Materiality

What images come to mind when you think of the word ‘spirituality’? Hands folded in prayer? Light shining through a cloudy sky? A dog-eared and underlined Bible?

Theologian Walter Brueggemann thinks these sorts of images aren’t inappropriate—but definitely incomplete. He laments that Christian spirituality typically evokes otherworldly, individual, or mental images in us, rather than the mundane, everyday interactions of our lives. He suggests we try using the word ‘materiality’, signalling that our spiritual lives are deeply intertwined with the material realm, everything from money to food, place and time.

This summer we will be tracking with Bruggemann and this idea of materiality, following the chapters of his recent book, “Materiality as Resistance.”