Sallie McFague on Loving God and the World: in Memoriam

Dr. Sallie McFague is a theological legend, a pioneer feminist theologian, and one of the most powerful thinkers in my own theological development. We learned that she passed away this weekend. Over the course of the podcast I have had the honor of interviewing her twice and since hearing the news of her passing I have received a bunch of messages asking for the interviews themselves. After I found them I started listening and remembering how powerful they were. I knew that if anyone was interested in hearing the voice of this powerful theologian for themselves it should be as easy as possible. That is the main reason I started HBC years ago!!

While going back through the two episodes I decided to edit them together to make access easy. The biggest surprise I found was this amazing selection in which Dr. McFague reads the end of her last text. It is was moving then, but even more so now. I knew it needed to be shared on its own, so Elgin (11 year old son) created this little video.

Dr. McFague was the Distinguished Theologian in Residence at the Vancouver School of Theology in British Columbia, Canada. Prior she taught for thirty years at Vanderbilt University Divinity School. In the podcast we cover a lot of ground, including how Sallie became a theologian (which includes a kindergarten revelation), her focus on religious language, radical love, kenosis, panentheism, and even some member submitted questions, including:

1. How does her concept of wild spaces address privilege
2. In the revival of radical theology recently, how do you understand the reality of God?
3. Where should one start with feminist theology?
4. What do you think about the increased usage of the term Anthropocene?

And don’t forget to check out Sallie’s books, Blessed Are The Consumers and Models Of God. These two texts changed my mind in significant ways.