The Loft LA - Progressive Christianity in Podcast Form

The Loft is a progressive Christian community that is unapologetically inclusive. If you're curious about what a socially and politically progressive Christianity looks like, this podcast is for you. This podcast is the edited audio from our weekly Sunday gathering of people who are interested in following Jesus’ spiritual path of radical compassion.

A Chorus of Generosity: Justice & Compassion 11/17/2025

A Chorus of Generosity: Justice & Compassion Our newly adopted mission statement reflects our core values of justice and compassion, which represent our public and private commitments to Christ-like acts of mercy. These values are rooted in the ancient wisdom of scripture, including teachings from Hebrew prophets and the life and witness of Jesus. This Sunday, we continue to focus on our congregation's mission and how the new community described by Isaiah invites each of us to be part of this community and its "Chorus of Generosity." www.TheLoftLA.org /episode/index/show/theloftla/id/39057925

Liturgies for Resisting Empire: Seeking Community, Belonging, and Peace in a Dehumanizing World 11/10/2025

Liturgies for Resisting Empire: Seeking Community, Belonging, and Peace in a Dehumanizing World This Sunday, we welcome guest preacher Kat Armas. Kat Armas is a Cuban American writer, speaker, and theologian from Miami, FL. She holds a ThM from Vanderbilt Divinity School, and a dual MDiv and MAT from Fuller Theological Seminary. Kat has spoken at seminaries, universities, and conferences nationwide and her work has appeared in the National Catholic Reporter—where one of her essays was shared by the pope!, Plough Magazine, The Christian Century, Christianity Today, Sojornours Magazine, and more. Kat currently lives on a small farm in middle Tennessee with her family—which includes her spouse, young children, chickens, goats, pigs, dogs, and cats. Her new book was released this week. Liturgies for Resisting Empire: Seeking Community, Belonging, and Peace in a Dehumanizing World examines the ideologies of empire that infiltrate daily life and offers a pathway toward liberation. Additionally, Pastor Molly will offer a reflection on our new mission statement, as well as an invitation to participate in our fall stewardship campaign. www.TheLoftLA.org /episode/index/show/theloftla/id/38974030

You Can’t Love Yourself Without Accepting Yourself 11/03/2025

You Can’t Love Yourself Without Accepting Yourself During the fourth and final week of The Seasons of Origins, we are invited to imagine together a more just church and a way forward toward such a church. Imagination is essential here, and one key doctrine that limits the Church's ability to envision what it can become is Original Sin. St. Augustine developed the doctrine of original sin, which claims that we are born “marked with sin.” However, through his transgressions of the Jewish purity codes, Jesus shows us that none of us is born contaminated. We will also be observing All Saints Day. We encourage you to bring photos or mementos of loved ones you remember on this occasion to set on the altar during worship; you can bring them up to the altar before or during the prelude. After worship, please reclaim your items to take them home. www.TheLoftLA.org /episode/index/show/theloftla/id/38888290

You Can’t Have Redemption Without Confession 10/26/2025

You Can’t Have Redemption Without Confession During the third week of The Season of Origins, we are invited to seek to repair past harms through justice-focused actions. Few harms have affected Christian communities as deeply as patriarchy. Women, children, and men have, and continue to suffer under the oppressive hierarchies that patriarchal thinking promotes. We invite you to join us this Sunday as we seek out new origin stories in the life and teachings of Jesus that can guide us in healing from the harms of patriarchy. www.TheLoftLA.org /episode/index/show/theloftla/id/38787220

You Can't Have Authority Without Accountability 10/20/2025

You Can't Have Authority Without Accountability During the second week of The Season of Origins, we are invited to name and lament the atrocities of the past and examine the role Christian theology played in justifying those past harms. As Angelinos, we can see the harmful effects of Manifest Destiny theology all around us. However, Jesus guides us toward a new way of relating to one another in the Gospels by constantly reminding us that the love of God should motivate us to be responsible to all people, not just those within our tribe. www.TheLoftLA.org /episode/index/show/theloftla/id/38639070

Just Because It’s In The Bible Doesn’t Make It Christian 10/12/2025

Just Because It’s In The Bible Doesn’t Make It Christian Accounts of violence in the Bible, like the story of Joshua's conquest of Canaan, have been used by Christians to theologically justify violence, genocide, and war. But are these the only or main stories we should rely on when thinking about how to engage with the world? During this first week of the Season of Origins, we are invited to seek out the liberative anti-oppressive counter-stories within the Bible and our Christian tradition. As Christians, if we are to heal our past harms, we commit ourselves to living like Christ. www.TheLoftLA.org /episode/index/show/theloftla/id/38557320

How Conversation Leads to Coalition Building 10/05/2025

How Conversation Leads to Coalition Building Conversation is at the heart of our gatherings in The Loft; it's how we worship. On this final Sunday of our Loft 101 series, we focus on a well-known story from John's gospel, where Jesus engages in a conversation with a Samaritan woman at Jacob's well. Deeply embedded in scripture, this story shows us a model for how conversation can be central to our community. Join us this Sunday as Rev. Dr. Carter is joined by Everest and Westley in the center as they discuss the importance and challenges of building a big-tent progressive Christian community. www.TheLoftLA.org /episode/index/show/theloftla/id/38473045

Practicing Self-Compassion 09/29/2025

Practicing Self-Compassion Compassion was fundamental to Jesus’ ministry and the primary lens through which he engaged his community. At The Loft, we strive to follow Jesus’ spiritual path of radical compassion and view compassion as one of our guiding values. We invite you to join us this Sunday as we explore why compassion is fundamental to our spiritual practices and essential for both inspiring and guiding our actions. www.TheLoftLA.org /episode/index/show/theloftla/id/38390785

Longing to Belong 09/22/2025

Longing to Belong In a world that rewards individualism, how valuable is community? At The Loft, we believe there is significant value in creating a culture of belongingness. This value is born out of our reading of the bible, where the importance of belonging is evident in the lives of the Israelites and the early Christian communities, who had communities that they belonged to, a homeplace where they were loved just for being themselves. We invite you to join us this Sunday as we explore the value of belonging with Marilyn Figueroa, an immigration lawyer and member of The Loft community, who will share her insight into the current situation we are facing with ICE and the Department of Homeland Security. www.TheLoftLA.org /episode/index/show/theloftla/id/38303115

Imagination & Reorder: Energizing The Prophetic Community 09/15/2025

Imagination & Reorder: Energizing The Prophetic Community While the dismantling of the old order began with Moses, and the prophets guided his people through their deconstruction and disorder, Jesus energized his community by teaching and practicing a new way to follow God. Jesus ushers in a new expression of the Mosaic tradition he inherited. Similarly, we are called to practice prophetic imagination, and by putting into practice what we hope for, we embody the prophetic energy, the Spirit of God, to do the work our souls must have. www.TheLoftLA.org /episode/index/show/theloftla/id/38220695

Compassion As Prophetic Criticism 09/08/2025

Compassion As Prophetic Criticism Jesus inherited and practiced his prophetic ministry from Moses, Isaiah, and Jeremiah, among others. Similar to his forerunners, he used prophetic criticism to critique a dominant religious and political culture that had become numb to suffering. However, Jesus' use of compassionate acts as a form of prophetic criticism was a notable shift in approach and one the church ought to mirror. www.TheLoftLA.org /episode/index/show/theloftla/id/38125600

From Despair to Hope: Isaiah & Prophetic Energizing Description 09/01/2025

From Despair to Hope: Isaiah & Prophetic Energizing Description Order - Disorder - Reorder. As our community navigates a time of disorder, the task of prophetic imagination and ministry is to cut through despair and to identify the dissatisfied coping mechanisms that seem endless and unresolved. The prophet Isaiah and those who wrote in his style demonstrate how prophetic communities use the language of amazement to energize their people and help them shift from despair to hope. www.TheLoftLA.org /episode/index/show/theloftla/id/38044945

The Worm & The Whale: Jonah and the Prophetic Imagination 08/25/2025

The Worm & The Whale: Jonah and the Prophetic Imagination Jonah is one of the minor prophets, famous for living in the belly of a big fish for three days and being angry at God. But what else does his story have to teach us? Come this Sunday to find out! We’re excited to welcome Everest Harvey, our Director of Youth and Social Justice Ministries to the Loft this Sunday while Rev. Dr. Carter is away. www.TheLoftLA.org /episode/index/show/theloftla/id/37945335

Jeremiah & Prophetic Criticizing 08/18/2025

Jeremiah & Prophetic Criticizing Jeremiah is rightly considered one of the major prophets. He is prominent in both the Hebrew Bible and quoted extensively by Jesus and the authors of the New Testament. While he is often misunderstood as a doomsday prophet, Jeremiah should be seen as someone who embodies the alternative consciousness of Moses in the face of a denying king. Jeremiah helps his community move from order to disorder through prophetic criticism, forcing them to see the suffering around them that they are trying to pretend does not exist. www.TheLoftLA.org /episode/index/show/theloftla/id/37858360

Moses - The Founding Prophet 08/11/2025

Moses - The Founding Prophet The radical break of Moses and Israel from the Egyptian Imperial system is the foundation upon which Christianity was built. The radical actions of Moses and the Israelites can hardly be overstated. In liberating his people, he guides his community through a Spiritual maturation process of order, disorder, and reordering. These three steps are guideposts for the prophetic decolonization that we see in the ministry of Jesus and what ought to be the ministry of the church. www.TheLoftLA.org /episode/index/show/theloftla/id/37758000

Creating Holy Disorder 08/07/2025

Creating Holy Disorder The task of the prophetic community is to nurture, nourish, and evoke an alternative orthodoxy — a consciousness that sees the world differently from the dominant cultures around them. However, the challenge we face is that the structures of the dominant culture are designed to numb you from feeling your own or others' suffering and from developing the ability to recognize that suffering. How do we resist the temptation to avoid feeling such pain? Amos shows us that seeing the world differently requires vulnerability. Only when we allow ourselves to be vulnerable can we share in and with the suffering of others and see the suffering of the world as God’s suffering. www.TheLoftLA.org /episode/index/show/theloftla/id/37655165

Queering Hope 08/07/2025

Queering Hope We invite you to join us as we welcome Rev. Kevin Wright who will be preaching in The Loft this Sunday while Dr. Carter is away. In his sermon Rev. Wright will explore what it looks like for marginalized communities, particularly queer communities, to have hope during a time like this. Rev. Kevin Kim Wright is an ordained elder in the Baltimore Washington Conference of the United Methodist Church. Currently, Rev. Kevin lives in Los Angeles and serves in an extension ministry appointment as Chief of Staff at Point Foundation, the nation's largest nonprofit scholarship provider for LGBTQ individuals. www.TheLoftLA.org /episode/index/show/theloftla/id/37575710

Hope In An Apocalyptic Era 07/14/2025

Hope In An Apocalyptic Era The biblical witness is a book of hope. From Abraham and Sarah through the Apostles, people of faith placed their hope in the promises of God and God’s covenant with them. However, when Jesus’ spiritual path of radical compassion became overshadowed by the Roman Empire, God’s work of redemption was increasingly pushed aside. Too many Christians have embraced a secular version of hope that depends on a mythical idea of human progress. But this is not the hope seen in the Israelite community of Moses or the disciples of Jesus. www.TheLoftLA.org /episode/index/show/theloftla/id/37397645

How Not to Be a Bystander 07/07/2025

How Not to Be a Bystander Injustice is making itself visible in the streets of our city. Are we prepared to act with compassion and wisdom? Have we rehearsed our responses in a way that is faithful to the ways of Jesus? Join Rev. Blair for a conversation on “How Not to Be a Bystander”, based on James 1:19-27. Rev. Blair Trygstad Stowe serves as our Public Theologian in Residence, which makes her a regular on our The Progressive Christians Podcast. She is an ordained Elder in the California Pacific Annual Conference; while completing a PhD from the Boston University School of Theology, she serves as the Assistant Dean of Co-curricular Development and Assistant Professor in the Practice of Ministry at the Claremont School of Theology. Rev. Blair and her husband, Andrew, as well as their children, Ansel and Ellory, are regulars at Westwood UMC, most frequently in The Loft. Dr. Carter will be away until July 9, while teaching a seminary cross-cultural immersion class in South Africa. www.TheLoftLA.org /episode/index/show/theloftla/id/37302105

Enfleshed 06/30/2025

Enfleshed In our final Sunday during Pride month, we look into Paul's letter to the Galatians, ready to liberate it from theologies and assumptions that have been used to devalue our bodies and lives, and find freedom in a gospel of embodiment and connection. Dr. Carter will be away until July 9, while teaching a seminary cross-cultural immersion class in South Africa. www.TheLoftLA.org /episode/index/show/theloftla/id/37215170

Queerly Beloved 06/23/2025

Queerly Beloved Small groups were essential in the creation and maintenance of The Methodist Church. They remain the bedrock of how we sustain connectedness in our increasingly post-religious society. For the members of the Westwood UMC Queer Group, it has been a balm for the soul. Please join Rev. Dr. Carter as he is joined in conversation with members of our Queer Group to discuss their faith journeys, the role our community has played in their journey, and where we need to continue to grow in order to continue becoming the unapologetically inclusive community we hope to be. www.TheLoftLA.org /episode/index/show/theloftla/id/37111540

TRANSubstantiation 06/16/2025

TRANSubstantiation Trans identity is more than just what pronouns you use. For Christians, trans identity pushes us to wrestle with what it means to be created in the image of God and the transformation that takes place every time we celebrate Holy Communion. Join Rev. Dr. Carter and Everest Harvey as they explore what it is about being trans that isn’t clicking for people. www.TheLoftLA.org /episode/index/show/theloftla/id/37023400

Never Consider Unclean What God Has Made Pure 06/09/2025

Never Consider Unclean What God Has Made Pure We sometimes forget that no Gentiles (i.e., non-Jewish folks) were present to receive the pouring out of the Holy Spirit during the first Pentecost. To be sure, eventually there would be Gentile followers of the Way of Jesus, and those Gentiles would be baptized with the fire of the Holy Spirit. The story of the Gentile Pentecost teaches us that, despite our perceptions of ourselves, we are not qualified to determine who is and isn’t welcome at God’s table. This Sunday, we are celebrating Youth Sunday in The Loft. The Grapple youth will participate in worship by leading prayer, reading scripture, and playing with the handbells. We are also excited that three of our graduating high school seniors, Oz, Lauren, and Will, will offer their reflections on the role that Westwood UMC has played in their lives. We hope that you can join us as we celebrate our amazing youth and youth leadership. www.TheLoftLA.org /episode/index/show/theloftla/id/36916140

Flesh That Needs Lovin' 06/02/2025

Flesh That Needs Lovin' That human beings are created in the image and likeness of God has been a fundamental theological pillar in the history of Christianity. However, who images God and to what degree do they reflect God’s image has been a consistent point of contention. In our current social and political moment, queer persons are now facing the same scrutiny over whether they image God in ways that mirror what Black, female, disabled, and other nonwhite bodies have, and still are, facing. So what do we Christians really mean when we say that human beings are created in the image of God? www.TheLoftLA.org /episode/index/show/theloftla/id/36822670

The Theo-Politics of Us and Them 05/26/2025

The Theo-Politics of Us and Them We are living through such a period of stark political polarization that the idea of a multi-racial, pluralistic democracy feels more like an idea than a tangible reality. Indeed, these are difficult, but not new times. Both the early Christian communities and those living with HIV/AIDS knew what it felt like to be cast as outsiders rather than members of their community. Is it possible to find healing and wholeness in the midst of such division? www.TheLoftLA.org /episode/index/show/theloftla/id/36709910

Grace, Redemption, & The Power of Letting Go 05/19/2025

Grace, Redemption, & The Power of Letting Go Life isn’t fair; this is a simple lesson that we learn in childhood. However, knowing that life isn’t fair doesn’t necessarily make responding to life’s unfairness any easier. How we respond to life’s unfairness shapes us in more ways than we often realize. We invite you to join us this Sunday as we explore how the biblical story of Joseph and the story of Jean Valjean from the musical Les Misérables show us how we can experience grace and redemption even when life has dealt us an unfair hand. www.TheLoftLA.org /episode/index/show/theloftla/id/36623905

Motherhood In America: No One Is Coming To Save Us 05/12/2025

Motherhood In America: No One Is Coming To Save Us At its best, being mothering a child is likely one of the most rewarding things someone can do. And yet, the systems of society, both old and new, can make being the kind of mother you may want to be feel impossible. On this Mother’s Day, Rev. Dr. Carter will be joined by Rev. Blair Triggstad-Stowe to discuss what we can learn about motherhood from the musical Into The Woods and the biblical story of Hannah. www.TheLoftLA.org /episode/index/show/theloftla/id/36532515

Celie & Esther: The Courage to Speak 05/05/2025

Celie & Esther: The Courage to Speak Celie is a young black woman growing up in rural Georgia in the early 20th century. Esther is a young queen and Jewish woman living under Persian colonialism around 450 BCE. Though they lived over two thousand years apart, their stories have unfortunate similarities that have stood the test of time. Patriarchy and sexism are not new, and yet what we see in their stories is that if you are faithful in an unfaithful world, you will find the voice that God has placed within you. www.TheLoftLA.org /episode/index/show/theloftla/id/36430900

Creation Care & The Wilderness Economy 04/28/2025

Creation Care & The Wilderness Economy This Sunday, we’re celebrating Earth Day by reflecting on and reimagining our relationship with the land. After their escape from slavery and bondage, the Israelites are given the opportunity to build new economies that run counter to the Imperial Domination System they had seen within the Egyptian Kingdom. Against this social background, the wilderness narrative reveals the struggle of a people charged with cultivating a radically different way of living in community on the land. www.TheLoftLA.org /episode/index/show/theloftla/id/36336250

The Kingdom of God 04/21/2025

The Kingdom of God Throughout his entire earthly ministry, Jesus taught his followers that the kingdom of God had arrived that and now was the time for them to choose which kingdom they would serve, God or humanity. That Jesus was crucified tells us that he was executed by the rulers of the Kingdom of Rome, and that he was resurrected tells us that he was vindicated by God. . We invite you to join our Loft community in the Sanctuary for an Easter Sunday Celebration featuring the Singers of Soul Gospel Choir as we reflect on the hope we find in the resurrection of Jesus. Children are welcome in The Loft gathering as Easter is an especially meaningful time to worship together. We will have kids worship activity kits that you can pick up on your way in, just in case they need a little distraction during worship. Additionally, there will be a kids area in the back of the sanctuary for those who need a little more space to wiggle or parents who want to sit on the floor with their kids. On-site childcare is also available for children from birth through age 4. www.TheLoftLA.org /episode/index/show/theloftla/id/36240860

The Loft LA - Progressive Christianity in Podcast Form

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