When I was a child and into my high school years, I was made to say the "Pledge of Allegiance." This nationalistic pledge is still said in some schools today despite the fact that it is quite dangerous for anyone to say for a variety of reasons, which I will highlight below. For Christians, it …
Category: Theological reflections
Dear white people…
Dear white people, Hello, I'm Dillon, and if you're a white American, I am writing specifically to you. Like you, I am a white person in America. In fact, according to the two DNA tests I took a few years ago via Family Tree DNA, I am super-duper white. My test results showed that my …
Living Buddha, Living Christ
Recently, I had the opportunity to discuss a book that was seminal to my personal faith journey and deconstructing the fundamentalism I'd been a part of for multiple decades. The book is entitled, Living Buddha, Living Christ by Zen master Thich Naht Hanh. Join me and host Michelle Collins as we discuss orthopraxy, certitude, and …
Jubilee > Business as usual
Despite the dire warnings from public health officials and what is known from historians of earlier pandemics like the so-called "Spanish Flu" pandemic of one hundred years ago, there is a chorus of voices calling for states to reopen to economic activity. The current occupant of the White House has once again resorted to incendiary …
Podluck Podcast with Megan Westra
I recently recorded an episode of the Podlcuk Podcast with host Megan Westra. She graciously allowed me to get on a roll and once the train was moving, it was hard to stop. Click the link below to give it a listen. Going Golden with Dillon Naber Cruz
The Corona Apocalypse
Due to the Corona virus pandemic, the apocalypse is truly upon us, but not in the Left Behind series' way of misinterpreting scripture. Rather, the Corona apocalypse is revealing many aspects of the world we live in as they truly are. The word apocalypse means "unveiling" in its Biblical context and not some horrifying doomsday …
Grace in the time of Corona virus
This is a scary time and as someone with Complex PTSD, I am personally struggling with the stress and anxiety that the Corona virus pandemic is causing. It's hard to know whether to turn off the news and stay off of social media because it can be overwhelming to be inundated with the updates, or …
A Ruthian take down of purity culture?
Let's talk about sex.
Looking back and forward with eyes of grace.
It's that time of the year when we arbitrarily flip the calendar to a new year. This time we are also entering a new decade with what I hope is twenty-twenty vision - pun intended. As I look back on a decade fraught with emotionally eviscerating pain, I want to remind myself that there were …
Continue reading Looking back and forward with eyes of grace.
Mary started it: An Advent reflection
"Why are you making Jesus political?" "The social gospel proponents don't care about individual salvation, and that's what Jesus was all about." Interacting online is something that I do as a public theologian and I often see questions and statements like those above while perusing the internet. A major, if not THE major, theme of …
The Tattooed Theologian 