.94)
Yeah.

Will (01:01:38.11)
And I think that that's the same thing we kind of need to do, I guess, with, with scripture, just as much as with, with Trinity and with, with Jesus to go, look, you know, there's just so many different ways to engage with this. So many doors to come through, you know, stop stressing about whether or not you're, you're doing it the right way or getting the right result and maybe come a bit more with, yep, just, just curiosity and.

Sally Douglas (01:01:44.807)
Oh, exactly.

Sally Douglas (01:01:51.917)
Yeah.

Sally Douglas (01:01:59.255)
Yeah.

Will (01:02:06.494)
exploration and it comes back to what we spoke at the beginning about that self-awareness. You know, it's just as much about revealing. That's what's really wise what you said too around if you, if you know that your trauma is only going to be triggered by it at the moment and take a break. That's, that's a good self-awareness, but also we might, we might approach it and say, it's frustrating me and it's not so much about the words on the page. It's frustrating me for another reason that maybe is worth paying attention to.

Sally Douglas (01:02:17.886)
Um, yeah. Yeah.

Sally Douglas (01:02:35.116)
Yeah.

Will (01:02:35.51)
Because maybe that's the invitation. Maybe that's what spirit is saying to me. That's what Sophia is saying to me about let's sit with this frustration and maybe we work into action or maybe, maybe we, we surrender it. Um, but there's yeah. Invitation all the way through.

Sally Douglas (01:02:44.246)
Yeah.

Sally Douglas (01:02:50.012)
Exactly.

Sally Douglas (01:02:54.194)
Exactly, and I really want to affirm what you said about reading in community, but I think we are made to be in community and we are in danger when we start reading texts on our own of going into our own loopy lands, like into our own little cul-de-sacs, and so reading in community is really important and

I'll tell you what, if people are wanting to do, to get a full, like a full flavor, great thing to do is just read all of Mark's gospel in one sitting. Like get the whole flavor of, I mean, I love Mark's gospel, but it's the shortest, so it's also easier to read in one sitting. But we often focus in on the particular stories or passages that we either love or hate, rather than getting the full, a kind of full flavor taste. So that's another thing to do. And the other thing I'd say is,

Sometimes if we're in a community and everyone is just like, everyone might be very happy eating a very bland diet of biblical reflections or so on. So we need to find other friends and sometimes they're dead. Like we, so we find them in the communion of saints in the writings of people who've gone before us. And I, and you know, if we do believe in the communion of saints and I certainly do, then it's fine that sometimes our friends have died centuries ago. You know, that they can still be our companions on the way.

And so, like I remember just being astonished, like well, you know, we, Christians and contemporary context have these bizarre arguments about creation being literal. Origin, writing in the early church says, anyone who takes creation literally has completely missed the point. Like, completely missed the point. So we need to know that, we need to know that we are part of...

part of the community, in a sense, that we don't have to have all the answers ourselves, that we can go back and learn from others, as well as contemporaries. And there's a gift, there is such a gift in that.

Sally Douglas (01:04:56.758)
You know, the notion that the Bible is the word of God, I think, is heresy. Jesus is the word of God for us as Christians. The Bible holds, holds that proclamation, but that's the whole centre of our faith, is that Jesus is the word. And we could save ourselves so much agony if we could come to the text knowing that, you know, the Bible is in the United Church, in the basis of union, which is our foundation document.

Will (01:05:21.238)
Yeah.

Sally Douglas (01:05:26.434)
when we came into union, it describes the Bible as unique. So we can't just throw it out and preach from a poetry book. It's prophetic, it speaks of God's dreamings and it's apostolic, it has testimony to the risen Jesus. And within it, we hear the word of God, capital W, Jesus. And I just think that is such a helpful way of holding, well, far closer, in line with the early church's understanding.

and a helpful way for us then to come to the text and all its complexities and contradictions. And yeah.

Will (01:06:03.726)
So good. I'm on my way into the uniting church, Sally, and people like you just make me feel like I'm heading in the right direction. Thank you so much, Will. Yes, yes, I am aware of that too, and I'm seeing glimpses of that too, but I'm having more experiences at the moment of, ah, yes, there are other people that think along similar lines. That's a good thing.

Sally Douglas (01:06:08.554)
Well, okay. I mean, we're broken like everyone else, but yeah.

Will (01:06:33.142)
Um, I'm so grateful for your time and we'll wrap this up in a minute. I have two quick questions. One is I've actually had many more questions that maybe I'll ask you another time because you're brilliant and we didn't get to them, but a quick question that is not on my list of little discussion starters is on your wall there. You got an image of it appears like it's, it's black Jesus as mother, breastfeeding a child. Could you describe this to me? Cause it's just, um, I'm entranced by it. Tell me the story behind that.

Sally Douglas (01:06:35.926)
Yeah.

Sally Douglas (01:06:42.143)
Yeah.

Sally Douglas (01:06:56.655)
Yes.

Sally Douglas (01:07:00.866)
Do you want me to bring it over? I can bring it up.

Will (01:07:03.57)
Yes, but also describe it for people that are only listening to this. It's primarily audio, but it's just an image of God that I'm loving. Wow.

Sally Douglas (01:07:05.836)
Yeah.

Okay.

Sally Douglas (01:07:12.854)
It is astonishing, isn't it? So one of the people at the parish I serve is an artist. And this is several years ago, had been sharing with them the reality that in one pita, the author invites the community to imagine, talk about metaphors, imagine themselves breastfeeding from Jesus. So one pita chapter two, and if you, if people just think I've...

committed heresy in saying this. My academic article about this has just become open access in the last few weeks. So you can check it out. The first, the part of the title is newborn, nursing Jesus and newborns, newborn and nursing Jesus, something like that. But it's all got Sally Dove. Anyway, so this image is, the person who made this artwork for me knows that I love Ethiopian iconography very, very much. I'll say.

maybe slightly connected, love reggae music. But so they made this artwork of Jesus breastfeeding a baby and brought it to me. I know, I just wept when they brought it to me. And for this book, they made a fresh artwork based on this thing for this latest book, El Schmidt. So yeah, I feel incredibly honored to have this painting in my life. And it's the most incredible image to think about. What does it mean like?

Will (01:08:17.578)
It is stunning.

Will (01:08:37.175)
I love it.

Sally Douglas (01:08:40.718)
the author of one person says like newborn infants long for the spiritual milk if indeed you know the Lord tastes good. What does it mean to come to Jesus like newborn infants who are not placid let's be honest who are not um quiet you know people always pretend that children they're called to be like a baby or a child an infant is to be innocent or trusting well babies are trusting but they're also highly demanding can turn up a house upside down if they're hungry um

So what does it mean to take seriously that we're called to be like newborn infants who are longing to be fed? I think it means we can say to Jesus, I'm hungry, feed me and trust that we will be met. Yeah.

Will (01:09:22.462)
I love it. I also love that as an artwork that is actually presenting an image of God that is, that is masculine, feminine and transgender. And it's actually the fullness, the fullness of God captured in a really marvelous disruptive way. So shout out to your friend who's the artist who did that. Um, okay. Last question, Sally, which I ask everyone who comes on the podcast, just your

Sally Douglas (01:09:33.03)
Yeah.

Sally Douglas (01:09:45.588)
Yeah. Yes. Yeah.

Will (01:09:51.106)
final thoughts you would want to leave with people listening who are who are misfits who are potentially disoriented in the journey of faith or trying to just take it one day at a time. Obviously people are at all different stages but what would be the thing you would most want to leave with the listeners?

Sally Douglas (01:10:11.138)
that you're not alone. I think it can be easy to think that you're alone when you're challenging the community you're part of or you're feeling dislocated from it so that when you have the energy to seek out companions for the way and you might not agree with everything they say but companions whether it's in podcasts like this or in other podcasts or in writing

Sally Douglas (01:10:38.47)
and to know that the fierce love of God, she's loving you regardless of how you're feeling about her. Like so and she's patient.

Sally Douglas (01:10:52.51)
and longing to be friends but waiting as you need.

Will (01:10:59.938)
Beautiful. Thanks so much, Sally.