“I have no interest in inflicting damage or exacting retribution. Truth-telling, on the other hand, is essential. Sadly, truth-telling is now considered "demonizing" by those invested in the status quo.” TruthHonestySocial JusticeStatus QuoSocial ChangeRetributionTruth Telling Author:Jamie Arpin-Ricci
“That fact that someone can convincingly lie to themselves to uphold an untruth makes it no less dishonest. Or harmful.” TruthLyingHonestyLiesImpactIntentionHarmDishonesty Author:Jamie Arpin-Ricci
“The level of 'acceptable' dishonesty we Christians allow to avoid facing uncomfortable truths betrays our ideals as shallowly held.” TruthChristianityHonestyDishonestyShallowness Author:Jamie Arpin-Ricci
“You are not obligated to be an apologist for your life.” SelfTruthHonestyIdentityObligationAuthenticity Author:Jamie Arpin-Ricci
“If you think it is more important to be moral than loving, you probably don't understand what either word really means.” LoveTruthMoralMoralityGoodnessGoodLoving Author:Jamie Arpin-Ricci
“The prophetic voice only seems all the more loud when spoken amidst the deafening silence power demands.” TruthJusticeSilencePowerSocial JusticeInjusticePropheticProphets Author:Jamie Arpin-Ricci
“Sometimes the silence of God is simply Him waiting for us to accept what we already know to know right and true.” GodTruthPrayerSilenceAcceptanceTheology Author:Jamie Arpin-Ricci
“If your orthodoxy doesn't fully affirm compassion- if it is not, itself, deeply compassionate- then it is no orthodoxy at all.” TruthCompassionTheologyCompromiseBeliefsOrthodoxy Author:Jamie Arpin-Ricci
“From the very beginnings of our story as followers of Jesus, we have recognized and honoured the fundamental truth that every person is made in the image of God. Yet, while we are quick to celebrate those aspects of the divine image with which we personally relate, we all too quickly reject and denounce those that are different than ourselves as suspect or lesser than or sinful.” TruthJesusSinChristianityDivineTheologyImage Of GodConfirmation BiasNormativity Author:Jamie Arpin-Ricci
“From cave paintings depicting hunting grounds to the Babylonian tablets capturing the "whole world" (as they experienced it). Through the advancements of the Middle Ages, especially from Islamic scholars and Chinese cartographers. Massive strides came about with the Renaissance, as exploration and expansion abounded. Then on to the massive leaps to modern surveying and satellite imagery. The journey has been astonishing! I cannot help but think that this mirrors the path of our understanding of God and the world They created. Our sincere, yet limited perspectives began to expand as our experience and understanding grew. The reality of that which we sought to "map out" was (and is) often our best efforts, complicated by ignorance, limitations, bias, and more. We imperfectly stumble towards better, more honest representations. Even then, our growing understanding helps us see the limitations of our own attempts to bring meaning to that which is so much bigger than our capacity to fully understand. Just as we know that the Mercator projection map is deeply problematic and, in many ways, wildly incorrect, so too do so many of our understandings of the Divine often fail to meet our own standards. And in the same way, we also hold on to them because they are familiar and we are so deeply invested in them. And in the end, no matter how good and accurate and true our "maps" are, they will always and only ever be mere representations- pale reflections of a much grander, complex, and ever-changing reality.” GodTruthHumilityDivineTheologyMapsPhilosphyCartographyLimtations Author:Jamie Arpin-Ricci
“Hope must be tethered to accountability, shaped by memory, and measured not by the language of the powerful but by the lived reality of the marginalized.” TruthHopeLanguageJusticeSocial JusticeMemoryAccountabilityMarginalization Author:Jamie Arpin-Ricci
“Speaking truth to power about systemic injustice does not create disunity and division. In fact, it names the very disunity and division that we have failed to acknowledge and take accountability for.” TruthJusticeResponsibilityPowerUnityInjusticeAccountabilityDisunitySystemic Oppression Author:Jamie Arpin-Ricci
“An act of unconscious discrimination that is the result of social conditioning is still intentional if not conscious.” TruthJusticeResponsibilityAccountabilityIntentionalitySocial ConditioningDiscriminiation Author:Jamie Arpin-Ricci
“The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness could not colonize it.” LightTruthJesusDarknessColonialismColonizationColonial Author:Jamie Arpin-Ricci
“Truth-telling will always be a disruption to those who benefit from the lie.” TruthPoliticsPowerHonestyLiesActivismDishonestyDisruptionTruth Telling Author:Jamie Arpin-Ricci
“Change doesn’t begin by finding all the answers. It starts with asking the questions power works hardest to silence.” TruthChangeJusticeAnswersSilencePowerCuriosityActivismResistance Author:Jamie Arpin-Ricci
“Justice names both the wound and the weapon, even when they reside in the same person.” TruthJusticeResponsibilityTransformationSocial JusticeActivismAccountabilityReconciliationRestorationHealing Restorative Justice Author:Jamie Arpin-Ricci