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Isaac Villegas

Pastor. Writer. Durham, NC resident. "The call of God's noncoercive love is for us to resist the violent powers of this world with our bodies."

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Words

“Transfigurations happen. Sometimes we get to witness them; most of the time we don’t. But we trust that God still loves this world. We believe that God still dazzles us with wonder, with the warmth of human care, earthly life transfigured with heaven.“
~ A Prison Cell Transfigured

  • A prison cell transfigured

    The Christian Century
    February 27, 2023
    Theology
  • A baby shower in a shelter

    The Christian Century
    December 14, 2022
    Theology
  • A liturgy in the borderlands

    The Christian Century
    October 14, 2022
    Theology
  • Guns and suicide

    The Christian Century
    August 25, 2022
    Theology
  • Spreadsheets and casseroles

    The Christian Century
    June 10, 2022
    Church Life
  • Mutual aid in an age of estrangement

    Sojourners
    April 12, 2022
    Church Life
  • Communion tears

    The Christian Century
    April 12, 2022
    Church Life
  • The witness of trees

    The Christian Century
    January 18, 2022
    Theology
  • Wounded life

    Conrad Grebel Review
    December 14, 2021
    Theology
  • Cross marks on the stable door

    Sojourners
    December 1, 2021
    Bible
  • Miguel’s Kitchen

    The Christian Century
    November 10, 2021
    Theology
  • We wait with God

    Sojourners
    November 1, 2021
    Bible
  • The waters remember

    The Christian Century
    October 20, 2021
    Theology
  • When Mennonites were settlers

    The Christian Century
    October 6, 2021
    Books
  • Words without knowledge

    Anabaptist World
    September 18, 2021
    Church Life
  • Estranged from empire

    Sojourners
    September 1, 2021
    Bible
  • God loves without reason

    Sojourners
    September 1, 2021
    Bible
  • Work, money, and my salary

    The Christian Century
    August 6, 2021
    Church Life
  • In the middle

    Sojourners
    July 12, 2021
    Bible
  • Everything made for love

    Sojourners
    May 28, 2021
    Bible
  • The Soil

    Anabaptist World
    May 28, 2021
    Bible
  • Emptying the tombs

    The Christian Century
    May 1, 2021
    Activism
  • The Spirit’s Nomadic Word

    Sojourners
    April 28, 2021
    Bible
  • What kind of Easter?

    Sojourners
    April 1, 2021
    Bible
  • The Sower

    Anabaptist World
    March 17, 2021
    Bible
  • Captive to sin, Healed for justice

    Sojourners
    March 1, 2021
    Bible
  • Consider the trees

    The Christian Century
    February 5, 2021
    Theology
  • The Rabbit Who Visits My Garden

    Sojourners
    February 1, 2021
    Bible
  • Incarnation means solidarity

    Sojourners
    January 1, 2021
    Bible
  • Politics of disgust

    The Christian Century
    December 14, 2020
    Theology
  • Borrowed language

    Anabaptist World
    December 11, 2020
    Theology
  • The Politics of Mary

    The Christian Century
    December 2, 2020
    Bible
  • Coneflowers

    Ruminate Magazine
    October 26, 2020
    Church Life
  • Who keeps us safe?

    The Christian Century
    September 9, 2020
    Activism
  • anti-violence

    The Mennonite Magazine
    July 30, 2020
    Theology
  • The mysteries of cloud and fire

    Leader Magazine
    June 29, 2020
  • Judgment

    The Christian Century
    June 9, 2020
    Church Life
  • A pastor’s pandemic diary

    The Christian Century
    May 20, 2020
    Church Life
  • The Ecclesial Ethics of John Howard Yoder’s Abuse

    Modern Theology
    May 11, 2020
    Peer-Reviewed
  • Christus Victor

    The Christian Century
    May 6, 2020
    Book Review
  • Tisha B’Av

    The Christian Century
    April 1, 2020
  • God of life

    The Christian Century
    February 14, 2020
    Reflections on the Lectionary
  • Transfiguration

    The Christian Century
    February 4, 2020
    Book Review
  • Epiphany

    The Christian Century
    January 29, 2020
    Reflections on the Lectionary
  • As-salaam alaikum

    The Christian Century
    January 3, 2020
  • What if we treated all of creation—plants and stars, soil and rivers—as our kin?

    The Christian Century
    December 27, 2019
    Book Review
  • The Labor of Incarnation

    The Mennonite Magazine
    December 1, 2019
  • La Frontera

    The Christian Century
    October 14, 2019
    Book Review
  • Tasting salvation during a fellowship meal at a maximum security prison

    The Christian Century
    September 19, 2019
  • When Death in the Desert is not an Accident

    Sojourners
    June 1, 2019
  • Then Solomon Took a Census of All the Aliens

    Religions
    March 26, 2019
    Peer-Reviewed
  • Intersectional Transgressions

    Anabaptist Witness
    November 2, 2018
  • The Gospel in Solentiname

    The Christian Century
    October 24, 2018
    Book Review
  • God’s love, our bodies

    The Christian Century
    July 13, 2018
  • Unconverted difference

    The Christian Century
    May 18, 2018
    Reflections on the Lectionary
  • Spiritual freedom in concrete form

    The Christian Century
    May 11, 2018
    Reflections on the Lectionary
  • Faith after ascension

    The Christian Century
    May 9, 2018
    Reflections on the Lectionary
  • Pentecost

    The Christian Century
    April 19, 2018
    Reflections on the Lectionary
  • Easter 7B

    The Christian Century
    April 17, 2018
    Reflections on the Lectionary
  • Ascension of the Lord

    The Christian Century
    April 10, 2018
    Reflections on the Lectionary
  • Marielle Franco and the crucifixion of love

    The Christian Century
    March 26, 2018
  • Holy Water, Holy Feet

    Commonweal
    March 16, 2018
  • Love notes and protests

    Scalawag Magazine
    December 5, 2017
  • White skin

    Scalawag Magazine
    September 26, 2017
  • Incarceration is a tomb

    The Christian Century
    September 13, 2017
  • Allah Loves Beauty

    Ruminate Magazine
    July 1, 2017
  • At the deathbed of a man who cared for others

    The Christian Century
    January 23, 2017
  • Amish wisdom and the calling of grace

    Faith & Leadership
    December 13, 2016
  • Wife and Wife

    Bearings Online
    October 24, 2016
  • A church for the kids: Why I still care about denominational politics

    The Christian Century
    October 10, 2016
  • Allowing holy second thoughts

    Faith & Leadership
    September 20, 2016
  • Know the world, know yourself

    The Christian Century
    August 15, 2016
    Book Review
  • Apocalyptic climate

    The Other Journal
    September 25, 2015
    Bible
  • Another Moses

    The Mennonite Magazine
    September 23, 2015
  • Two loves

    The Christian Century
    April 19, 2015
    Bible
  • Psalm 23

    The Christian Century
    April 14, 2015
    Bible
  • Burned in solidarity

    The Christian Century
    April 12, 2015
    Bible
  • Touch and see

    The Christian Century
    April 7, 2015
    Bible
  • Drones are demons

    The Mennonite Magazine
    January 23, 2015
    Theology
  • Sixth Extinction

    The Christian Century
    January 15, 2015
    Books
  • Exile and Return

    Anabaptist Witness
    April 1, 2014
    Books
  • a church of many identities

    Faith & Leadership
    May 20, 2013
    Church Life
  • One body, many voices

    Mennonite World Review
    April 15, 2013
    Books
  • church as prayer

    Vision: A Journal for Church and Theology
    April 1, 2013
    Theology
  • listening to prayers

    Faith & Leadership
    March 11, 2013
    Church Life
  • wounds of love

    The Mennonite Magazine
    March 1, 2013
    Bible
  • post-christendom or neo-christendom

    The Mennonite Magazine
    February 1, 2013
    Culture
  • Stability vs. Mobility

    Sojourners
    July 1, 2012
    Theology
  • Christendom isn’t dead

    Mennonite World Review
    June 11, 2012
    Culture
  • Change from above or below?

    Mennonite World Review
    May 28, 2012
    Book Review
  • A holy hybridity

    The Mennonite Magazine
    April 1, 2012
  • Led into leadership

    Faith & Leadership
    November 15, 2011
    Church Life
  • Forms and flows of the word

    The Other Journal
    October 15, 2011
    Theology
  • Life of the body

    Mennonite World Review
    January 17, 2011
    Church Life
  • I believe in the Holy Spirit

    The Mennonite Magazine
    May 1, 2010
    Church Life
  • The Anabaptist Prison

    Conrad Grebel Review
    January 1, 2010
    Theology
  • Roadside Jesus

    The Mennonite Magazine
    February 17, 2009
    Church Life
  • Radical ecumenism

    The Mennonite Magazine
    June 3, 2008
    Church Life

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