Spirit in Action

Guest host Robert Wolf of American Mosaic shares the poetry, prose, and voices of the homeless people he's worked with over the years. The voices are gritty and real, providing an honest glimpse of life most of us never see. In 1989 Robert started his writing workshops with the homeless of Nashville, and he's gone on to gather writings from all over the country, creating an American Mosaic, both book and radio program, part of Free River Press.

Minnesotans United for All Families is trying something new in their struggle for marriage equality - listening & telling personal stories - and it's working like nothing before has ever worked. Liz Oppenheimer & Jeanne Burns share their experience with "conversations" and Grant Stevensen, director of the Faith Dept. of Minnesotans United for All Families talks about the united effort of many walks of faith in opposing the proposed marriage amendment to the MN constitution

Glen Retief paints vivid pictures and addresses vital questions of identity & social justice in The Jack Bank: A Memoir of a South African Childhood. His stories deal with race, apartheid, homosexuality and homophobia, physical violence, sexual abuse - and much more - and he leads us on a journey of discovery and insight. And I learned that Post-Apartheid South Africa was the first country to protect the right of same-sex marriage.

Mel White is an eloquent, incisive, and compassionate voice exposing the lies of the Christian Right. This is something he knows from the inside, having ghost-written "autobiographies" for Pat Robertson, Jerry Falwell, and others, before he accepted his homosexualtity as a gift from God, rather than a sin to be obliterated.

Dan Dieterich is a founding member of ICE - Interfaith Community for the Earth, an organization formed to fight global warming and promote ecological well-beling. ICE is a member of Wisconsin Interfaith Power & Light. Working at the local level, ICE is a good example of how a small group of folks can harness their energy, in community, to bring about the big changes our world needs.

Dan Dieterich is a founding member of ICE - Interfaith Community for the Earth, an organization formed to fight global warming and promote ecological well-beling. ICE is a member of Wisconsin Interfaith Power & Light. Working at the local level, ICE is a good example of how a small group of folks can harness their energy, in community, to bring about the big changes our world needs.

Wendy Call spent 3 years with organizers in southern Mexico, the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, facing the threat of globalization in the form of a Megaproject to develop the area.

David Campbell, co-author of American Grace, speaks about the rise of non-religious affiliated "nones" in the USA, issues like abortion & same-sex marriage (and how they divide us), how the hippie 60's led to the rise of the Religious Right, and much more. With piercing insight, solid documentation & historical richness, American Grace is an invaluable resource to make sense of the religious world in the USA, and the political world it interacts with.

Noa Baum is an Israeli-born woman now living in the USA who has found her avocation in telling stories, who came to my attention through her one-woman story-telling show called A Land Twice Promised, about the personal stories of people vying for or sharing the land variously called Israel or Palestine. Stories can change hearts and find a way forward in places where argument is powerless or counterproductive, so Noa's very personal sharing may light for us a more peaceful way forward in a very troubled world.

The topic is the Transition Town movement and the experience of Steve Chase, Director of Advocacy for Social Justice and Sustainability at Antioch University New England and involved with the Keene, NH, transition, and Ruah Swennerfelt, former long-time long-time General Secretary of Quaker Earthcare Witness and is currently involved with the Transition Town implementation in Charlotte, VT.